I like to think of pokeball’s like Genie’s Lamps. Well it beats the alternative of thinking of this poor little creature trapped in a ball.
Interesting to see someone else working on a fan game using ChoiceScript. I’m writing one myself, although based on a different IP, and here’s what little I know from that:
As far as I know, fan games are similar to other fan works (art, fiction, cosplay) - they exist largely at the pleasure of the original copyright owner. I think it’s safe to assume that if lots of other people produce and circulate fan works without getting cease-and-desist notices, then you should be okay in the eyes of the copyright owner. In my case, a number of other fans have already made fan games and mods related to the IP my game is based on, so I’m reasonably sure the original creators don’t object. (As I understand it, however, actually taking parts of the original works - like sprites or music ripped from a Pokemon game - and redistributing them in your game would be more likely to count as copyright violation/piracy, so not a good idea to do that.)
I’ve read the license included with ChoiceScript, and it doesn’t contain anything that seems to exclude the engine from being used to create fan works, so I think you’d be okay there. Whether or not CoG the company would allow you to circulate fan works on their forums is a whole different question and may or may not have anything to do with the legality of your work.
Personally, I plan on posting my game to a couple of fan sites and the official boards for the work it’s based on, since its audience would really be fellow fans and that’s where they hang out. Not sure I’ll post it on the CoG forums at all, since they seem to be mostly for WIP hosted games.