Is there any chance that the good old tactical first person RPG "Wheel of Time", published by Atari with the Unreal Engine 1 in 1999 could be ported to Windows 7 and 8? EA tried to use the "A Wheel of Time" license for a mobile game in 2006 and then abandoned the studio working on it with a kickstarter campaign. After the campaign totally failed there is nothing heared of it again (besides the book series still being released as a more popular series within the circles of real fantasy fans and collectors).

After the author died in September of 2007 there were rumors about a last book being made while the author was allready ill and fighting with an aging desease called Amyloidose. The last book in the universe of "A Wheel of Time" was released this year and closed the saga. I can fully understand that this book is the last thing we see of this series and universe, if his widow wants it to be that way - as far as i know he gave her all the rights to this name, books and universe.

But there must be a chance to revitalize the old PC game, since it was slightly flawed before being patched later - even partly by the small community who loved the game dearly - but one of the best and maybe even the first tactical 3D first person fantasy games on PC with no doubt about it.

This one?

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

For me the original Wheel of Time runs otherwise quite fine in Windows 7/64bit, except that the Quicktime videos (intro, videos between missions etc.) run in slideshow mode for some reason. I know for many others the game just skips the video parts altogether, and they don't even realize they are missing the in-game videos. It might be pretty confusing because the videos explain quite a lot about the story, what happens between the missions. So if you miss them, you'll probably be wondering in the beginning of each new mission "Huh? A jail? How the heck did I suddenly end up in a jail? And who is that dead guard beside me?". :)

If I run the quicktime videos directly from the game directory, they play fine. So that I've done when playing the game, watching the in-between videos outside the game whenever I finish a level. :) I'm near the very end now, I haven't played for a couple of weeks now. I think it should be quite easy to "port" it to Win7/8, just need to do something about those videos. Shouldn't be a problem, I think GOG has fixed many other video codec problems in other games too, e.g. the videos on retail Return to Krondor didn't work for me at all in Windows 7, but the GOG version's do.

I don't quite like the gameplay of WoT though. It sure is different from most FPS games, but I find the gameplay somewhat maddening in how you seem to constantly run out of ammo, some weapons are quite useless or underpowered (e.g. if I shoot fireballs or darts at the enemy knights, they just use a shield to hurl them back to me; and those freaking arrowmen have 100% accuracy, hitting you every time from afar). And the only weapon which has unlimited ammo is near useless too.

I do not know about revitalizing it, but I for one would love to see that game here. I still have the disk version from 1999, but a digital DRM-free copy will be welcome and an instabuy for me.

This would be an instabuy, i love the game just for how different it is - by giving you so many different "weapons" (offensive as well as defensive) with very little individual ammo, it forces you to constantly change your tactics and adapt to every situation.
The bossfights in this game are some of the most memorable for me, there's just something incredibly fun about constantly switching between all the offensive and defensive options available to you. Or just running from a boss for a minute and then turning all the seeker spells in the air against her with a single, well-timed reflect spell...

This game is bloody amazing. Way, way, better than 99% of games released. Inspired graphics, beautiful music, a soundscape that really sells the environments, and a combat system that is actually interesting. Sadly, I think I read somewhere a few years ago that the game was in limbo due to its license. Hope I'm mistaken about the legal standing of the game, but either way this game is fantastic. Would really be a shame for it to be forgotten.