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The Star Control devs (and the company Toys for Bob) have been very accomodating toward freeware fan projects and ports of their games (see http://sc2.sourcefor

The Star Control devs (and the company Toys for Bob) have been very accomodating toward freeware fan projects and ports of their games (see http://sc2.sourceforge.net/ http://sc2.sourceforge.net/) for decades now. The fact that they're litigating this leads me to think Stardock's actions are really egregious.

xupybd 8y ago
From my reading of the article. Stardock purchased some rights to the franchise. Then the original authors released a new game in the series. Stardock then sued the original authors as they believe they now own the franchise. The original authors are now counter suing. Edit: after reading https://www.stardock.com/games/starcontrol/article/487690/qa-regarding-star-control-and-paul-and-fred https://www.stardock.com/games/starcontrol/article/487690/qa... it seems Stardock only sued in response to take down notices. Second Edit: after reading https://www.dogarandkazon.com/ https://www.dogarandkazon.com/ I have no idea who sued who first. Both accounts don't seem to agree. Third Edit: Watch the video in cdumler's comment it gives a very good summary from the courts.
- crooked-v 8y ago
  The takedown notices were entirely legit, given that the original devs retain the copyrights to various bits of content that Stardock used without permission. Stardock's lawsuit, in comparison, seems pretty baseless, given that Stardock only owns the SC trademarks, and Reiche and Ford are obviously avoiding use of those in their game.
  - MikusR 8y ago
    The origins game has no bits of content from original games.
    - extropy 8y ago
      The DLC however does.
      - MikusR 8y ago
        It was newer released. And the DMCA claim was against main game and not DLC.
cdumler 8y ago
I've been a long time fan of Star Control. I've been watching things for a while. If you check out YouTuber Law on YouTube, you can get a really good take. Not a lawyer, so my layperson's understanding: The creators sold the rights for Star Control's trade mark, marketing and distribution rights on the condition that if the game fails to generate $1,000 in revenue then all rights revert to them. The distributing company eventually stopped selling the game. The creators presumed the rights reverted to them, but never got a declaratory judgement to legally cover that they did. The defunct rights were eventually sold through companies until it wound up with Atari, who sold the trade mark rights to Stardock. Stardock believes that the contract for the copywrite is still in effect; thus, they own the franchise. Stardock wanted to make a game and began doing so. It's he said/she said at this point: Creators says they were in discussions with Stardock who wanted to by rights to the copywrite to make a game, but ultimately the creators said, "No, we want to make a sequel." Stardock says they told the creators they have the rights to make the game and wanted their blessings/input. There appears to be evidence that Stardock's version of events have changed over time and misrepresents events. Whatever the case, Stardock decided to go ahead with the idea that the most the creators could own is the original characters, artwork and music. So, they made a game with the core idea but with alternate versions of the characters, art and music. The DMCA takedown was issued because it appears that Stardock then decided to use some original characters in the game, to which the original creators claim copywrite. The most recent court ruling was less than stellar for Stardock, who used very poor legal arguments: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ieb1ajwwUFo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ieb1ajwwUFo
- Centigonal 8y ago
  Thanks for the succinct explanation & video!
- smacktoward 8y ago
  Good summary! One small correction/amplification: > Stardock wanted to make a game and began doing so. It's he said/she said at this point The filing in the Leonard French video indicates that the court has access to correspondence between Wardell and Reiche/Ford from this period, in which Wardell explicitly acknowledges Reiche/Ford's claims to the SC1/2 IP and says that he accepts those claims as valid and would not incorporate such IP into his new game without a license from them. (Which Reiche/Ford refused to grant.) Much later on, Stardock released DLC content packs for Star Control: Origins that incorporated some of those very IP elements Wardell acknowledged Reiche/Ford's rights to into that game. Example: - Star Control: Origins Arilou Content Pack: https://steamdb.info/app/899550/ https://steamdb.info/app/899550/ - The Arilou alien race from Star Control and Star Control 2: http://wiki.uqm.stack.nl/Arilou_Lalee%27lay http://wiki.uqm.stack.nl/Arilou_Lalee%27lay So if Wardell is saying now that he has never accepted Reiche and Ford's claimed rights to the SC1/2 IP, and the court has written evidence that at one point in the past he absolutely did acknowledge those rights, that would put the dispute outside the "he said/she said" zone.
mcv 8y ago
> The fact that they're litigating this leads me to think Stardock's actions are really egregious. I don't see how they are, though. If those emails in Stardock's description of events are genuine, it seems Brad Wardell went out of his way to accommodate and include Paul and Fred in the project as much as possible. Paul and Fred's announcement seems to have come rather unexpectedly and seems to have been timed to coincide with Stardock's release. While I'm generally predisposed to like two indie developers trying to claim their rights back, my impression here is really that Brad and Stardock acted in good faith every step of the way, while Paul and Fred sprang some nasty surprises on him. Though it's entirely possible that Stardock is presenting a skewed version of the history, of course.
- anjbe 8y ago
  After reading Stardock’s lawsuit (https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.320268/gov.uscourts.cand.320268.51.0.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.320268...) and Paul and Fred’s response (https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.320268/gov.uscourts.cand.320268.50.0.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.320268...) several months ago, I came to the opposite conclusion. Fred and Paul were initially sued for saying their new game, Ghosts of the Precursors, is a sequel to the game Star Control II from 1992. Which it is. And that it contains the characters from that game. Which it does. They own the copyright on both the game and the characters, and can legally release a sequel if they want; they’re only missing the name. Maybe it would have been wiser for them to call it a sequel to “our unnamed game from 1992.” But getting that wrong shouldn’t warrant a lawsuit, especially one with such misleading claims as Stardock filed. In light of the response Paul and Fred filed, as well as the posts they’ve made on their blog (https://www.dogarandkazon.com/ https://www.dogarandkazon.com/), I interpret the email chains from Stardock differently from “good faith every step of the way”: rather, as Wardell earnestly wishing to create a sequel with the original (copyrighted) characters and universe, being rebuffed, and petulantly claiming not only that his partial rights (trademark + SC3 partial copyright) allow him full control over the Star Control universe (including, e.g., to incorporate Paul and Fred’s characters in DLC for SC:O as he has done) but also ludicrously claiming that they never owned any rights at all, despite contracts to the contrary. I quote from Stardock’s complaint above: > This at least 30-year long misrepresentation and false narrative that Reiche and Ford peddled to Accolade, Atari and to fans of the Classic Star Control Games [that they are the “creators” of Star Control], has resulted in Reiche (who contracted with Accolade and was paid to develop the game despite never having rights to what he purported to license to Accolade) effectively holding hostage whatever copyrighted material that exists in Star Control II and preventing others (including the true authors) from benefiting from it. I tried to come up with a charitable reading of that quote, and simply couldn’t. To say nothing of this other quote from another comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18805155 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18805155

xupybd 8y ago

From my reading of the article. Stardock purchased some rights to the franchise. Then the original authors released a new game in the series. Stardock then sued the original authors as they believe they now own the franchise. The original authors are now counter suing. Edit: after reading https://www.stardock.com/games/starcontrol/article/487690/qa-regarding-star-control-and-paul-and-fred https://www.stardock.com/games/starcontrol/article/487690/qa... it seems Stardock only sued in response to take down notices. Second Edit: after reading https://www.dogarandkazon.com/ https://www.dogarandkazon.com/ I have no idea who sued who first. Both accounts don't seem to agree. Third Edit: Watch the video in cdumler's comment it gives a very good summary from the courts.

crooked-v 8y ago
The takedown notices were entirely legit, given that the original devs retain the copyrights to various bits of content that Stardock used without permission. Stardock's lawsuit, in comparison, seems pretty baseless, given that Stardock only owns the SC trademarks, and Reiche and Ford are obviously avoiding use of those in their game.
- MikusR 8y ago
  The origins game has no bits of content from original games.
  - extropy 8y ago
    The DLC however does.
    - MikusR 8y ago
      It was newer released. And the DMCA claim was against main game and not DLC.

cdumler 8y ago

I've been a long time fan of Star Control. I've been watching things for a while. If you check out YouTuber Law on YouTube, you can get a really good take. Not a lawyer, so my layperson's understanding: The creators sold the rights for Star Control's trade mark, marketing and distribution rights on the condition that if the game fails to generate $1,000 in revenue then all rights revert to them. The distributing company eventually stopped selling the game. The creators presumed the rights reverted to them, but never got a declaratory judgement to legally cover that they did. The defunct rights were eventually sold through companies until it wound up with Atari, who sold the trade mark rights to Stardock. Stardock believes that the contract for the copywrite is still in effect; thus, they own the franchise. Stardock wanted to make a game and began doing so. It's he said/she said at this point: Creators says they were in discussions with Stardock who wanted to by rights to the copywrite to make a game, but ultimately the creators said, "No, we want to make a sequel." Stardock says they told the creators they have the rights to make the game and wanted their blessings/input. There appears to be evidence that Stardock's version of events have changed over time and misrepresents events. Whatever the case, Stardock decided to go ahead with the idea that the most the creators could own is the original characters, artwork and music. So, they made a game with the core idea but with alternate versions of the characters, art and music. The DMCA takedown was issued because it appears that Stardock then decided to use some original characters in the game, to which the original creators claim copywrite. The most recent court ruling was less than stellar for Stardock, who used very poor legal arguments: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ieb1ajwwUFo https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ieb1ajwwUFo

Centigonal 8y ago
Thanks for the succinct explanation & video!
smacktoward 8y ago
Good summary! One small correction/amplification: > Stardock wanted to make a game and began doing so. It's he said/she said at this point The filing in the Leonard French video indicates that the court has access to correspondence between Wardell and Reiche/Ford from this period, in which Wardell explicitly acknowledges Reiche/Ford's claims to the SC1/2 IP and says that he accepts those claims as valid and would not incorporate such IP into his new game without a license from them. (Which Reiche/Ford refused to grant.) Much later on, Stardock released DLC content packs for Star Control: Origins that incorporated some of those very IP elements Wardell acknowledged Reiche/Ford's rights to into that game. Example: - Star Control: Origins Arilou Content Pack: https://steamdb.info/app/899550/ https://steamdb.info/app/899550/ - The Arilou alien race from Star Control and Star Control 2: http://wiki.uqm.stack.nl/Arilou_Lalee%27lay http://wiki.uqm.stack.nl/Arilou_Lalee%27lay So if Wardell is saying now that he has never accepted Reiche and Ford's claimed rights to the SC1/2 IP, and the court has written evidence that at one point in the past he absolutely did acknowledge those rights, that would put the dispute outside the "he said/she said" zone.

mcv 8y ago

> The fact that they're litigating this leads me to think Stardock's actions are really egregious. I don't see how they are, though. If those emails in Stardock's description of events are genuine, it seems Brad Wardell went out of his way to accommodate and include Paul and Fred in the project as much as possible. Paul and Fred's announcement seems to have come rather unexpectedly and seems to have been timed to coincide with Stardock's release. While I'm generally predisposed to like two indie developers trying to claim their rights back, my impression here is really that Brad and Stardock acted in good faith every step of the way, while Paul and Fred sprang some nasty surprises on him. Though it's entirely possible that Stardock is presenting a skewed version of the history, of course.

anjbe 8y ago
After reading Stardock’s lawsuit (https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.320268/gov.uscourts.cand.320268.51.0.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.320268...) and Paul and Fred’s response (https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.320268/gov.uscourts.cand.320268.50.0.pdf https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.cand.320268...) several months ago, I came to the opposite conclusion. Fred and Paul were initially sued for saying their new game, Ghosts of the Precursors, is a sequel to the game Star Control II from 1992. Which it is. And that it contains the characters from that game. Which it does. They own the copyright on both the game and the characters, and can legally release a sequel if they want; they’re only missing the name. Maybe it would have been wiser for them to call it a sequel to “our unnamed game from 1992.” But getting that wrong shouldn’t warrant a lawsuit, especially one with such misleading claims as Stardock filed. In light of the response Paul and Fred filed, as well as the posts they’ve made on their blog (https://www.dogarandkazon.com/ https://www.dogarandkazon.com/), I interpret the email chains from Stardock differently from “good faith every step of the way”: rather, as Wardell earnestly wishing to create a sequel with the original (copyrighted) characters and universe, being rebuffed, and petulantly claiming not only that his partial rights (trademark + SC3 partial copyright) allow him full control over the Star Control universe (including, e.g., to incorporate Paul and Fred’s characters in DLC for SC:O as he has done) but also ludicrously claiming that they never owned any rights at all, despite contracts to the contrary. I quote from Stardock’s complaint above: > This at least 30-year long misrepresentation and false narrative that Reiche and Ford peddled to Accolade, Atari and to fans of the Classic Star Control Games [that they are the “creators” of Star Control], has resulted in Reiche (who contracted with Accolade and was paid to develop the game despite never having rights to what he purported to license to Accolade) effectively holding hostage whatever copyrighted material that exists in Star Control II and preventing others (including the true authors) from benefiting from it. I tried to come up with a charitable reading of that quote, and simply couldn’t. To say nothing of this other quote from another comment: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18805155 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18805155