Ok thanks

I'm reasonably confident the rights are with Tatem Games / Igor Karev. Source: some copies of legal documents in my possession. I let GOG know of this some months ago, so maybe it's in the works. But, I think Tatem just aren't interested in re-releasing the game, from whatever interviews and posts of theirs that I've read. Anyone and everyone who wants the game here is gonna need to vote on the wishlist and try contacting them.

http://www.gog.com/wishlist/games/chasm_the_rift

http://tatemgames.com/contact.html
https://www.facebook.com/Tatem.Games
https://twitter.com/tatemgames

You don't need to own the rights to the original to produce a remake, you would just need to come to some kind of arrangement with the rightsholder of the IP, if you're serious about this. I would imagine it would be similar to how the Wacky Wheels remake is being handled.

I'm... actually slightly serious about it. Although it's certainly not something I could attempt at the moment. It's something I might attempt in the future when I have the resources/connections/confidence to handle putting a team together and dealing with all the "big boys" game development stuff.

It's just one of those thoughts that comes while you're driving. I suddenly realized "hey, you know... there's technically nothing stopping me from trying this. Maybe I'll just see who has the rights..." It was kind of at the same time I started thinking about how cool it would be to create a publisher to help out unknown indie devs... when or if I ever have enough money and know-how to even consider such a thing.

I definitely understand those sentiments. :)

Create a spiritual successor! ;)

A while back somebody mentioned that Atari had a new CEO that was email reply friendly, and if it isnt a problem I'd like to have that new CEOs email or any way to contact him, regarding the rights situation of an old game. Does anybody have that information? thank you.

I'm the one who has spoken with the Atari CEO, who passed along a contact within the corporation. Unfortunately she has not been responsive past the initial conversation, so I suspect things may have changed within the corporate structure. Or perhaps they are revisiting what to do with their properties.

Do you have that CEO's contact information? I'd like to ask her about a specific title that they might or might not own.

Is there any info around on whatever became of Pixel Painter's "Fuzzy's World of Miniature Spacegolf"? Over the years, I don't think I ever managed to even get a website, let alone some form of contact info.

So does anyone know what the rights story is with the following games?
Sentinel Worlds: Future Magic (My guess is that EA owns the rights unless somehow Karl Butier has some rights in the games, either way its a great game that I wish was on GoG).
The Bards Tale Construction Set (my memories of this game feature an Interplay logo on the title screen but I have no idea if the rights exist with Interplay, with whoever bought the carcass of Interplay when they went bust a while back or with whoever published games for Interplay back then)
Strife (not a clue who owns the rights to this one although its DOOM engine based so ZeniMax may have some rights there since they own the copyright to that through their ownership of ID)
Tron 2.0 (Disney owns the rights to the Tron universe AND have a relationship with GOG so that would probably be covered. The game uses the LithTech engine so I dont know if that would be an obstacle though)
Neuromancer (William Gibson owns the rights to the book but I haven't heard that he is particularly protective when it comes to the rights to his properties, maybe if the publisher is willing, it might be possible to get Gibson to agree as well)

I kind of figured Night Dive owned those rights.

Interplay is still active as a company, but they never owned the rights to the Bard's Tale games. That's still EA.
Night Dive Studios does. They even released an enhanced version of the game on Steam.
Disney owns both the IP and the game and they publish it on Steam.
Interplay probably owns the rights to the game, but as with every licensed game, a rerelease is more difficult than a normal game.

Ok so this was from the era where Interplay was a developer but other companies published their titles.
EA owns (or has acquired) the rights to so many old games (Bards Tale series, old sim games, a really old golf game from before it became "PGA Tour Golf" that had a neat course editor and who knows how many more that are unavailable from anywhere and that would be great to see on GoG...