Not to start a war, but the Shadowdark Facebook group I saw a link to a YouTube claiming Shadowdark “won” the OGL war.
First, you can never “win” open gaming. You can temporarily become dominant. If anyone has, it’s Paizo who often gets as much or more shelf space as D&D.
Second, while Shadowdark uses the 5e CC-BY SRD, but it contributes nothing to open gaming itself. It’s got a 3rd party license, and it’s fine enough, but that isn’t open gaming.
“I primarily produce game content of a mechanical nature (spells, magic items, etc.), with very little content that could be considered Product Identity. With so little to hold back as “mine,” it feels like my publishing strategy gets fewer protections under the ORC than others who have a higher percentage of non-mechanical material they can hold back for themselves. Is there a way I can designate more of my mechanical content as Product Identity?
I’m glad they spelled this out. By keeping Orc “viral,” they’ve created a license that is not going to suit everyone’s needs. I’m fine with that, although I don’t like the viral nature. I’m glad they spelled out what being viral means (although they didn’t use the term).