I am an aspiring hobbyist game developer who has yet to break ground on their first project, so this is all very speculative and might not actually go anywhere. To cut my teeth I want to make a PC port of one of my favourite board games, A Feast for Odin. Now, I am not a lawyer and I have only put a rather small amount of time into researching this topic, but by my layman’s understanding of copyright law (I live in Canada for reference) game mechanics are not protected by copyright, and I might be in the clear to distribute this project if I use only the very basic design building blocks of the source material and supply the rest of the program with my own work.
Ultimately, I’m not really looking for feedback on if this plan violates anyone’s copyright. If Z-Man Games Inc or whoever holds the copyright for A Feast for Odin in Canada comes after me then so be it, I won’t bother fighting a DMCA takedown. My question is if this project violates either the terms of service of Itch.io or the Quality Guidelines point I mentioned in the title. I do not intend to use any of the source material’s names, logos, or branding. I do not intend to create a product that could mislead anyone into believing they are playing A Feast for Odin in actuality. What I do intend to do is create a product that mimics specifically the functionality of another creator’s work without permission. My question is: does that section of the Quality Guidelines refer specifically to other creators on Itch.io, or does it mean anyone who’s produced a creative work? And as a followup question, if I do end up creating this program and it is deemed to not adhere to the Itch quality guidelines by a moderator due to the aforementioned mimicry, is it possible that they may remove the project from Itch.io altogether? I know the quality guidelines don’t mention the possibility, saying only that the project may be unlisted from the discovery index, but I’d like explicit confirmation.
I’m asking all this ahead of time because it is relevant to the scope of the project I choose to undertake. If I can’t publish here I’ll probably just rip the assets from game directly and make myself a toy for my own enjoyment, save myself the extensive visual design and re-imagining that a debranding/reflavouring would require. I do think it would be worth the work if I could use this platform to get audience feedback on things like the UI design that I’ll be doing myself one way or the other.