Good news folks, Nigel Kershaw accepted my LinkedIn request and sent me this email:

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Hey Howard, happy to talk about Daemnosgate. Not sure how much I can help you, It was a loooong time ago, and I was just the lowly games designer ;)

Take it easy,

Nigel

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So another point for tfishell for suggesting I include my email address!

I'll be responding and asking him if he has any suggestions as to where we can continue our quest for the rights to Daemonsgate.

Awesome! Imagitec self-published Daemonsgate, so whoever was in charge of the company ought to know about the rights to that game.

Thanks, I included that info in the email, and I'll let you all know what he responds with.

Irrelevant side note - each time I go to contact him, the XTC song "Making Plans For Nigel" cues up in my head. :D

Just ran across a user here on the GOG forums named RadonGOG, with the Radon Labs logo as their avatar. I'm going to message them about Project Nomads on the slim hope they actually worked there (as opposed to being a fan of theirs). If anyone knows this is already a blind alley, stop me now.

He's not part of Radon, just a Radon fan. He did mention it somewhere, let me see if I can dig that post up.

I can send him a message if you want, as long as he understands English. ;)

EDIT: Maybe I'll try sending a message to McGame, too.

Ah, thanks, and let me know if you find that info. Thanks for keeping me from fruitlessly annoying a fellow GOGnard. :)

Some cool news for the Strategic Studies Group games!

http://au.linkedin.com/pub/roger-keating/16/bbb/694

I just heard back from Roger Keating, "Senior Vice-President at Strategic Studies Group". He wrote me a positive email:

"I do have the rights to all SSG titles although it seems that websites will publish them with, or without, our permission.

I do have a problem with the old games in that I do have copies on 51/4 inch floppies but not on any upgraded media. These disks may, or may not, be readable as I do not have a machine to read them. The later games are stored on CD's and other media so I can access them.

I am not sure of the process to convert them to the PC but would be willing to work with anyone who wanted to try.

I should also point out that you are the first person who has ever asked me about the accessing the old games although I do get a few requests to upgrade them.

Regards,

Roger"

I wrote back telling him I was pretty sure GOG would have a 5 1/4 floppy drive and ways to convert to PC, and asked if I could send his email address to the GOG staff, and gave him the GOG email and contact form if he wanted to do it himself.

Fantastic! And I don't believe the games have to come strictly from physical media he owns, just the rights to distribute them. Though of course getting them undiluted from the source is best. Plus he may have some interesting ancillary materials that never made it into the commercial releases.

I did mention that if he gave his permission, GOG could download some of the games from the "abandonware" sites, but I didn't mention it here because it might ultimately come across as being fueling his frustration with people that put that put SSG games up without SSG's permission.

Maybe I'll send him another message about bonus material.

Oh, and Piranjade, I sent a message to Marco Hüsges on LinkedIn. I may also try to make contact on http://www.mcgame.com/uk

Dunno if Nigel broke the ice for me or not, but I just got another acceptance on LinkedIn. This one is from Sande Chen, one of the writers on Siege of Avalon. Time to bother her with a follow-up.

EDIT: Message sent. By the way, she was also a writer on The Witcher.

Thank you!
I don't think there is much use trying McGame as he isn't manager there anymore according to the German registry of Companies but we should keep this in mind in case he doesn't react on LinkedIn.
I sooo want to see this Thalion thing resolved.

Oh, okay! Good to know.

I think I'll be slowing down on doing this a little as the summer months come to a close. (It would be nice to get a confirmation from Turnipslayerr that he has received our emails and messages.)

Awesome effort by everyone!