I want to learn more about developing a game so I've been searching for opinons on asset flipping (not copying and pasting someone's prebuild demo game to call your own).

I'd really like to open a safe discussion (no trolling) and get other developers' and gamers'  opinions on this mostly negative subject as not every developer team  have the years to devote to building their own assets or funds to pay for an artist.

Brief Story
I'm currently the only artist on an indie game of a 3 man team and we're using Unity. I've spent the last 9 months modeling (Maya) and texturing (Substance Painter) every game asset (everything is unpaid), plus all marketing/promotional materials (Photoshop, Premier, After Effects) on top of working a regular job. I rarely go out anymore, I stopped streaming, and I rarely play games like I used to so I can complete my tasks.

I'd like to make a side game to learn more about developing a game (mechanics/level design) but don't have the necessary "years" to model / rig / animate characters or environment assets to build a full game. I have however found full environment packages and characters from the same artist that I'd like to purchase from their website and use but being fully transparent about using them.

Maybe once the team finishes our feature indie game, I could go back to this project and replace all the assets.

Please be respectful to each other and share your opinions.

There's nothing wrong with using premade assets if you get them legally and morally. I don't think that even counts as asset flipping. Making games is hard and time consuming, it's only natural to make your work easier when possible. Many of my own games are made with free culture assets. Heck, one of them was inspired by the assets in question, and wouldn't exist without them. I make a point of crediting the author even when the license doesn't require it, and that's that. Besides, many creators sell their assets on marketplaces like Itch.io precisely so that other people don't have to make their own. It's common, accepted practice, and mutually beneficial.

Now, I hear some people grab assets from wherever, sometimes even example games for various engines, that were never meant to be reused, and pass them off as their own. That's not nice at all, and counts as plagiarism at best if not copyright infringement. What to do isn't an easy question however, and care must be taken not to accuse someone unjustly.

There's nothing wrong with what you're planning to do - building a game using assets you're paying for is pretty common, and as has been said above that's exactly why the asset marketplace exists. We did it in one of our own projects by paying for a set of character portrait images because we couldn't achieve the art style we wanted with the skills we had available on our team, and thought nothing of it. We'd have needed to spend a lot more to commission and brief an artist, so buying stock assets made much more sense to our project budget.

You can also make use of free assets that people have made (with the correct usage rights), and if you give them a shoutout in your credits or social media then everyone's a winner! Good luck with your project!

As long as your not PURELY using pre-made assets i think your okay, Jim Sterling made a few videos on it, probably should check it out

These might help you.

~ Star

Thank you all for your opinons. I've read through blogs, watched Jim Sterling and BigFry videos, but was still unsure how "frowned" upon it was. The packages I plan on using all match each other as it's from the same artist but level design and game play mechanics will all be created. But alas, I don't feel as bad for dropping a bunch of money on really good assets.