That's odd - what's your Abandonia username? I'll go poke a look in the database and see if I can do something.

Same as here.

PM sent!

Orphanware definitely exists, a figure I saw recently for copyright works in general is that only 15% of works that would have been public domain under previous copyright law are actually owned by anybody now, but since our upgrade in 1976 their still covered by copyright even though nobody actually owns them and finding out is a serious hassle.

Software isn't easy to know who owns it and there are definitely cases where nobody owns it, although that mostly applies to works done up to the early '90s where one or two individuals could still create a game without much help.

There's also such a thing as copyright within copyright - using the Havoc engine, for example, or using music tracks inside your game, or using a movie license - even if the owning company goes bankrupt, then you still have the owners of those elements that may get upset.

It's why so many great series from the 80s get released with horribly crappy music instead of the original: Married with Children, Tour of Duty, etc. The Wonderyears is being blocked from release because of the high amount of music I heard.

(First off mind the bullet points.....I use them to collect my thoughts what with my OCD and all.)

1. As Hedwards said above TRUE orphanware does exist, but the amount of it is very slim...and often people throw the term around without checking first.

2. No problem bro......you DO know we call you that cuz we love ya, right? XD

3. Still, a good number DO buy a copy once a game becomes available for sale.......most goggers fit that role for example.....many of us have pirated and then bought copies once GOG started selling them. ;)

IMO if you get a license to use copyrighted material in your works and have paid the IP holders for it already then it should be a lifetime license....possibly with some stipulations that every year/time the game with such added works is re-released a certain percentage of the proceeds get kicked back to the IP holders of the works(music/trademarks/etc) used within said works(games/etc).

Doesn't always work like that I'm afraid. If it was a flat fee, then it may be true, but take the new release of Worms Reloaded: it had some music removed for copyright reasons.

Reality is, that the moment you publish your product in a different way, it's possible for the original IP holders to go "wait a sec, we didn't agree to this". It's why they could release a show like Tour of Duty on VHS tape decades ago but now can't release it on DVD without having to cut the music. For games it's no different - different medium = different contract. Adding to this, that the IP for a LOT of games has changed hands since then, confusing matters even more.

The percentage system could work if the rights holders all agreed to it in whatever future release of the game/etc that came about when signing the original contract. :\

I Spose ill join in the fun here...

For me ya ive used the abandonware sites to nab a few titles, but ive always checked GoG.com first and bought it here if its here. I Prefer to pay for games if its a viable thing. Unfortunately its not always the case and some of these titles don't even come up on ebay so I have no other alternative. now as it goes i did have some of these "abandonware" titles before discovering GoG.com but when I found this site I Bought up the games they had that I had downloaded as well as others. I Just wish GoG's Selection would grow faster with the likes of stuff from acclaim and what nots (Would love to buy Shadowman and Turok 1 and 2 as they had pc ports)

+1

My opinion on abandonware is that it is, overall, a good thing. It helps preserve a lot of older games that otherwise might have been lost (due to disc degradation and such). It would be a shame if some of the real milestones games were lost permanently (which has happened to movies, many old movies have been lost and will never be seen again). But it is also important to realize that abandonware is just another name for piracy. A form of piracy that might be morally justifiable (and I think there are cases when there is alright to download abandonware), but still piracy.

The big problem comes when you are supposed to draw a line. Where does abandonware start and general piracy end? Is it enough for a game to not be sold right now, or do we have to wait a certain amount of time before a game becomes "up for grabs"? How long? It is not uncommon for a game that is a few years old to get re-released in a compilation of older games. Heck, some games that are more than 10 years old are still being sold in stores (Jagged Alliance 2 is a good example, brand new boxed copies are still being produced for that game).

Orphanware is another slightly tricky term. It is not enough for there to be some questionmarks about who actually holds the rights, but there has to actually be no right holders left standing. Usually the publisher has at least part of the rights (which is the case of System shock, the rights are split between two parts), so even of the company that made the game has long since disappeared, there is still a rights holder left standing. And even if there was no publisher involved and the company is long gone, the former owner of the company still often have the rights to the game.

It's a cd-image ? If so, mount it and use the installer from sierrahelp.com:
http://www.sierrahelp.com/Patches-Updates/NewSierraInstallers.html#L

It's just a rar, but I will try to find an image so I can use this. Thanks!