I'll be out of town for a few days. We're going to a wonderful wedding of two good friends! :-D

Have fun, you two! If there's going to be a polterabend, be sure to make a big mess. :P

*********************************

Here's an article on D&D rights ownership throughout the years:
http://forum.baldursgate.com/discussion/20105/the-unofficial-what-the-heck-who-owns-what-bg-related-and-when-thread

I heard back from Pascal Stradella, who worked on Hexplore. It doesn't seem like English is his first language, so maybe there's a French-speaker on GOG who could communicate with him (and some of the other French contacts). He only says that the publisher Ocean Software doesn't exist yet(?), but he is interested in buying the domain Hexplore.com. If anyone wants to follow up with him, I'll PM you his contact information.

Got in touch with PolyEx, who made Vigilance on Talos V. Like the Shadows of Cairn dev, he might be persuaded to make the game officially freeware. If anyone wants to follow up with one of those devs, here are their sites (e-mail addresses are on those pages):
http://www.antsoftware.com/
http://www.polyex.com/page1/page1.html

Sent a query to Ben Cooley of Cinematix in the off-chance that he has the rights to Revenant or whether they are truly with Eidos/Square Enix.

Sent a query to the license holders of Jurassic Park about Trespasser: Jurassic Park and to Heavy Metal about Heavy Metal F.A.K.K. 2

We also need a Russian-speaking GOG user to help interpret this article:
http://avegamers.com/blog/special/action-forms-intervyu-s-igorem-karevym-chast-1-istoricheskaya
At least the parts that mention GOG and Chasm: The Rift. I'd also like to get in touch with Igor Karev, but I can't find a direct e-mail address. He's at Tatem Games, but I've never gotten a response from e-mail, Twitter or Facebook.
http://www.linkedin.com/in/ikarev

Ant Software has the rights to Shadows of Cairn. The dev says he's not really interested in doing anything with the game anymore. I figure he could write a freeware license and put the game's files up somewhere and make it officially freeware.

Ah, okay, so Ant Software has Shadows of Cairn rights, and PolyEx made Vigilance on Talos V and isn't really interested in it anymore (apparently), so you want me to suggest they make the games freeware, and suggest a freeware release on GOG, perhaps?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Some more games from Abandonia; comments and opinions on them welcome:

Nectaris, from Sunflowers Interactive
---(Sunflowers bought by Ubisoft in 2007, so maybe Ubisoft has rights?)
NetStorm - Islands at War, from Activision
---(compatibility issues?)
Neuromancer, from Interplay
Nightmare Creatures, from Activision
---(compatibility issues? Would nGlide help?)
No Respect, from Ocean Software (Infogrames/Atari)
North & South, from Infogrames/Atari
Ocean Ranger, from Activision
---(are there better sims of same type?)
Offensive, from Ocean of America aka Ocean Software (Infogrames/Atari)
Oils Well, from Sierra
Omega, from Origin/EA
One Step Beyond, from Ocean Software (Infogrames/Atari)
---(rated well, but doesn't look that interesting overall)
Oregon Trail (1992) from MECC
---(perhaps if Broderbund or TLC had rights, they're with Ubisoft? Maybe Gameloft?)
Pacific General, from SSI
Panzer General, from SSI

One step at a time. ;) I've suggested as much to them already (except for bringing it to GOG). None of this is urgent or anything given the circumstances. You can first take a look at YouTube videos of the games, or download and try them out first (the PolyEx dev told me to look for the game online, he doesn't even have the game files anymore) before deciding how much effort you want to put in contacting them.

According to Wikipedia, Konami has the rights to the Nectaris series.

Now, most of the games I look into already appear to be with Take Two, Warner Brothers Interactive, Activision, Sony, Atari, Square Enix, Ubisoft, or Electronic Arts, but there's no real way for us to confirm with them what they have. So, has there been any game in particular you had your sights on where the rights situation looks fairly uncertain? Or some game you want to see on GOG in particular?
Edit: Consider that an open question, anyone reading can put something forward.

Neuromancer - Would be nice to have, though there is the potential double-whammy of licensing. The game itself is based on the novel of the same name, and the soundtrack is derived from music by Devo. So there may be multiple rights issues for the copyholder to negotiate.

Nightmare Creatures - An okay game, I think I had the sequel on the Dreamcast. As you mention, there might be technical concerns. Did well enough commercially to get a sequel, so may have sufficient appeal.

North & South - Somewhat odd in that it is a game about the American Civil War but based on a European bande dessinée. It seemed to be fairly regarded in the Amiga community, and looks appealing.

One Step Beyond - A follow-up to Pushover, though with different play mechanics. Decent enough in its own right, though I would really like to have Pushover here first, as it's quite an enjoyable puzzle game. Also, One Step Beyond is a "product" game, like the 7-Up game Spot. One Step Beyond is selling the British crisp Quavers. They appeared briefly in Pushover as a last-minute marketing tie-in, but this game was designed from the ground up to highlight the product. The main character, Colin Curly, is the Quavers mascot (or at least was at the time).

General series (SSI) - Just about all of these are highly regarded, even Fantasy General. Panzer General is one that folks consistently praise, so it would be a nice one to land as well.

What I've been doing is going through Abandonia and looking to see what games came from a publisher already here (or I know were bought by one that is here, like Sierra and Activision). If I do not recognize the publisher then I try to do a little research on them, to see if they were bought or appear to have been bought by another one that is already here. If they don't appear to have been bought, that's when I start doing some research.

(I'm just working a general list for GOG. I'm not someone who is willing to spend a lot of time researching every game on Abandonia to see where the rights may lie. I figure GOG can take it from my lists)

As for games I want to see? Well, at last one was rejected. :P I enjoyed Frogger 1997, Frogger 2, and Pac-Man Adventures in Time, but trying to bring Hasbro and Konami and Namco together probably wouldn't be worth GOG's time and money. (not to mention potential compatibility issues) My most-desired games, the Humongous Entertainment catalog, probably won't have much of a chance at coming until Tommo Inc. secures the rights, and even then, they may want to charge more than GOG would. (Nimbus Games recently re-released Putt-Putt Goes to the Zoo for 9.99 on Windows; we should just get the SCUMMVM versions for 5.99.)

But feel free to help others, if they have suggestions. :)

Thank you thank you, as always. :)

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Originally I was just posting this link privately, but I figured now I'd go ahead and post it again if anybody wants to look. This is the link to the lists and research I've been doing on the games, currently on Dropbox: https://www.dropbox.com/sh/7lv58tieef46xls/nV3-ePiFgJ

Not something I'd be interested in, but I reckon it has a cult classic status and it reviewed very well.

I'd love to see the SSI General series in GOG just for Fantasy General.

Received a quick reply from Sande regarding Siege of Avalon:

I believe it is now open source, but I know someone i can ask about its status.

I wrote back to her that my understanding is that the game engine is open source, but that the "chapters" of the game (essentially all the game assets) are not. This means you still have to have a commercial copy of the game to play, only that the game engine is available for more modern OSes via open source. Perhaps I am wrong about this, we'll see what she comes back with.

----------------------------------------

Recieved a follow-up from Sande:

Chapter One is open source, available on SourceForge, but the other chapters were not released.

The entire series was published by Global Star Software

I'll see what I can find on Global Star Software, first I've encountered of them in this quest.

----------------------------------------

Founded in 1995, Global Star Software Limited is a Canadian software publisher headquartered in Mississauga, Ontario. It was acquired by Take 2 Interactive in 1999. (http://www.allgame.com/company.php?id=3796)

So, a good thing or a bad thing? How is the relationship, if any, between Take 2 and GOG?

We simply don't know. Closest thing we heard was from a recent interview:
"I would say that we’ve been speaking with every single major developer and major publisher who we haven’t signed yet. Whether we do so in person at E3, whether we’re doing so over the phone, whether we’re going to try and catch them again at GamesCom or GDC, I mean, we’re talking to everybody. Whether we’re getting anywhere is entirely a second issue, but we are talking to everybody."
http://games.on.net/2013/07/we-see-pirates-as-our-competition-we-dont-see-steam-as-our-competition-gog-com-on-hatemail-torrents-and-sharing-games-legally/

"There are still some problems, but the problems are increasingly less about “We don’t want DRM-free games for our classics” and more like either, “Man, we don’t know who owns the rights for this,” or just, “We don’t have anybody whose focus is restoring old content at this company, so we have no idea who you should talk to.”
http://games.on.net/2013/07/theres-a-very-persuasive-argument-we-have-which-is-money-gog-com-on-why-drm-free-works-and-bringing-the-big-publishers-around/

Got this from Abandonia a while ago. Not bad, but the controls and camera can be horrid at times, especially when fighting multiple enemies.

Thanks SCPM, good info. Take 2 is too large for me to pursue as an independent actor, since I wouldn't want to screw up any negotiations GOG may have going with them. So I guess I'll have to let Siege of Avalon rest, unless a bluetext reads this and decides to follow it up themselves.

Yah, I seem to recall similar issues when I played it. A competent game, but one I'm not motivated to exert myself on behalf of, given how many better ones are out there.

Any new info? I'm going through my list of games I was looking for and I'm up to Millennium now.

Good timing, I had just popped up the Deuteros X site again. I will ask on there if anyone has a clue as to the current ownership of the Millenium/Deuteros franchise.

EDIT: Amiga site Back To The Roots distributes both games, so it would appear that at least the Amiga rights to the titles has lapsed or gone public. I cannot confirm this to be true, however.

This page lists the developer of Millenium as Marjacq Micro Ltd., an independent developer representation firm who is still in business. They may be able to furnish information on the current rights. Let me know if you'd like me to contact them.

----------------------------------------

I have sent an email to Julie Man of Marjacq Man Ltd, asking if her firm was involved with Millenium and, if so, if she can tell me who the current rights holder is.