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Night Dive Studios: How One Company Is Bringing Old Video Games Back From The Dead
- Thread starter Lime
- Start date
Abandonware. Though I still own both of my Nolf1&2 CDs.
Kick actually outlined this plan in my interview, he feels that Night Dive needs to build up more clout, enough clout to where the megaliths would take Night Dive seriously.
What kind of clout is that? Economic? Awareness? Making their own games that become overly successful to garner attention from the corporate megaliths?
Didn't indicate that much.
Sounds more like a hypothetical situation rather than any real sort of plan.
pantsattack
Member
What Capcom games would be out there?
There were PC versions of a lot of their older games like Resident Evil, Dino Crisis and some of the Street Fighters that aren't available anywhere currently.
jaundicejuice
Member
Warner Bros essentially killed Night Dive's attempt at re-releasing No One Lives Forever and then did fuck and all afterwards. Such a shitty company.
pantsattack
Member
Well, I bought Alpha 2 on GOG and it runs real real bad. Hopefully it's not like that.
In this thread I learn that GOG has Alpha 2. Interesting. Even stranger is that it's literally the only Capcom game on GOG.
Lol. Thanks for the update.
No problems.
A couple old Amiga games (like Wings) are available on Gog via emulation. There's some great emulation packages and groups out there that painlessly get Amiga games running on Windows with their own executable, I'd love if gog looked into doing more of that in a legal way.
I've also noticed another platform called Zoom that seems to be making deals. As far as I know they have the exclusive rights to sell their own updated versions of old PC games like Killing Time, Requiem Avenging Angel, Zone Raiders, Uprising and other 3DO published games.
Those are just emulation and not actual ports though.
It is still something.
Hot Coldman
Banned
Holy shit, for real? That's fantastic.
This is what I was told.
I'd love that. I think Jase Hall owns Condemned now? I remember earlier in the year him looking for an indie developer to make a Condemned 3.
That was accurate last I heard.
D
Deleted member 80556
Unconfirmed Member
I still remember people saying a SS2 re-release would never happen due to the copyright issues. I'm still amazed they were able to do it. They're awesome.
Considering this, I hope that Night Dive tries again to get NOLF, I doubt WB would oppose considering their alternative is dead in the water.
Considering this, I hope that Night Dive tries again to get NOLF, I doubt WB would oppose considering their alternative is dead in the water.
afternoon delight
Member
Wait what?
Gentleman Jack
Member
Suck a kick in the balls. Fuck any publisher that just sits on old IP rather than come to an agreement that actually pleases fans. A lot of them are guilty of this!
Q
Queen of Hunting
Unconfirmed Member
nice so turok comes before christmas wooo 
nice so turok comes before christmas wooo
Seems what they would be aiming for, at least get the game out there before the Steam Sale.
MulderYuffie
Member
Night Dive Studios is a fantastic publisher and can't wait for Turok and whatever else they have in their future.
Dragoon En Regalia
Member
Sad to hear there's no progress on getting the rights for re-publishing Azrael's Tear. That's a game I think really deserves its spot in the limelight, years after it was discarded by the press. Hopefully Night Dive could get access to any source code and prepare an improved version.
Actually I was told just yesterday that there has been movement in that direction but things are looking a bit nebulous but they may work something out.
charlequin
Banned
Large companies like this are incompetent by design. Once a large, publicly traded company is operating in a self-sustaining state and shareholders become the biggest levers on its behavior, it becomes much more risky to try something unusual and potentially fail than it is to just ignore even slam-dunk opportunities -- because ignoring an opportunity doesn't get bad ink but screwing even a minor thing up does. When a large company like this does things that are daring or savvy, it's because individual people with enough power to do so have taken it upon themselves to actually do something useful with their time.
Who is the rights holder in this case? That surprises me a bit more if it's a single company.
Whoever it is who made the call to shut them down on this is some jackass stuffed suit with "VP" in his title who'll be in another division or another company in five years. Especially with tough nuts to crack like LucasArts, past experience has shown that the best strategy is just to be persistent and try again periodically so you get to roll the dice again with the next person filling the same job.
The individual in question was not named as you would expect but recalling from the earlier third interview they were apparently rather eccentric. Like they had to track him down to a private island or something to that effect and they said they were not interested in seeing the game re-released.
Crimsonclaw111
Member
Really glad to hear Turok 2 is coming too, I don't remember if I had heard about 2 when the first was announced.
Also a big fuck you to WB.
Also a big fuck you to WB.
Shame "No One Lives Forever" fell through. I really hope they go back and try to get the three parties on board. There's a demand there, and the three are stupid to not let Night Dive do it.
Also if they're getting Forsaken, I'd love for them to get the Descent IP proper. But given that Interplay is still "alive" in name and given the name/IP to a multiplayer-shooter that'll never happen. Blech.
Also if they're getting Forsaken, I'd love for them to get the Descent IP proper. But given that Interplay is still "alive" in name and given the name/IP to a multiplayer-shooter that'll never happen. Blech.
charlequin
Banned
Oh, it's an individual person, not a company.
Glad I met the download then.
I own the game on Saturn, PSX, and PC (which is completely different) but the recent PC port that was pulled just plays so much better. It's truly night and day. The Saturn version was great for its day and but the frame-rate is quite low and the controls difficult. PSX version runs smoother and is slightly different but it's also even more variable since they uncapped the frame-rate.
Maybe, but the Kotaku article says that Acti and Fox each said they may have something, but didn't have the records on hand to prove it, and it was WB's change of heart that ultimately put a stop to things.
It's hard to say whether or not Acti has anything without knowing what Vivendi actually bought all the way back in 2003; buyouts of companies aren't always as simple as "Here is some money; give us everything that was published under your name." For all we know, by buying Fox Interactive, Vivendi bought the right to publish games based on Fox properties without needing to worry about licensing fees (indeed, it released a few Fox-related games in the few years following the buyout) while Fox itself retained ownership of the games it had previously published, which could indeed be the case given there's no transfer of ownership data for Fox Interactive titles on Copyright.gov (20th Century Fox is still listed as the copyright claimant).
Late edit: Another small nugget of info to consider, relating to the above: The original Alien vs Predator was being published on Steam by Fox until last September (it's now self-published by Rebellion). Rebellion promptly began working on a GOG/Steam cross-play patch, and as far as I can tell the game didn't release on GOG until after the publisher change on Steam.
Night Dive: huge mega publishers, just dedicate one lawyer to search through files and get to the bottom of the copyright situation for the benefit of the industry.
WB, Activision, and Fox: Nah fam