How tightly do Lucasarts and Sierra hold on to their old licenses?

[Armakuni]

I'm wondering as it would be totally kick ass to have episodes based on some other old adventure games series. I know this is probably totally unrealistic but hey a guy can dream :)

I'd love to see episodic Monkey Island games, perhaps get Ron Gilbert on the team.. that would be a dream come true for me!

Or Space Quest episodes.. that would kick ass too! Or Quest for Glory.. or Gabriel Knight! Gabriel Knight episodes would be so damn cool!

What old series would you like to see continued as series? I realize it's very unrealistic but theoretically speaking what would you like to see? :)

[abdallah]

Simon the sorcerer.. Those games were brilliant.
And Outcast. There was a sequel in the works but after Infogrames died, so did the sequel.

[AdamG]

Sierra is extremely protective of their licenses. They have let a few Space Quest and King's Quest fan games be made, but otherwise they keep a tight grip on them. I don't know much about how LucasArts handles theirs. I doubt either company would object to someone buying licenses to their old games though.

[numble]

From Bill Tiller at Autumn Moon Entertainment:

http://www.adventure-eu.com/forum/index.php?topic=1056.0

Lucas won’t sell their IPs. I know from several people have tried buying some. And they tried to buy some of the lesser known ones too. My guess is Lucas won’t sell because it is not their policy to sell. I think they don’t want to set precedent and they don’t want to spend their management time and lawyer time contemplating each offer to buy a LEC license. SO they just say not to all offers out of hand.

But what I’d like to see is a Monkey Island game designed by Ron Gilbert, written by Tin Schafer, Check Jordan, and Jonathan Ackley, animated by Larry Ahren, and the backgrounds done by myself. Now that would be a fun game to work on. Never going to happen.

-Bill Tiller

[ShaggE]

Sierra is extremely protective of their licenses. They have let a few Space Quest and King's Quest fan games be made, but otherwise they keep a tight grip on them. I don't know much about how LucasArts handles theirs. I doubt either company would object to someone buying licenses to their old games though.

You don't need to own the license if your making a freeware title, right? (I'm making a fangame based on the Blood license) I mean, isn't it like fanfics? As long as there's no profit being made...

[LuigiHann]

You might not need to pay them, but you need their permission. Otherwise, not only can they stop you, but they are legally obligated to do so, in order to protect their copyrights.

[ShaggE]

I whipped up an e-mail to Atari to obtain permission, thanks for clearing that up for me, I'd be pretty pissed if I got a cease and desist letter after months of development lol

[TribeHasSpoken]

You don't need to own the license if your making a freeware title, right? (I'm making a fangame based on the Blood license) I mean, isn't it like fanfics? As long as there's no profit being made...

Definitely not true. I'm a member of the team of The Silver Lining (http://www.tsl-game.com), a King's Quest fan game. We were shut down by Vivendi in September 2005, though they allowed us to continue work on the game in November following negotiations.

[ShaggE]

If worse comes to worse, I'll just use the Chewbacca defense on 'em.

[AdamG]

What's that, "RARRRLL?!"? :p

[Josh]

I was at a bookstore earlier tonight and saw complete collections of Kings Quest, Police Quest and Leisure Suit Larry for $20 (well, complete except for the Swat games and most recent Larry endeavor) didn't notice Space Quest though. So it's clear that Sierra is still interested in holding the licenses to their games. At least they're putting them out again with Windows XP computability.

[doom saber]

I was at a bookstore earlier tonight and saw complete collections of Kings Quest, Police Quest and Leisure Suit Larry for $20 (well, complete except for the Swat games and most recent Larry endeavor) didn't notice Space Quest though. So it's clear that Sierra is still interested in holding the licenses to their games. At least they're putting them out again with Windows XP computability.

Actually, the recent collections are not complete since they are missing the original sci versions of the first games. I guess they decided to remove these since there is no point of having the originals with the remakes. Larry is missing part 7 because Vivendi did not want to put an ao rating on it because of the easter egg at the end of the game and dunno if the laffer ulilities and casino are included.

As for Vivendi releasing them with xp Compatability, sadly no. It is only the games with dosbox.

[Armakuni]

Yeah those collections are pretty bad. If you want good collections you should look for the "Roberta Williams Antology", "Quest for Glory Anthology", "Leisure Suit Larry Ultimate Pleasure Pack" and an older Police Quest collection. You can find them on eBay often.. they can be quite expensive sometimes though.

[doom saber]

I have th old police quest collection, the old lsl greatest hits and misses, and qf antholoy(the one that was released before the collection with the qfg5 demo. Only my qfg collection survived while the rest died by unnatural causes.

the old collections are better than the ones that were released by Vivendi since they have demos, interviews and trivia. I doubt Vivendi has those

Unrelated, but Vivendi is releasing love for sail on mobile. However, it a new game or remake since you are not the original Larry, the format looks different even though it is an adventure game, and sprites that look like Ken Williams and Al Lowe are in it even though they didn't work on the game.

http://www.adventuregamers.com/images/showimage.php?id=6472

[Maratanos]

Sierra I could see doing it.

Oh wait, they already have...

Caesar IV (http://www.caesariv.com/)

[Hero1]

From Bill Tiller at Autumn Moon Entertainment:

http://www.adventure-eu.com/forum/index.php?topic=1056.0

Well that about wraps up those ideas for a maniac mansion/monkey island game *sigh*

[NatsFan]

I'd love to see episodic Monkey Island games, perhaps get Ron Gilbert on the team.. that would be a dream come true for me!

I really would not like to see Monkey Island episodes. There didn't need to be any games after CMI, EMI was just redundant.

Besides, I think don't think that LucasArts are very likely to let other companies use their licenses, the only reason that Telltale got the rights to Sam & Max was because LucasArts's license expired.

[numble]

Well that about wraps up those ideas for a maniac mansion/monkey island game *sigh*

I think the option to license the IPs from Lucasarts (as in, it still belongs to you, but we'll pay you royalties, so you make money out of nothing) might still be open though. I interpret Bill's comment to mean Lucasarts is unwilling to give up ownership of IPs.

[jp-30]

Yeah. LucasArts won't sell the rights to their games, but as we know with Star Wars & Indy Jones, they're open to having third parties develop games using their licenses which they then publish.

Same as Telltale using the CSI license to make games for Ubisoft.

The old interview with Dan regarding the LucasArts licenses is still very positive.

Game Informer: A lot of those LucasArts franchises are still very popular – you spoke about Day of the Tentacle. Is there a chance you’ll be able to wrangle a few more of those away for more episodes? Are you working on that at all?

Dan Connors: It’s definitely on our minds and it’s definitely something we think about. Maybe I can give you more information a while from now. It’s definitely something that makes good sense to everybody. For them it’s the same thing. For them it’s "What’s the business model? What’s the retail model?" It’s not their type of game – it’s not Star Wars, it’s not with the movie, with the lightsaber – an action game. When trying to do the two things at the same time it makes it challenging. They’ve been trying to figure out the right solution, and hopefully Telltale is part of it.

[Armakuni]

I really would not like to see Monkey Island episodes. There didn't need to be any games after CMI, EMI was just redundant.

What I had in mind is getting Ron Gilbert on the team and going back to the end of MI2 and continue from there.

[jp-30]

Give Ron has his own game he's trying to develop, in the unlikely event that this were ever to happen I'd see Ron's role similar to that of Steve Purcell's for Sam & Max. Sort of a creative consultant, removed from the day-to-day production of the game(s).

[Buuga]

I really would not like to see Monkey Island episodes. There didn't need to be any games after CMI, EMI was just redundant.

Besides, I think don't think that LucasArts are very likely to let other companies use their licenses, the only reason that Telltale got the rights to Sam & Max was because LucasArts's license expired.

When does license for Full throttle expire?And I hope, Telltale will notice that :D the long waited sequal would be nice.. well..sam&max are good though :rolleyes:

[TribeHasSpoken]

Unlike Sam & Max, I believe Lucasarts actually owns the rights to Full Throttle and aren't just licensing them from somebody else.

[jp-30]

That's correct. LucasArts own Full Throttle, Monkey Island, Maniac Mansion / Day of the Tentacle, Zak McKraken, Grim Fandango and The Dig. The rights will only expire when they become public domain, and I think Disney has ensured that will be 100+ years.

[Buuga]

oh, ok.

Let's hope that Telltale will make just good games as lucasarts in the early days.
(Althought I didn't like Loom:D) Maybe games like full throttle or the dig musn't have sequals.

There's a tiny market area for adventure games, and best of those will get noticed. (as Sam and Max). But I have also noticed that only older people (20+) play those. We grew among them, so it's logical. So I assume, the trend of point'n click games would rise, if parents only bought games for theirselves (and let children play only those) :)

Let the lucasarts do their Star Wars crap. But how's Sierra doing?

[Derwin]

That's correct. LucasArts own Full Throttle, Monkey Island, Maniac Mansion / Day of the Tentacle, Zak McKraken, Grim Fandango and The Dig. The rights will only expire when they become public domain, and I think Disney has ensured that will be 100+ years.

I can wait.

[Certifiable]

I doubt Al Lowe'd appreciate me using his email snippets, but since it's for a decent cause, here goes:

I recently talked to Al about the prospect of Telltale nabbing Leisure Suit Larry's rights and him helping Telltale on any future ideas they have to make a proper Larry game instead of the pseudo-adventure game sequel Magna Cum Laude.
(Just like Purcell and Smith with Sam and Max and BONE.)

In a "Player One" (http://playerone.libsyn.com/) podcast, he even decided to leak a few of the ideas that had bounced around in his head ever since Sierra said "Show's over folks!", all about the "Larry 8" that never came to be.

But that aside, I asked him a few ideas I'll shorten to quick questions here.
(Bear in mind these are summaries, not what I asked him word for word.)

1) Do you own Larry's rights?
2) If it's enough, would you consider joining Smith and Purcell down at Telltale?
3) Would Ken and Roberta Williams join in too?

His replies?

1 & 2) "I don't own the rights to any of the games or characters I created for Sierra; they do. Or rather, Vivendi Games does since they own all the assets of what once was Sierra. So there's zero chance of me doing anything with those characters."

3) "The Williamses and I are happily retired now and loving life. I doubt that I'll ever go back to do another game. Not with the games market the way it is today: all sequels and violence."

So sadly, it may not be the last word, but it sure as hell sounds like it.

But, to end on a bright note, Al and more Laffer fans are headed to the FIRST (maybe ONLY) Adventure Gamer Con to celebrate many a thing, including Larry's 20th, down in VEGAS!

http://www.adventurecon.org/

So, you see, it's not all tears and goodbyes. :D

(And we also never considered him helping create NEW characters... ;) )

Oh, and to be fair to Al for using his words outside of my inbox, go, venture forth to his amusing email list called the Cyberjoke 3000 (http://www.allowe.com/Humor/cj-main.htm), or better yet, go see his website too, ingeniously called www.allowe.com (http://www.allowe.com/)!

(Oh, and for the BIG fans, his site has lots of other Larry bits, including the demo video test in 3D that WOULD have been Larry 8's format.)

[Armakuni]

Al is great, always replies to emails.. and I imagine he's getting a lot of them.

Hehe I told him once how I caught my brother with his pants down playing Larry 7 on my PC! That's both sad and funny :D

[Haggis]

I hope you disinfected the chair after he was done.

[marsan]

I can wait.

Sounds like big business. I know all about big business. Especially since I've been on a high fiber diet:

I can wait... I can wait...

[Armakuni]

I hope you disinfected the chair after he was done.
You think I hang around waiting for him to finish? :D

[Haggis]

Hahaha, that made me laugh. :D Especially with the smiley. It's comedy gold. :D And for added comedy, no I didn't expect you to hang around. I didn't expect him to hang around either, nor beat around the bush! Oh man, stupid double entendres...

[AdamG]

Yeah, Al Lowe is great. He takes care of his fans really well.

[Badwolf]

There's a tiny market area for adventure games, and best of those will get noticed. (as Sam and Max). But I have also noticed that only older people (20+) play those.
I'm 16, my brother's 12, my mate's 18 and we've all been enjoying the Sam and Max games (I got into adventure games at about 6ish, and have been playing them ever since).

It's a shame that nobody I know at college (barring one or two people) give a damn about adventure games though (one dismisses them all as 'rubbish' despite admitting having never played one), so you're probably more or less right with the 20+ comment generally.

[AdamG]

I'm 22, and I started playing computer games at 6 1/2. One of the first games we had was Star Trek Judgement Rites and Star Trek 25th Anniversary Edition. Man, I feel like an old fart. :p

And my computer? Tandy... 25mhz 486SX, 1 MB Ram, 120Mb hard drive, pc speaker sound... That's it.

[Armakuni]

I'm 26 and I started with Leisure Suit Larry 1 on my fathers laptop (beautiful black and orange :D). Next one I think was Police Quest on my Amiga 500 and then several other old Sierra games (played a lot of old Sierra games on my Amiga). Then I bought Monkey Island for the Amiga because of the great box art (I knew nothing about the game, had no clue it was an adventure game even) and that's when I really got hooked on adventure games. Of course I always liked them but that game really increased my interested in the genre a lot. From there on I bought a PC to play the 256 color Sierra adventure games (they were horribly ported to the Amiga).

[ShaggE]

I'm 22, and I started playing computer games at 6 1/2. One of the first games we had was Star Trek Judgement Rites and Star Trek 25th Anniversary Edition. Man, I feel like an old fart. :p

And my computer? Tandy... 25mhz 486SX, 1 MB Ram, 120Mb hard drive, pc speaker sound... That's it.

Damn, I miss my old Tandy 486... (I'm 20, so I cut my gaming teeth on a Tandy)

Mine had a Sound Blaster card with that Dr. Sbaitso program, I used to spend long amounts of time seeing how it would respond to various insults.

[AdamG]

Dr. Sbaitso? Never heard of it. :/ I played a lot of old Sierra games on my Tandy too. I was opening it up and upgrading it by the time I was 7. I upgraded the cpu to a 486DX 100Mhz, upgraded to 8MB of ram (to play Space Quest 6), added a CD-ROM Drive (I think it was...2 speed?), a soundcard, and a 14.4baud modem. I used to play Decent on it. Back then you dialed up a person's phone number and connected to their computer. Good times. :p

[ShaggE]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dr._Sbaitso

Back in my 486 days I mostly played games like Wolfenstein 3D and Commander Keen, which explains both why my mind is so warped (Who buys a FPS for a 6 year old?) and why I love id and Apogee so much :P

[genuineparts]

Simon the sorcerer.. Those games were brilliant.
And Outcast. There was a sequel in the works but after Infogrames died, so did the sequel.

A Simon Sequel was just relased in Germany.
http://www.simon-the-sorcerer.com/

[Certifiable]

I got into Larry after my roommate found the ORIGINAL (this is circa 2000 by the way) and a friend was there as well, and we had great fun puzzling out what to do.

I found it so much fun I bought the Ultimate Pleasure Pack - AWESOME purchase!

Er...but here comes the flammable end to the story.

Short for cash after playing most of them, I...*mumbles*...sold it to a pawn shop.

Gotta admit, that was STUPID. But at the time we had no idea how rare they would be and that no pack would equal it!

Amusingly though, I got revenge accidentally on the pawn shop: I forgot to put the manual back. Hope the next buyer can get a new one or a refund.

And there's some kind of cosmic humour that my copy's run ended with it being sold to a PAWN shop - both the chess AND sexual humour involved!
(We're always shoving Larry around after all.)

Here's hoping the Suits get wise and release a PROPER pack!

[Certifiable]

Oh, and to give hope to Al Lowe fans: I suggested that despite Larry being owned, it didn't mean Al couldn't think up a NEW adventure game for Telltale!

Ended the letter by telling him it worked well enough for Freddy Pharkas. :D

(Oh, and Life, The Universe, and Everything!)

[baron_calamity]

I don't think Sierra is quite done with their adventure IP. In 2004, Vivendi Universal's top three most profitable games were in order:

World of Warcraft
Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude
Half Life 2

Ignoring comments on quality, its clear that Sierra's adventure IP has value and they aren't going to let that go.

Why aren't they using it? They had a big problem with management turn over which managed to kill one project after another. There were 2 LSL games in development that were killed off because of the GTA Hot Coffee scare and yet another management changed. PSP game was a classic adventure game meets japanese dating sim and it was looking to be very good. The PS2 console sequel to MCL was looking horrible (and I liked MCL some what) and considering how bad Family Guy turned out (which may of been what the game transformed to after Sierra dropped them) we were probably lucky. There was a Space Quest RTS that seemed odd that got killed.

Sierra did those re-releases also. Which were rather disappointing. The gametap editions work fairly well. Nothing great but it is a lot more than Lucasarts is doing.

I personally think we'll see something from Sierra at this point years before Lucasarts lets things losing up.

That said, I rather look forwards to the new Adventure games being made by companys like Telltale.

[Certifiable]

There was even a Nokia N-Gage "LSL: Love for Sail!" that took place on...a plane. Bwha?

Al said this about it:

"I had seen those things, and yes, Love for Sail! on an airplane is about as bright as they get down there today. <sigh> And people wonder why the industry no longer makes money!"

[baron_calamity]

There was even a Nokia N-Gage "LSL: Love for Sail!" that took place on...a plane. Bwha?

Al said this about it:

"I had seen those things, and yes, Love for Sail! on an airplane is about as bright as they get down there today. <sigh> And people wonder why the industry no longer makes money!"

I'd ignore Al since he hasn't been completely truthful about his dealings with VU with his fans. He doesn't have to be, but I find everything he says as suspect these days.

What I've read is the game takes place on an airplane, casino and a cruise ship, with the cruise ship being the largest part area. It *may* come out on the N-Gage but its going to be available for just about any phone that can do games (it will be up to your carrier)

[doom saber]

True since Al is in the game, so I assume he had some involvement in the game.