Status of the D3 code/copyright

[rastoboy]

Not sure if this is the right place to ask, but does anyone know who currently owns the source and copyright to d3?

Lee

[Grendel]

Matt Toschlog owns the D3 source code. No idea who owns the (c).

[Duper]

Isn't the copyright split between Parallax and Interplay?

Interplay owns the name and some vid and network code rghts and Parallax source rights? Val explained it once about 3 years ago.

[Kyouryuu]

Well, Descent recently popped up on Volition's web site for the first time ever. Course, FreeSpace was there for a long while...

[rastoboy]

Thanks for the responses.

Frankly, I'm interested in buying the code and taking a crack at D4...

I did try to contact Mr. Toschlog but didn't receive a reply, which may indicate a lack of interest, ability, or perhaps he's just on vacation.

Has anyone else tried to do anything like this? Or has the community tried to do it to GPL it?

Lee

[d3jake]

I'd like the scripting source for it. I'd like to know how they do some things in there...

[kaelan]

I'd definitely be willing to donate to an effort to buy and GPL the D3 source code. I'd love to finish up that D3 OS X port that was in the works.

[Mobius]

Frankly, I'm interested in buying the code and taking a crack at D4...

Lee - you are a funny bastard, that is for sure. I laughed and laughed, until I stopped, in fact.

You are a dreamer - and the best thing you can do, is STOP WASTING YOUR TIME THINKING ABOUT DESCENT 4.

Instead, go and get behind Core Decision and Into Cerberon. They are the future of Descent-like games.

Descent is dead.

And if it EVER rises from the grave, it will take a budget of over 4 Million US dollars to release it.

Now - get off the crack. Please.

[Nosferatu]

He does have one point though.

Since no one wants to make any money off it anyway, why not at least release the code?

Then we can have an effort like Diedels on D3 as well as D2.

[rastoboy]

Actually, if I had my druthers I would GPL it, too. No real risk (that I can see) to the owner of the copyright, as I don't think it would be commercially feasable to release a game with source code just to avoid paying royalties.

[zbriggs]

Actually I can tell you the exact details of the copyright for Descent if you like. We looked at doing it in the begining but after a great deal of research and a great many conversations we got to the bottom of things and decided that we would make a new game rather than work on the old one.

Feel free to contact me if you like.

Sincerely,
Zachary Briggs, Executive Producer
HighOctane Software
(866)328-1886
zach@highoctane.biz

[Escorter]

Descent is dead.

NOOOO!!!!! DESCENT LIVES!

[Nosferatu]

Actually I can tell you the exact details of the copyright for Descent if you like. We looked at doing it in the begining but after a great deal of research and a great many conversations we got to the bottom of things and decided that we would make a new game rather than work on the old one.

Feel free to contact me if you like.

Sincerely,
Zachary Briggs, Executive Producer
HighOctane Software
(866)328-1886
zach@highoctane.biz

Actually I cant wait to see the full game and Ill probably be a player of it.

That said, I have read a few details from your FAQ that definately do not like.

I'll probably still be a player of D3 for a good time to come even after CD is out.

[rastoboy]

Yes, by all means, please enlighten us. I was offered licensing arrangements from two different (I presume) entities, so I'd be curious to hear about it, just as a fan for that matter.

Lee

[Templeton]

Actually, I am curious as to why everyone is so caught up in the \"Copyright\" portion of this. I am by no means a programmer or know much about it.

I do, however, have a substantial background from the legal perspective and Intellectual Properties. Unless what is a part of the actual character for character sequence of the language is vital to carrying on the legacy, you could just skip all of this and go for the throat on the actual \"Trademark\" portion.

The \"Trademark\" is the actual branded name and persona of Descent anyway, so could you not just use an up to date engine and write new code based on the same art and premise of the Descent series?

[Duper]

because, anything with \"Descent\" on it, Interplay will hammer you. and that's pretty much it.

[Templeton]

Well that would fall under the \"trademark\" section and not the copyright. BTW, the Descent trademark has been abandoned and Interplay has no claims to it anymore. They have, however, continued to keep the Freespace one active.

Thinking of contacting the PTO about acquiring that Trademark.

[zbriggs]

Actually I can tell you the exact details of the copyright for Descent if you like. We looked at doing it in the begining but after a great deal of research and a great many conversations we got to the bottom of things and decided that we would make a new game rather than work on the old one.

Feel free to contact me if you like.

Sincerely,
Zachary Briggs, Executive Producer
HighOctane Software
(866)328-1886
zach@highoctane.biz

Actually I cant wait to see the full game and Ill probably be a player of it.

That said, I have read a few details from your FAQ that definately do not like.

I'll probably still be a player of D3 for a good time to come even after CD is out.

What didn't you like on the FAQ?

Zach

[Nosferatu]

What didn't you like on the FAQ?

· Golly, this all looks so difficult! How am I supposed to be able to compete in multiplayer with long-time 6DOFers?

Core Decision multiplayer runs off of a tier-based difficulty system. The highest difficulty setting, Leet, has all axes enabled, whereas the lower difficulty settings have various levels of movement restrictions.

If you play on a newbie server you only have to worry about 3 axes. If a 6DOF veteran joins that same server, he will be subject to the same restrictions. The playing field thereby automatically evens itself out.

Somehow the idea of having a 6DOF emulate a ground pounder makes me ill.

Oh and this

· Will there be more than one ship?

No.

[Diedel]

Frankly, I'm interested in buying the code and taking a crack at D4...

Lee - you are a funny bastard, that is for sure. I laughed and laughed, until I stopped, in fact.

You are a dreamer - and the best thing you can do, is STOP WASTING YOUR TIME THINKING ABOUT DESCENT 4.

Instead, go and get behind Core Decision and Into Cerberon. They are the future of Descent-like games.

Descent is dead.

And if it EVER rises from the grave, it will take a budget of over 4 Million US dollars to release it.

Now - get off the crack. Please.

Mobi, you are so very disappointed.

[Gold Leader]

Descent is dead.

NOOOO!!!!! DESCENT LIVES!

I agree Descent will always livve for true fans

@ Escorter if you think Descent is dead why would you waiste your time by playing it then, that doesn't sound like your a fan of it lol

As a proud owner of the Voodoo5 6000 and descent3 Descent 3 is also the ultimate 3dfx game on a V6K it was made for the Voodoo3 it had the most advanced 3dfx Glide effects of it's time.

the Voodoo5 6000 runs Descent3 flawlessly @ 1024 x 768 x 16 @ Glide with FSAA x8 and in Glide it looks the best

Even I would like to have known what type of engine DescentIV: Invasion would of had, or if it also was gonna support 3dfx Glide for my purpose in testing 3dfx Prototypes I was ready for anthing.

As for the new games titles comming out, they will never replace a game series as good as Descent 1 through 3, that is totally impossible, as a Descent fan there will be nothing better than the original it's self.

Those new games don't have an original idea they copied the idea from the makers of the Descent series so nothing new imho, okay a different name & Story line lol

[Kilarin]

Somehow the idea of having a 6DOF emulate a ground pounder makes me ill.

This is the reaction I was afraid that Core Decisions "training" mode would get from regular players. I posted an alternative here, but they do seem set on limiting the axis. I think I'll do something in the the Core Decision forum discussing this.

[Escorter]

@ Escorter if you think Descent is dead why would you waiste your time by playing it then, that doesn't sound like your a fan of it lol

I don't think Descent is dead. It's my all-time favourite game. And I'm a huge fan of it!

[Burlyman]

That's cause you're just dreaming! lol

I notice a lot of Descent players think I'm nothing but a negative S.O.B., but the truth is, it takes a lot for this Material Defender to admit that DESCENT IS DEAD...seeing D4 die twice is what did it for me.

Now this is one situation where y'all can't just blurt out \"STFU MOBIUS!\" ^_~ I'll have to agree with him here...but whatever you do, please don't use the crappy Fusion Engine to make D4. =P Besides...Descent has its design problems...like overpowered missiles in multiplayer. Time to move on. Now I'm going to go play some D2. =P

[Valin Halcyon]

Who reopened this can of worms? Man, I get a stab of pain through my heart each time...

Just did a bit of poking around at the copyright office though. I see no REGISTERED trademarks for Descent, but I found the copyright entries for the Descent materials though.

Descent 1 demo and retail are separate entries, and belong to Parallax Software.

Heh, Descent, Equinox and Stealing Thunder, by Peter Telep is owned buy PX too.

Descent II is owned wholley by Parallax Software, one entry for demo and full version. Interesting..Parallax owns the copyright on the Redbook, not Interplay. The game's manual even falls under the entry.

A revelation....Descent 3 is owned by..OUTRAGE ENTERTAINMENT Inc. So is D3 Merc.

Never is there a mention of Interplay, so I assume the stuff dealing with Interplay is in the publishing contracts for the games...which of course is not public domain. Oh well.

Hope that clears up questions...with the sale of Outrage to THQ I can only assume that D3's copyright went with it. The display of D1 and D2 on Volition's site seems to tell us that PX has been merged into Volition.

[Kilarin]

It's time for someone to speak up in defense of the d3 Fusion engine. I LIKE it. I LOVE being able to fly outdoors oocasionally. I like having the ability to have much more complicated plots and goals than you could in d1 or d2. Come on, d1 and d2 WERE a lot of fun, but it was still,

1: grab three keys
2: blow the reactor
3: next mine.

repeat ad. nausium.

Were there weapon ballance issues in D3? yes. Did multiplayer have great big hulking holes in it? yes. But these issues could be fixed if we had access to the FUSION code. And there are other changes I'd like to make as well, new enhancments in gameplay etc. But all of these could probably be done just fine within the FUSION engine.

Now I've heard people griping about the graphics, that if a new Descent doesn't look like the latest Halo, it won't be worth playing. I have something to say on that as well.

Phhhbbbbtttttt! On graphics!!!!

D3 looked just fine, and plays FAST on my old 1.8mhz machine. Give us an updated version of D3 with bug fixes, weapon reballance, and a few cool enhancements, and you will attract a potentially much large audience because they don't have to have the brandest newest machine with a $500 voodoo card just to make it run.

[Duper]

weapon balance? Define please.


What gaping holes in mutliplayer?

[Valin Halcyon]

I agree wholeheartedly...so...D4 as a D2 TC anyone? j/k

Though, with Diedel's work, especially in the realms of more cubes and really high Q textures and higher polycount, it may be possible to eventually...uhh..make a D3 TC of D2. We do after all know most/all of the D3 resource file formats. Give D2 the ability to load those files, then add support for the various stuff we've come to expect form D3..without the expected bugs, of course.

The vertice oriented level format would make porting levels really hard...not sure how possible it'd be to render them with D2's current engine, that may make it impossible to port D3 levels without writing a new level rendering engine for D3 levels.

At any rate, I'm not going to undertake any such project (in case you were getting your hopes up...), you'll find me working on D2X-XL soon, I still have the Tigg and Prime models, as well as their performance info from Descent Online. I plan to work on getting those installed and working with D2X-XL, and build a file formatting system to allow \"drop in\" custom ships. Given the nature of the upgraded D2X engine, I may just drop in higher poly models of the ships anyway...like the GX that Eagle made for D4 that's floating around in D3 modder's archives. It's certainly low poly enough for cards these days. DIV was targeted to work well on GF4s.

[Kilarin]

weapon balance? Define please.

I haven't heard anyone complaining about SP, just MP. Mainly complaints about the black pyro, the Omega cannon, and sometimes the MD. And, as quoted right above in this same thread:

overpowered missiles in multiplayer

To me these are non issues. I LIKE the MD. If anyone can get a hit with that darn thing, they DESERVE to send me spinning into oblivion. But if you don't like a weapon, change it or leave it out. It's not an engine issue.

What gaping holes in mutliplayer?

Descent 3 is vulnerable to a lot of cheating in MP. That's why there has been so much debate about the 1.5 patch. It's not official, but many people want to run it because it stops the cheaters. My personal opinion is that the D3 community is so small right now that cheating isn't much of a problem anymore. BUT, if we did get a serious revival going again, this issue would need to be addressed. But you could do that if you had the net code for D3 available.

make a D3 TC of D2 j/k

Too bad we couldn't add outdoor support to the D2 engine, then you really could do it.

Here's a few things *I* would like to see changed if we ever got so lucky as to get a D4.

1: Remove or at least raise the ceiling on the outdoor engine. This isn't critical, but it would be nice.

2: I really don't like the fact that when I pick up a cloak or rapidfire, it has to be used RIGHT THEN. I'd like the OPTION to store them and use it later. It needs to be an OPTION, because you want to keep them in their current "pickup auto-activate" mode for MP, but in SP I want to be able to run over a cloak, then hit a key later to activate it. Also, I think for game balance reasons it would probably be best to limit it so that you can only store ONE cloak or rapid-fire at a time.

3: I want a way to DELETE cameras! I LOVE the camera/marker feature in d3, but it's very frustrating to drop a marker saying "black shark here", then later come back and pick up the black shark but not be able to eliminate the marker.

4: Dump or modify the cyclone. It's really not a very useful secondary.

5: Replace the bouncing betty (Has anyone ever seen one of those hit ANYTHING?) with a short fuse mortar that fires backwards. Now THAT would be a nice surprise for anything chasing you.

6: It would certainly be nice if there were an audio "radio" system for communicating in multiplayer. Wouldn't need to be high quality, low quality sound would probably add to the "feel", and you would certainly want to limit the number and size of messages that could be sent. This might not work out real well in practice, but it certainly SOUNDS cool, and the internet has sped up enough it really should be able to handle short verbal messages in-game.

[Duper]

Thanks Kilarin. I can agree with those. LOL at bettys. ... i think I might have gotten a kill once. ...a loooonggg time ago. counter measures have always been a sore point as it takes more bandwidth. But like you said, leave them out as a server host.

The black pyro has never bothered me much, but I don't use it much as too many ppl whine about it, so I normally use a pyro (GX). I love that mod. It's a great model. I don't like the way any of the others fly. The tank is ok, but it's a bit much imo in normal anarcy. It's like in mech4 where everyone uses the biggest most heavily armed mech they can muster. This is fine as it's part of the game, but it gets boring. I'll get the smallest fastest mech I can build with 1 heavy laser and just pester the bigger slower mechs.
Yea, I die a lot but it's fun!

[Escorter]

1: grab three keys
2: blow the reactor
3: next mine.

You forgot the robots!

[Kilarin]

You forgot the robots! Very

Ha! Yes, they WERE a significant factor.

[Peter]

Lets stop talking about what we would do if we get the code and lets talk about actually getting the code! Someone needs to talk to Outrage Entertainment or THQ as, according to Halcyon, they own the copyright.

[Duper]

If you read between the lines, I think you would see that the answer is no. Valin already tried and went to great pains a couple of years ago to build a Descent game. I don't think we will ever get the source. We only need the 1.5 patch finished and that would be it. In all reality, the Fusion engine isn't that esy to work with from what I've heard and it's 6 years old. There are better ones out there now.

[Escorter]

We want the code, because D3 needs a lot of bugfix and enhancement. We don't want to make a new Descent with it. Please tell me: how many new games created with the Descent 1/2 engine?

[Duper]

Do you really want me to answer that?




You are right however. I wasn't thinkin clearly. 5 hours of sleep over the last week has taken a toll on this aging body.

[Top Gun]

Actually, believe it or not, the engine of the two FreeSpace games is based off of a modified Descent II engine.

[Duper]

Descent under the Mountain was also wasn't it? but these were all Parallax games.

bah ...details.

[Valin Halcyon]

*points to Top Gun's comment

Yes indeed. FS and FS2 are built on a vastly improved and not to mention expanded DII engine. BTW, it also has a very last minute up to date glide renderer.

As for talking to someone about copyrights...LOL! They are right, I took it as far as it was possible to go. I had an Interplay Producer assigned to Orbital and everything. He worked hard, I worked hard..no one could get Matt or Mike to talk compromise, and I mean that exactly. I never delt with functionaries or secretaries except when they were not in the office. Forget it. Unless it's from Parallax (or maybe THQ? Still don't know if they aquired Descent through the buying of Volition/Outrage), there WILL BE NO D4.

[Escorter]

Orbital wanted the rights of the title \"Descent\", because they wanted to make D4, right? We dont want the rights of the Descent title, we simply want the source code.

BTW Sorry for my bad english... It's 1:31 AM, and I'm tired.