No One Lives Forever Rights Vanish Into The Night

[LordMonty]

That sounds a bit crazy, but also quite funny that such things can be misplaced hope someone just say's 'its mine!' and runs off and makes a new one and re-releases the old ones.

 

[Dr.Awkward]

Well, even if the rights are lost, they might be able to make the games available again. They just won't be able to put a price on it. (And to be honest, there's a point where you should no longer live on the successes of your past...)

 

[Adam Jensen_v1legacy]

Well, in that case I hereby claim the rights and all of it's riches for myself.

 

[devilmore]

So long as they don't give the license to Team Ninja who then turn the main protagonist into a whiny submissive *****...

 

[Slash2x]

So... If I would, hypothetically speaking, pirate NOLF now, who would I be stealing it away from?

Apparently nobody.

but he would still be stealing the profits from that nobody!



it doesn't need to make sense when it comes down to laws.



OT: I remember playing NOLF a while back. I couldn't get into it sadly.

Still have to ask though, how the hell do you lose Rights for an IP in the first place?

wouldn't the people that set up the copyright in the first place have a copy of it? Do they just print out a small scrap of paper that says "ORIGINAL CONTENT, DO NOT STEAL" and be done with it?

Im thinking its less "who owns the IP", instead its more like "do we really want to re-release this game?"

If nobody has the rights to the software then it is abandonware and free game for download. There are websites that legally let you download software that is public domain. Just like you can download certain books that nobody has the rights for too.

Also I have the rights to the game and I will be starting a kickstarter with a 10 Million goal soon....

 

[wulfgar_red]

let it rest in rest in peace.
i don't want to see it desecrated with DLCs, microtransactions, "made for all apes" approach, quick time events, michael bay style and bethesda writing.

 

[Deathlyphil]

Pretty sure I still have my copy somewhere. I tend not to throw out pc games.

I never quite got all the hype about it though. It was fun, quirky, very Austin-Powers 60s psychedelia, but ultimately an average experience that I never finished, and never looked twice at the sequel.

 

[Shakura Jolithion]

Owning both the original and the sequel (though not the xpac for the sequel), I feel special. That being said, I have to wonder about checking with whatever government agency runs copyrights, as someone suggested earlier. Surely there's records there or in some other form of who sold what to whom? Also, both companies should probably do an internal search for the rights to find them...

 

[Kuredan]

NOLF and its sequel are among my most favorite games of all time. I still have physical copies of the games (The original NOLF had a great lounge soundtrack with the game) but I would love to get those games on a cloud and optimized for the latest operating system.

NOLF2 was the first game I immediately replayed once I had finished. There were so many cool locations and "RPG" elements made it fun to play though in different styles.

 

[Entitled]

So first 10 years are free, it'll then cost you $100 to go to 20, then another $400 to go to 30, then another $900 to go to 40, and so on. So those properties which are really important to certain companies.. like the mouse to Disney, they can continue to hold on to without dragging absolutely everything with them. But by the time you're renewing to get up to 80 years protection (which is comparable to now), it's cost $14,000 for the privilege, and jumps to nearly 30,000 by the time you get to a century's worth of protection. Which is probably less than they've spent on lawyers by now but that money would all be going into the public purse compensate for allowing them the exclusive rights.

Horrible idea.

Well, not as horrible as the current system, but still. There are some IPs that are worth billions of dollars, no matter how highly you set up the initial tax, these would be the ones that would end up under corporate control for hundreds of years, while private artist couldn't keep their personal work for even their lifespan.

Even thought the biggest products, the ones that define our popular culture, are exactly the ones that the public has the most interest in owning as soon as possible.

If anything, a copyright system that truly cares about progress for "The Useful Arts", should give disproportionate protection for the little works that are indeed sttruggling to make a profit under the current system, and drop the most profitable ones into public domain as soon as possible (5-15 years), along with abandonware and any other no-longer-published work.

 

[Lt. Rocky]

Is it possible Warner Bros Interactive has the rights? Monolith Productions never had the secured rights to make an official sequal to F.E.A.R. as a result of becoming a subsidary of WB (You may recall FEAR 2: Project Origin used to be simply called Project Origin) until the publisher did some IP shopping when Vivendi was offering and bought the rights from them. Maybe WB also bought the rights to NOLF.

 

[Johnson McGee]

I'm very surprised that there isn't a law that says the rights either become public domain or default back to the developer in this instance.

 

[Davroth]

I'd buy an HD remake of that game in a heartbeat. The writing is hilarious, and the gameplay in really fun and varied.

I guess we wont see any of the like until they find out who owns it, though. xD

 

[cikame]

Can i claim ownership of the rights to NOLF?
Super bizarre situation, as soon as it's sorted i wouldn't mind playing a Steam release of the 2nd game.

 

[antidonkey]

I really enjoyed NOLF 1 & 2. Fun games with a great sense of humor. I always hung around guards when being all sneaky just to hear their conversations. I also still have my copies on CD and am glad of that now. It would sweet if the games went public domain and GoG could just give copies away as bonuses or gifts for long time users.