How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

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bigbadbogie
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by bigbadbogie »

How about the name 'Icarus' for the Hadean/Olympian homeworld? What about Hadeans and Olympians? These names were all from Greek mythology which is probably not copyrighted by Activision...
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by Ded10c »

If you have the Hadeans and Olympians from planet Icarus, you'll run into trouble. Frankly, having Hadeans and Olympians as alien races might be pushing it. As a rule of thumb, it shouldn't be immediately obvious that you're ripping something off.
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by Red Spot »

bigbadbogie wrote:How about the name 'Icarus' for the Hadean/Olympian homeworld? What about Hadeans and Olympians? These names were all from Greek mythology which is probably not copyrighted by Activision...
Simple rules when it comes to stuff like this.
-Does somebody who can do something about it care? No » Dont care yourself
-Are you going to make money of of it? No » Just do it


As long as you're not making money of of it the most that you can see done against you is receiving a C&D-letter. Comply and you go free. Now how likely is it that you're going to receive a C&D-letter cause you're modding BZ2, specially with projects like FE, Bionite, BZC, etc not receiving them?
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by Ded10c »

We're discussing the creation of a separate game, not a mod. Using someone else's IP for something like that can potentially land you in hot water.

We have nothing to show that Activision don't care since nobody has tried to manipulate their IP like this before. Do remember that absolutely all mods for both games are owned by Activision or Macmillan as per the editor license agreements. Mods which violate these agreements - and there are several - are illegal, but that's not an IP issue.

Bionite is irrelevant since it avoids the Battlezone IP altogether and goes off in its own direction.
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by General BlackDragon »

long as it's free it wont much matter. I think since the company can't make money off BZ anymore, and BZ2 proved that future attemps are a net LOSS of money, they aren't interested in trying again. And they don't own the BZ title anymore so they can't make a sequel anyway.
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by Ded10c »

Obviously it'd be the current owner with whom there would be an issue, as the ownership of the IP and ownership of the mods would have passed together.

If I recall correctly intellectual property is one of those things that will be lost if not protected when challenged.
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by Red Spot »

AHadley wrote:Obviously it'd be the current owner with whom there would be an issue, as the ownership of the IP and ownership of the mods would have passed together.

If I recall correctly intellectual property is one of those things that will be lost if not protected when challenged.
Correct, and the first 'challenge' is a C&D-letter, assuming no money was made with it. If money is made, basically the same would happen, but now they want the money as well. If they can prove they themselves are working on the same and you now have caused them to lose money, that could be hurtful, but since it isnt even all that clear who the owner might be it is highly unlikely that that will happen.

Also note the mentioning of Bionite in my previous reply, not a mod.
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by bigbadbogie »

I'm not even convinced that whoever owns Battlezone's title would honestly give a damn about it. It's a 15 year old and very obscure game which can only either be bought second hand or downloaded illegally. As GBD said, nobody makes any money from it anymore.

Would Activision or whoever else even notice? If they did notice, would they really care? Would they waste their time and money on a lawsuit over this relic?

If I'm not mistaken, they're a little preoccupied making and distributing modern AAA games worth hundreds of millions.

The Battlezone series was executed and buried at the turn of the millennium. It's consigned to archives at the back of some decaying Activision warehouse.
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by Ded10c »

Red Spot wrote:Also note the mentioning of Bionite in my previous reply, not a mod.
As its lead writer I know exactly what Bionite is and how it avoids these issues; I made certain of it myself.
bigbadbogie wrote:Would Activision or whoever else even notice? If they did notice, would they really care? Would they waste their time and money on a lawsuit over this relic? [...] It's consigned to archives at the back of some decaying Activision warehouse.
We don't know for sure who owns the IP. There are three possibilities; Activision, Rebellion, and nobody. If Rebellion do have it, we can guarantee that they plan to do something with it.
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by bigbadbogie »

I thought that Rebellion bought the rights to the original Atari Battlezone.

Was Activision really more than a distributor?
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by Ded10c »

What Rebellion have purchased is unclear, since we don't have a conclusive source. It also depends on the terms of an agreement Kahless claims to be privy to; according to this agreement all parts of Activision's Battlezone IP returned to Atari, not just the name.
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by bigbadbogie »

So it's all down to Rebellion.

We might have to wait and see what they do with it.
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by General BlackDragon »

http://www.justformen.com/products/touch-of-gray/

Remember to buy some for when that day comes, you'll need it.
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by Zero Angel »

Regulators
Regulate any stealin' of this biometal pool, we're damn good, too
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Gotta be handy with the chains if you know what I mean
Earn your keep
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Re: How much of Battlezone can be 'borrowed'?

Post by Red Spot »

AHadley wrote:
Red Spot wrote:Also note the mentioning of Bionite in my previous reply, not a mod.
As its lead writer I know exactly what Bionite is and how it avoids these issues; I made certain of it myself.
bigbadbogie wrote:Would Activision or whoever else even notice? If they did notice, would they really care? Would they waste their time and money on a lawsuit over this relic? [...] It's consigned to archives at the back of some decaying Activision warehouse.
We don't know for sure who owns the IP. There are three possibilities; Activision, Rebellion, and nobody. If Rebellion do have it, we can guarantee that they plan to do something with it.
Fact that it openly claims to be a successor for BZ2, that might already be enough to get you in hot water, specially since it clearly is the same sort of game. But first the requirement of somebody caring needs to fulfilled, which doesnt seem to be the case.

What info do you have, that we all seem to be missing, that gives away to you(plural? royalty?) that Rebellion as owner of the rights will do something with it and you(plural? ..) can guarantee it?
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