Legal Issues
Some companies shut down fangames as copyright infringements. The term foxed is often used to describe these incidents, stemming from the original coining of the term from 20th Century Fox's shut down of an Aliens-themed total conversion of Quake. Original copyright holders can order a cease and desist upon fangame projects, as by definition fangames are unauthorized uses of copyrighted property. Many fangames go as far as taking music and graphics directly from the original games.
A notable case in late 2005 involved Vivendi Universal shutting down a King's Quest fan project, King's Quest IX: Every Cloak Has a Silver Lining. It was to be an unofficial sequel granting closure to the series, which had its last release in 1998. After a letter-writing campaign and fan protests, Vivendi reversed its decision and gave permission for the game to be made.{ Conversely, fan protests for the shutting down of Chrono Resurrection (a remake demo of Chrono Trigger) in 2004 have yielded no result on Square Enix's action to block the project.
Other times, companies have endorsed fangames. For example, Capcom has featured Peter Sjöstrand's Mega Man 2.5D fangame in their community site more than once. More recently, Capcom Senior Vice President Christian Svennson has stated that, while they legally can't sanction fangames, they won't proactively go after them either.
Because fangames are developed with a relatively low budget, a fangame is rarely available on a console system; licensing fees are too prohibitive. However, homebrew fangames have occasionally made it onto consoles with prolific homebrew gaming, such as the Dreamcast, PlayStation Portable and Game Boy Advance.
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