The Ur-Quan Masters Discussion Forum

Seeing things like UQM and DOSbox has really gotten my wheels spinning lately.  For a long time, the hobby has been parting ways with "old duffers" like me (39!).  More and more, new stuff I've tried sits on the shelf, and I find myself wishing for another round of games from 10+ years ago.   No matter what a person's tastes are, I think everyone who's played long enough remembers Master of Orion, Warlords, X-Com, and a good double handful of true classics from the 80's and 90's.

I firmly believe that a company could make good $$ just scooping up old classics, either buying the rights cheap or just going with public domain material like UQM did.   They could update the graphics, do what's needed to run them on modern rigs, and put them out to buy- basically unchanged from the original.  Sure, the payoff wouldn't be a dump truck full of cash, but you wouldn't have to lay out tens of millions to do it either, as is required for a modern A list title..

But what do I know, I'm just an old, unhip game geek.  Yesterday's news.  It's all about MMORPGS, RTS, and action action, action!  What a silly git I am, to still want to mess with turn based strategy, or a good (even turn based!) rpg.  (Sigh).  It's a shame.  Guess I'll just have to take up golf or fishing, some kind of "grown up" hobby....

The answer to that is easy.

Gaming companies from 10+ years ago have gone defunct and the rights to those games have been eaten up by larger corporations such as Infogrames or EA. Such mega-corps sit on the copyright licenses for such games and refuse to budge on them for any price in the vague hope that they might revive it later.

I would elaborate further but I have to get back to work. That should cover most bases though.

Yeah, I'm not shocked, I've even heard of this in a couple of specific cases.  But it sure isn't the answer I'd hoped for.  Even if those big mass market monstrosities DO get around to reviving stuff, it probably isn't going to be anything I'd like.  grr...

Yes, but I haven't those games that are given on legal abandonware sites lost their copyright? I know a site that really gives only those games that aren't ESA protected, meaning that aren't sold anyomore. Anyway, I thought that there's a specific time after wich you loose copyright. But, I'm not an expert so don't blame me if I'm wrong about legality.

In most countries in North American and Europe, copyrights expire several decades after the death of the author (or about 100 years after publication if the creator is a corporation). This essentially means that, in the US and most European countries, the copyright has not expired on a single computer game and will not do so for many years.

Abandonware sites are, with the exception of those few that distribute only with the copyright holder's permission, heavily engaged in copyright violation. Most of these sites get away with it by being situated somewhere with lax copyright laws or law enforcement, removing games as soon as the copyright holder complains and/or keeping a low profile.

Personally, I feel that copyright law should be modified to allow access to works that are no longer being distributed. One way to do this would be to allow anyone to produce and distribute copies of a work as long as the copyright holder is reimbursed (e.g. by enforcing a copying tariff). On the plus side, this allows copyright holders to make a profit without doing anything. The problem with this idea is the business infrastructure necessary to collect payments and distribute them to copyright holders (in practice, a government-run agency would have to handle this).

A simpler idea, albeit less palatable from the business point of view, would be to drastically decrease the time until a copyright expires (e.g. to 15 years). This is unlikely to become reality in the US, where copyright terms continue to increase, but is possible in Europe.

Also, for the record, UQM is not public domain. The source code is under the General Public License and the content may be distributed as part of the game (see the COPYING file for details).

There are such companies.  Sort of.  I know that "Sold Out Software" repackages oldish goodies like Worms and Populous: the Beginning, but I'm guessing that they also install something else on the machine (their CD covers all say "powered by .Now technology").  They don't rewrite the game though, just sell it as it was.

Sold Out seems to replace the installers with their own ".now" system, which apparently installs the game, applies patches and installs whatever you need to read the manual (Adobe Reader, usually). The games seem to be unmodified (for example, Worms is still a DOS program and is clearly indicated to be incompatible with Windows Me and XP).

I would love to see Sold Out expand their selection (how about some classic stuff instead of all this post-1995 junk? ;)); with enough games available to customers worldwide they could essentially wipe out the abandonware problem.

the way things are going this is just going to be harder and harder...

Original copyright law DID expire after a reasonable person... which was extended due to heavy lobbing, which was extended again due to heavy lobbing, and again, and again, and again... Not only that, but unlike any other law they managed to make such extensions apply to already made things rather then only to future titiles (normally law is not retroactive, its only a crime if it was illigal when you did it! and if it is no longer a crime you are not going to have your penalty revoked). With the current trend copyright will NEVER expire and is being expanded all over the world... Also it will be slanted more and more towards the holding corporations rather then the actual authors. Heck much of your DNA is currently being copyrighted by companies in a giant race for "intellectual property"

I remember reading in australian news some time ago when police evacuated a building of its workers to allow RIAA representatives to raid the place and shutdown a company that made some p2p software there. And the new iraqi government passed laws to mimic american copyright laws and honor them less then a week after it was formed...

Don't expect to see revival companies until the "right to read" revolution comes about in 2062 :P
http://www.gnu.org/philosophy/right-to-read.html
UQM is a truely unique instance in this regard...

However, beyond law there is public opinion, and those are shifting... I actually meet many people today who think "fair rights" are unfair to businessess and so on...

Heck my roomate thinks that libraries should pay royalties to authors based on every person who reads each book (where each person pays for every book they read to the library)... And he isn't the only one...

The purpose of copyright law is NOT to enrich the creator of intellectual property.

It is to reward and encourage creativity and innovation.  That's why I think our copyright laws are already too far over the top.  We need to rein them into a reasonable time frame.  Ninety-five years after publication is simply too much time, even as far as a corporation goes.  Current copyright laws seem to DISCOURAGE innovation in many circumstances, because they turn this innovation into an elitist club that you can't join unless you're already a member.

Wait what? How does it discourage innovation? You don't get to join the club unless you come up with something new, unless of reusing someone elses old stuff. Isn't that encouraging innovation?

(Not that I think copyright should be ebnforced for a century mind you, but your statement makes as muc sense as the guy who kept going "Mickey belongs to us now. It's time to let him go")

Considering how many people think that "abandonware" is a legal category, perhaps the Retro Gaming advocates have done their work TOO well...? 

 My own Retro Lament... plugging StarCon2, no less! (http://brummbar.typepad.com/brummbar/2004/07/retro_lament.html)

Okay, in response to why there isn't a "Company" that distributes these retro games, it's because there's no need to sell them anymore, they'd only make profit from old geeks who already have the game but can't run it. That's why we port these games people, it's been done to plenty of DOS games: Eradicator, DooM, Duke Nukem 3d, Star Con 2, Deadlock, and other great games. If you want, I could even round up a list of sites where you can download all of these ports for FREE! The only requirement for them is that you have to have the original version of the game, because these ports commonly still use files that only the original versions have (UQM is an exception), and as an example of these files, Zdoom still uses wads and Lmps, and Rancid Meat's Duke3d Port still uses the original lvl files.

And how do they check this? Anyway, I doubt (although I could of course be wrong) the legality of this very much. Sure, the companies probably don't care seeing as they're old games, but that doesn't make it any more legal. Or am I wrong and they have obtained some sort of permission from the owners to port and distribute these games?

Most of these ports are based on source code released by the developers under an open source license (e.g. the source code of UQM, Doom and Quake have been released under GPL) but the content is still under a less permissive license (TFB allows unmodified distribution of content as part of an UQM distribution, but id hasn't changed the content license at all, so you essentially have to pay for the full Doom or Quake content). Most of these source ports are entirely legal (and encouraged by the original authors, as they extend the lifespan of the game by improving compatibility, graphics quality et.c.). In some cases, e.g. Ken's Labyrinth, the full content may also be modified and redistributed (but only non-commercially).

In some cases, the game engine is reverse engineered and rewritten; for example, ScummVM reimplements LucasArts's SCUMM system without using any of the original code. ScummVM is, thus, not a derivative work of anything LucasArts has made (it's essentially another implementation of a SCUMM interpreter, based on reverse engineered specs; this is legal for the same reason most PC clones are legal despite the BIOS being a clone of IBM's PC BIOS).

From a legal point of view, you're pretty much in the clear as long as you either follow the licenses written by the original authors or never, ever, distribute anything based on their code (i.e. reimplement all the code).

I'm still slightly confused here. So Doom and Quake or released under GPL and can be ported, but you cannot actually donload the port unless you own the game? Meaning that basically, if you download the port without owning the original, you should somehow be able to pay iD software (or whoever they are nowadays) for it?

If the question seems silly, keep in mind that my knowledge of software licensing is quite limited, which is why I asked abouty this in the first place.


But in order to run a game on the ScummVM system ,you must still purchase or own that game right? Or have they released their older games as well?


Forgive me again if I don't undesrstand again. Even if the code of somethign is reimplemented, doesn't graphics and suchlike still have an inherent copyright? I mean ,even though porting SC 2 to a new format changes (I assume) the code beyond recognition, all gfx and suchlike are still originals. Wouldn't this hold true for any title you port?

they ported Duke3d??! what!! where!!

 :D

My understanding is that in this case, you can do what you wish with the engine (iow, the code) but the monster sprites, sound effects, etc., are not for you to use unless you bought the game from someone (I doubt they sell doom themselves anymore.)

The reason for doing it this way is probably to protect their art concepts (since there is no longer anything worth protecting too fiercly in the code anymore.) Newer versions of these games wouldn't be as interesting if every other shooter was using their formerly unique monsters, because they released them into the public domain.

Searching soureforge for "Duke 3D" turns up 2327 results, so a lot of people, apparently. :)

http://sourceforge.net/search/?type_of_search=soft&words=duke+3d


This one has a lot of hits, looks good:

http://sourceforge.net/projects/eduke32

Meaning that the whole process is still dubious at best (in my opinion of course), unless you use completely different graphics and sounds, in effect renderign it a new game rather than a port.

Assuming I've understood this correctly, that still makes a port of say Doom dubious at best, seeing as anyone downloading it without owning the games is technically doing something illegal.

You can download the port, change it and redistribute it, but it's just a bunch of code; the graphics, sound and other content are not included; you have to get that some other way (e.g. download the shareware version and use the data files from there or buy the commercial version). Combining, for example, a modified executable with the original data and distributing that would be illegal. However, creating your own graphics, levels and so on and combining that with the GPL:ed source code would be legal.

The tricky part here is that that the source code (from which the game executable or a functional replacement can be easily reconstructed) is released under one license (often GPL) and the game content under another (part of the original game, which is usually under a "do not copy this to anyone ever" license).

SCUMM games are essentially programs written in an interpreted language; these scripts (including most of the gameplay logic) are stored together with the graphics and sound in data files. The main game executable is an interpreter that executes the game stored in the data files; it can also be considered to be a virtual machine (this is where the name ScummVM comes from). To run a game with ScummVM, you buy (or otherwise acquire) the original game and then use the data files with ScummVM, which essentially replaces the main .exe.

The point here is to not redistribute the data files (in the case of ScummVM, any of the game itself), just the modified source code (which is usually licensed under GPL). ScummVM is just a bunch of code released under GPL by the people who wrote it; the fact that it happens to implement a virtual machine compatible with SCUMM is, while by no means coincidental, irrelevant from a legal point of view as implementing a specification or deriving a specification from an implementation does not constitute creating a derivative work.

Without the explicit permission of TFB to distribute the content together with UQM, UQM would only be legally distributable as a program (based on the GPL:ed source code) lacking the game data; you'd need a copy of SC2 to run it (a 3DO CD to get voices, et.c.). The situation with UQM's 3DO videos is similar to that of most open sourced games; the playback code is freely available (reverse engineered from the Duck codec) but the content isn't.

The SCUMM case is particularly interesting as it has strong parallels to e.g. Java virtual machine technology. Essentially, the game data files (including scripts) are roughly equivalent to a Java archive containing an applet (and additional data used by it), SCUMM to Sun's JVM and ScummVM to a rival JVM (e.g. Kaffe).

For similar reasons, most emulators are legal but may require copyrighted parts of the computer to emulated in order to run. For example, Sinclair Spectrum and Amstrad CPC emulators can legally be distributed with dumps of the system firmware (permission from Amstrad)

I see. Thank you for clearing that up. So essentially, you cannot download a ported version of Doom from the internet. You can download the ported game engine, but must find the rest in other places. It just seems a bit silly to call it a port of Doom if it is, technically only a port of the engine and does not contain any of the data that makes the game Doom. But then I do know very little of standards within the computer industry, so it might be just me.


So essentially, the ScummVM program works like an engine for all LucasArt games. The same way that you could run the downloaded Doom engine with any number of permutations to create a different shoot-em-up?


So this is why Amiga emulators require a certain start-up file to work? I see.

For clarification on this issue- remember that something can be copyrighted, and released under a copyright license such as the GPL or Creative Commons, which gives permission for specific uses of the copyrighted work.

So for a game like tremulous, the code and the content are copyrighted, but the code is GPL since it's based off the Quake 3 engine, and the content is Creative Commons Attribution-Sharealike. They've explicitly granted you permission to copy and make derivative works from the code and the media of the game, under certain conditions.

For UQM, the game is GPL and we have permission from TFB to distribute their copyrighted content with UQM, but not for people to make derivative works. So, you can download and play UQM, but you can't, in the strictest legal sense, take the ur-quan and put them into your new space game. (This is also partly a property rights issue, which I won't go into here.)

For a game like doom, duke nukem, or descent, the code is GPL'd but, as mentioned previously, the content is not under a free license. Thus the "bring your own WAD" requirement for the strictly legal distributions of 'Doom ports' and the like.

Thank you for the explanation, even though I got the gist of it from Novus post already.

It is a good day when you learn something new.

We've actually heard from TFB about a new open content license a while ago, but there are still some questions we need to ask them. But for 0.6 you can expect a new, more liberal, license.

Actually, since the released Doom source code contains most of the gameplay logic (physics, weapon and monster behaviour, et.c.), referring to a port of Doom is justified. The expression "game engine" is usually reserved for the generic (not game-specific) part of the code. If the data is easily combined with the ported code (usually a matter of putting the new executable in the right directory or telling the executable where the game data is), the user can easily get a functional ported copy of the game from the separate code and content.

In some cases, the modified executable runs on the same system as the original, in which case the word "port" is, naturally, not applicable.

In a way, yes. Many "Doom" ports run several other Doom engine-based games (Heretic, Strife, et.c.) with quite small amounts of added game-specific code (although quite a lot of the gameplay logic in these games is in the executable, not the game data, necessitating some reverse engineering to get e.g. Strife flamethrower behaviour right). In the ScummVM case, there is a much clearer separation of game-specific code from the underlying engine, although the SCUMM engine changes enough from game to game to make supporting all revisions a bit tricky.

Whoops. Lost the last part of that sentence (forgot to proofread the last revision). Yes, I was going to use the Amiga Kickstart ROMs ("BIOS" in PC parlance) as an example of emulators that are essentially useless without a ROM image that is not freely available; you have to dump one from your own Amiga or buy a licensed copy.

When I talk about a "revival company" I mean re-releasing lost classics like M.U.L.E., 7CoG, Starflight (Did you see how good it looked on the Sega Genesis? Wow!) Sundog, Wasteland and so forth as actual, legit retail or downloadable products for new generations of gamers to enjoy.

I'd prefer retail for the inclusion of hard goods like box art, manuals, maps, etc.

All this ScummVM and WAD talk is nice as far as it goes - hell, it's better than nothing - but it often doesn't go far enough. UQM is the fortunate result of positive involvement by the original creators (and bless them for it) and a lot of amateur effort (in the literal sense of amateur; one who woks for love rather than money).  The stars aligned for UQM, thankfully. But for many other revival projects things don't work out so well. Had the ownership of SC2/UQM panned out differently, the project might well have been squashed like a bug by some EA-style corporate greedpigs; this has been the fate of a number of revivals of older Ultima games. I suspect that a A M.U.L.E. revival, for example, would be stopped in its tracks by EA regardles of how promising it was.

I don't want the classics to live on in some demimonde of emulators and hacked conversions. I will settle for that if I have to, but that should not be the goal.

Well, M.U.L.E. has been remade lots of times (e.g. Space HoRSE (http://www.shrapnelgames.com/gilligames/Space_HoRSE/1.htm); see also a list of M.U.L.E. clones (http://www.worldofmule.net/muleclon.htm)) with various degrees of success and originality, and the game itself works fine on lots of emulators.

I guess an official updated version (same or highly similar gameplay, carefully updated graphics/sound) is what you want, Brain? Otherwise, I don't see what you're missing (apart from easy and legal access to the original).

Well, yes. Apart from the necessary changes (DirectX for WinXP, for example), I want the games brought back to life under their own titles, properly crediting the original creators.

My Plan B after winning the lottery is to buy the rights for some of the titles and then 'public domain' them once and for all. That way even those games which might not sell well enough to warrant an outright commercial revival can still be available for anyone wanting to start an UQM-like project - this time without the fear of C&D hate mail from corporate lawyers.

If you just want "necessary" changes (same old blocky graphics et.c.), the easy way (from a development point of view) would be to convince EA to release M.U.L.E. disk images and/or emulator snapshots as freeware. Emulators are the best way to recreate the original experience on modern hardware, and creating an official disk image would be easy.

There's another obstacle to these pipe dreams: some older developers had the unfortunate habit of losing the source code during corporate shuffling-around, so even if you get the rights, you might still have to remake the whole game from scratch... which, with a little creative name-changing, is (probably) already legal.

Consider also that most games from the early 80s are written in assembly language; i.e. a textual representation of machine code with textual labels for variables and instructions (that may or may not be cryptic) and maybe some comments. You'd probably have to rewrite the whole thing even if you had the source code, unless you're emulating the CPU or happen to have a compatible one.

For games that old, emulation or rewriting are the only real options except in some special cases (e.g. programs in interpreted languages for which an interpreter is available, "well-behaved" DOS games). Reverse engineering a C64 program of about 40K (including graphics, music, et.c.!) in order to create a carbon copy in another language is also a lot easier than slogging through megabytes of machine-generated machine code from a modern game.

The hard part is legal, really. Getting EA to part with the rights or even convincing them to allow a rewrite for them is probably going to be tough (and/or expensive).