I would have been inclined to give the same charitable interpretation, but then I stumbled upon this Arstechnica article [1] from the time of the sale with a qu

I would have been inclined to give the same charitable interpretation, but then I stumbled upon this Arstechnica article [1] from the time of the sale with a quoted statement from the Stardock CEO Brad Wardell: “We won't be making any changes to the existing Star Control games. And Atari doesn't actually own the copyright on Star Control 1/2 so it's not like one could make a Star Control 2 HD or what have you without a license from Paul Reiche. And even if we did have rights to SC 1/2 I wouldn't touch them without his blessing.” [1]: https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/07/stardock-acquires-star-control-rights-in-fire-sale-plans-reboot/ https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2013/07/stardock-acquires-sta... I simply do not know how the interpret the above quote in any other way than that Stardock was aware that at least some of the rights were retained by Paul Reiche III at the time of, or immediately following, the purchase from Atari.