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News: Celebrating 30 years of Star Control 2 - The Ur-Quan Masters

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Author Topic: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark  (Read 59312 times)
Parker
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #15 on: July 24, 2013, 08:32:13 am »

And thank you for outbidding these guys! (wtf?)

This is the first time I've posted here in almost a decade, I can't believe how long ago it was when UQM was first released. I'm glad this forum and project are still kickin. Hey meep-eep!
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #16 on: July 24, 2013, 04:21:14 pm »

Hiya!

There was a Star Control 3? ;-)

I like the mechanics of the Starflight games but who can forget the first time they played through Star Control 2? When they realize that just some random planet has its own dialog tree with some cool resource hidden away? 
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #17 on: July 24, 2013, 05:38:55 pm »

I saw this on the Ars Technica article about the sale:  http://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/07/stardock-acquires-star-control-rights-in-fire-sale-plans-reboot/

What I'd love to see was someone pick up Arne's idea for a game:

http://androidarts.com/starcontrol/star_control.htm

(old page with gameplay and story)
http://web.archive.org/web/20081112232751/http://www.itchstudios.com/psg/main.php?id=sce
http://web.archive.org/web/20070817174408/http://itchstudios.com/psg/sce/intro_story.htm

(an old forum thread)
http://web.archive.org/web/20070608150956/http://starcontrol.classicgaming.gamespy.com/forum/index.php?topic=828.0

(one of his last active UQM forum threads)
http://forum.uqm.stack.nl/index.php?topic=4846.0

There are a few other projects from other groups/people, too, but I never really checked them out.  A good place to also reference is the Pages of Now and Forever website:

http://www.star-control.com/

...I hope StarDock doesn't kill their domain now that they own the naming rights.
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meep-eep
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #18 on: July 24, 2013, 07:49:41 pm »

Of additional interest here (since these boards are dedicated to the open-source version of SC2), is the potential resolution of a couple of lingering IP issues relating to the CGI movies used in the 3DO version of SC2.  Our understanding had been that PR+FF were not able to secure the rights to those cutscenes, so they are not included in the open-source version.  It would be really great if those movies could be released under a Creative Commons license, so that the Ur-Quan Masters project could be truly whole.
This new development is not going to help there. The 3DO cut scenes (and manuals) are owned by Crystal Dynamics.
Though possibly the people who originally made those videos have some claim as well.

And hi Brad. Like Paul, I am very interested in seeing what Stardock is going to do. It's good to see that there are Star Control fans behind this news, whatever happens next.

And welcome back, Parker.
« Last Edit: July 24, 2013, 07:55:06 pm by meep-eep » Logged

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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #19 on: July 24, 2013, 10:03:30 pm »

As much as I love SC2, I think there are a few things the Starflight series did better. The RPG mechanics, and planetary exploration come to mind. On the other hand, Star Control had better combat, and the way the universe unfolded in a preset way unless the player altered events in a specific time window really solved the dilemma of openness vs. authenticity faced by many sandbox games today. Ideally, a new Star Control would take the best parts of each franchise along with some new ideas.

I agree wholeheartedly, particularly with respect to planetary exploration. If the Stardock folks aren't familiar with the Starflight series as well, they should look into it - there's some very good ideas there that it would be a shame to miss.
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #20 on: July 25, 2013, 02:21:28 am »

This new development is not going to help there. The 3DO cut scenes (and manuals) are owned by Crystal Dynamics.

Ah, bummer.  Okay, then we just need to wait for (researches) Square/Enix to go bankrupt, so we can buy it off their corpse.
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #21 on: July 25, 2013, 10:30:23 pm »

For the interested, the purchase agreement lists the purchase prise as $305000.
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #22 on: July 25, 2013, 10:49:41 pm »

Hmm. I forgot/neglected to upload those pages to my functional server, but I don't like my old SC stuff much. Didn't think anyone cared about it.

My Star Control project(s) didn't really go anywhere, maybe because Starflight won me over. Also, I feel like the SC universe is more interesting than the game mechanics, but it feels wrong to change something like the Melee (it never quite fit into the single player, I felt) or mining, so I just dropped the project(s). Actually, I'm still eyeballing my Gameboy style RPG (SC Saga) because it's so scaled back and silly that it's actually doable.


Would've loved to grab some of Atari's more obscure IPs myself, but I'm not even aware of which ones they sold (they sat on a lot of stuff). Some terrible smartphone or f2p dev probably bought the bunch anyways.
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #23 on: July 26, 2013, 01:02:50 am »

I think a big part of the upcoming development fun is going to be including the communities in the development process.

One thing that's going to be helpful is that so many people here are already familiar with Star Flight. That's going to save us a lot of time in asking people to go play that game.
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #24 on: July 26, 2013, 02:06:58 am »

One thing that's going to be helpful is that so many people here are already familiar with Star Flight. That's going to save us a lot of time in asking people to go play that game.

Well, that pretty much eliminates any fear that the new Star Control will be dumbed down like other modern redos. A game that takes the best out of SC2 and Starflight sounds like an instant masterpiece  Cheesy

One suggestion: though the RPG crew mechanics in Starflight were pretty cool, it was a bit lame how you could just get people to max level by spending money. If those crew mechanics were to make a return, then hopefully the leveling process would be more gradual. It would also be nice to see minor as well as major skills. So in addition to the mainline stuff (piloting, engineering, communications, medicine, etc) you could have niche skills like zero-g combat, survival, programming, etc. that would come in handy in special situations.
« Last Edit: July 26, 2013, 02:13:12 am by Hurleybird » Logged
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #25 on: July 26, 2013, 02:10:54 am »

http://www.star-control.com/

...I hope StarDock doesn't kill their domain now that they own the naming rights.

Heh, thanks for the concern.  Speaking with Frogboy, that isn't going to happen.  I believe including the community sites and linking to them is one of his desires.
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #26 on: July 27, 2013, 05:39:14 am »

None of this changes the status of the Ur-Quan Masters or Star Control on GOG.

That's all I needed to hear.  Whatever the future may hold, I'm glad to hear that Stardock won't be saber-ratling the poor volunteer army of UQM. =)

I'm excited by the news that the Star Control license is once again in the hands of a company that cares enough to do anything with it.  I honestly don't even care what Stardock's plans are, as long as it's something more than "stick it on a shelf and only dust it off often enough to keep the legals nailed down."  I think it's safe to say Stardock has something more than that in mind.

Reboot, remake, sequel, prequel, whatever.  I already know that any forthcoming Star Control game won't be exactly the same as the old one - it literally cannot be.  Just as the new Star Wars trilogy couldn't possibly have been the same as the original - it's a product of a new generation, for a new generation.  Time has changed everyone's perspectives, including Paul's and Fred's, to some degree.  Even with them involved to the hilt, it would be different.  As long as it's got enough similarities, I will be satisfied to know that the franchise is not dead anymore. =)

Rock on, Brad.  You hold a palpable piece of my heart in your hands, all I ask is that you keep the dream alive.
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #27 on: July 28, 2013, 08:35:35 am »

So Excited!

Just make it exactly like SCII...with more turning angles...

Understand the point of a XCOM-like reboot, but would be happy with a straight up sequel to SCII. I guess it would be hard to appeal to people who never played SCII though. Maybe an opening with a short summary, or dialog in game could explain the SCII story?

Keep the top-down combat, but maybe 2 on 2? Or Massive fleet battles? Or every battle includes your primary ship + 1 ally.

It would also be cool if your allied ships could participate in conversations or events...other than just being meat shields.

Meh, who cares, just so excited that this is actually happening!!!
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #28 on: July 28, 2013, 09:00:50 am »

Maybe an opening with a short summary, or dialog in game could explain the SCII story?

Or you could include Groombridge Log, my Star Control novel in the collector's edition.
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Re: Stardock Highest Bidder on Star Control Trademark
« Reply #29 on: July 31, 2013, 06:57:24 am »

hehe Tiberian, wish we did finish the graphic novel Wink Would have been awesome to showcase to the whole world.

BUt, the novel itself is a masterpiece too!
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