These guidelines are to help the members of our modding community understand how to use our tools and share mods responsibly, respecting each other, as well as us.  They don’t supersede or replace our End User Licence Agreement (which you can find here: [EULA] which will take precedence if there are any conflicts between that EULA and these guidelines. We welcome feedback, and if you have any questions, or think these modding guidelines could be improved, please do let us know at info@axolotgames.se.

First things first!
We (and our fellow gamers) won’t tolerate any mods, posts, or other material, which:

• Is unlawful or gives rise to civil or criminal liability;

• Infringes the intellectual property rights of any third party;

• Is technically harmful such as computer viruses, worms, malicious software or harmful data;

• Is abusive, offensive, sexist, pornographic, homophobic, defamatory, libellous, discriminatory, obscene or racist, or which harasses any person;

• May be deemed a marketing or commercial communication or promotes the products or services of any person (Scrap Mechanic is not an advertising network!);

• Contains any restricted material, including but not limited to passwords, medical information or confidential information of any person; or

• Solicits, promotes, invites, encourages, advocates, incites or provokes any of the above.

When using the game, our modding tools, forums and other channels, you agree to conduct yourself in a way which is lawful, respectful, and which won’t cause harm to the Scrap Mechanic community. If your content or conduct doesn’t comply with these guidelines or our EULA, or if we need to take action to protect our rights or those of others, we may remove, restrict, suspend or alter your access to the game or tools, and your mods or other content. If you see anything which you think contravenes these guidelines or our EULA, or is otherwise objectionable please let us know at info@axolotgames.se.

Ownership

If you create a mod from scratch, you will own the rights in it.  If you decide to incorporate anything belonging to a third party (and that includes copying the actual model, script and other files you might find, and also re-creating their work yourself) then you should speak to them first and obtain their permission and this may mean that you do not own the mod.

If you would like to include existing content from Scrap Mechanic in your mods, for example by tweaking existing parts or features we’ve created, then we are happy for you to do so.  However, you can’t copy or share the game itself.  If someone wants to use your mod, they will need to own a copy of Scrap Mechanic themselves.

Just as we are happy for you to make tweaks to the ideas we’ve had for the game (provided that your mods comply with the rest of these guidelines and our EULA) we ask that you let us take inspiration from your own work.  So in exchange for us letting you use our tools or produce mods for the game, you grant us a perpetual licence to use, adapt and share that work as part of Scrap Mechanic or associated merchandise, commercially or otherwise.

If you are concerned and think we’ve copied your work in the game, please get in touch with us before suggesting you were responsible for it.  Sometimes people have similar ideas at similar times, without copying each other, and we also like to think we’re on the same wavelength as our gamers.  We’ll try to let you know if we took inspiration from your work.  If we do, we may get in touch with you first and if it’s appropriate we’ll try to find a way to give you credit.  Please note, we spend a whole lot of time creating new parts and features, and we can’t respond to all questions.

Although we created the game, and let you use our tools and parts from the game to create your own mods (in accordance with these guidelines and our EULA), we don’t expect to take credit for your mods, even where they are built on top of our work.

Quality control

When creating mods, here are a few guidelines to bear in mind:

• Try to include an informative thumbnail, title and description for your mods, so other mechanics can understand what they do;

• Test your mods carefully before you share them, so other mechanics don’t get frustrated by bugs or other problems;

• Avoid duplication by replacing earlier versions of your mods with updates rather than publishing multiple copies;

• If you want to use someone else’s mod as a starting point, make sure you get their permission first;

• Don’t interfere with other mechanics’ enjoyment of the game, and try to ensure your mods can be enjoyed by as many mechanics as possible - if they need heaps of memory and a powerful rig to use the mod, let them know.
  
  

Thanks for reading!