I think I'd prefer they did that with Sam & Max. ;)

It looks like Re-Volt has been removed from the catalog.
http://www.gog.com/forum/revolt/revolt_temporarily_delisted_on_gogcom

That sucks! I'm glad i bought it during the xmas sale.

Yes, he could. And obviously he did so. But what does he gain with it? How much money does he make from Telltale's game now? The game is already there, you just have to sell it to make "free money". It's not as if the game stops to exist, just because you ask for one bazilion Dollar for another 5 years of publishing rights. People just pirate that game from today on and no one makes money. As I said: It's stupid.

I don't effing know. But all of your questions are no answer to my question: Why in hell didn't they make an infinite liscense for one single game? It was already available for 5 years. No one gets harmed when it's available for another 2740 years. Because of ridiculous licensing fees? Hell, it's a 5 years old game! You don't get rich with those. But every sold copy is free money.

Seriously, I don't get the concept of such licensing deals... Allow Telltale to make and sell such a game, or don't allow it. It could be so easy...

Well that has been Telltale's well-known problem all along.

Now they lost W&G, before they lost Bone (a series which was never even completed). The rest of them are simply waiting to expire, unless, miraculously, the rest would be never-ending licence agreements. And that's not how licencing usually works.

And let's not forget, Telltale negotiated rights for King's Quest, but never released anything.

They deserve credit for keeping the genre alive with continuous releases and (back then) somewhat innovative idea of adventure seasons, but catalogue planning and such is not their strongest point though. Or, perhaps, this is all going to according to their plans. Maybe they have planned to keep few "hot" items that sell, and the older catalogue is simply let go. They way their forum is organised - just few latest game discussion areas visible and the rest hidden under "older games" - would actually suggest that it may be a company policy.

We had the same story already with System Shock 2 - modders were mad because gog used their work without asking and claimed that wasn't right. While it's maybe better to chit-chat with the community before using their work it's in fact not illegal nor have modders any legal chances to pull the game here. I'm lazy to search for the right thread about that topic, I remembered there was something similar with cracks gog used for the copy-protection of some games. It's understandable they ask for support from the license holder, but the way they do it in that posting it sounds to me they're asking for money from gog and the license holder, which is kind of silly.

Edit: Re-read the posting of the modders again and it seems I got that part about comprehension wrong, so my accusation that they are asking for money is maybe not correct.

Try seeing it from the licence holder side - Telltale did one series back in 2009 and ... that's all folks. You're not making money with a licence that nobody uses.

As much as I dislike W&G being pulled (and that Telltale not made more out of the license in the first place), what's REALLY worrying is, is the status of Sam & Max. Let's face it: last episode in 2010, no sign of a new one coming at all...
I love the walking dead / Wolf among us and Borderlands sounds like a great match for a Telltale story. But I doubt Steve Purcell received much for his license last year.
The only (remotely) good thing is, that probably no one else is so crazy wanting to pick up the Sam & Max license....

Considering one single game, it would make sense to keep it on sale rather than let it go into unproductive state (iow: licence expired).

But where it gets very complicated is if someone else wants to make a game based on the same IP. To prevent two competing companies/products having the same IP to make money with, everyone involved is usually accepting the fact that it is better to lose some money than risk having such competition going on.

This is why, for instance, older Star Trek games have always vanished from sale when some new company has licenced the IP.

The question is, is it impossible to have these things worded as "-- X can use the IP and sell products based on it until xx.xx.20xx, after which X can continue to use it under same conditions until someone else gets rights to use the IP--". That way games and other products would remain on sale, and still having the licence would be exclusive, as by every new licence agreement, the older one would become outdated.

Actually I don't see any problem with a company losing a license they don't plan to use anymore, I just think it's extreme that this includes completely removing all past products that used the license from the market. Of course I know nothing about how these things work, but I would have expected that they signed under the condition of keeping the rights to their own products even after the license expires.

Anyway, I don't really care in this case, as I already own W&G and don't know if I will ever play it, I just wanted to point out what I think of Telltale's shortsighted concept to buy other people's IP and create games from it instead of coming up with something original for a change. Not saying that you can't do creative things based on established characters and series (I was thankful for the first Sam & Max game), but it gets kind of old after a while, like blockbuster sequels, and if this is where it all leads to in the end ...

OK I already own Re-Volt and never cared to get W&G so this situation isn't problematic for me personally. It IS problematic however that some of these games are so stealthily removed and it takes one of the forum users to point out that it's gone. At least there's a post from official GOG staff on the Re-Volt page, why has no staff even pointed out its removal here? On the Re-Volt page it was said the removal was "temporary" and that they didn't post it on the front page because they think it will be sorted out soon. That's not the situation for most cases though, so I think GOG if they aren't allowed to post warnings should at least post on the front page that a game just got removed. These kinds of things are kinda helpful to know about and shouldn't have to be stumbled upon by accident like I did with these two games.

Maybe it's shameless but I have a redeem code for Wallace & Gromit's Grand Adventure if anyone still wants it; check out the classifieds ad or let me know what you'd think is a fair trade.