RTS Halo Mod Stopped by Microsoft 182
Headcase88 writes "Microsoft has officially asked the creators of Halogen to stop development at once. Halogen was an RTS mod being developed by Halo fans for the past three years. From the website: ' I was going to write a big sappy letter here, but what's the point. So..that's it then, I guess. The forums, site, and Moddb profile will all be shut down within the week. I can't say it hasn't been fun. It's a shame it has to end like this, but I suppose that's how it goes. Thanks, guys, for all the time you've spent supporting us. It's been a pleasure. We hate this as much as you do.' "
Too bad... (Score:5, Funny)
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That's trademarks. Copyright doesn't require enforcement - everyone could use your works and then you could sue Joe Bob 'cause you think he's ugly. As long as he doesn't have explicit permission to your works, you're in the right.
I put it down to lawyers being lawyers, and businesses being myopic in general. I'm sure they have their reasons, and I'm sure they're silly, but they take it seriously.
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That said, all of the "non-Quake3" models, art, and sounds are done from scratch to match the "original" art and sounds as best as possible, but there are definately differences. Wirehead couldn't just rip the models/skins and especially sounds from the original games. The end result is that Slipgater (Quake 1 character) rocket explosion sounds are just as wimpy as in Quake 2 and Quake 3, not the incredible room-shaking BOOM that Qua
Re:Too bad... (Score:5, Informative)
There is however a big difference: They are modding Command&Conquer and not Halo.
C&C is EAs property, not Microsofts. So if this mod would have become successfull, it would mean more C&C copies sold and EA makes more money, not exactly in the interest of Microsoft, since they get zero out of it.
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Yep, very logical, but nearsighted decision. Par for the course with MS of course.
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In most of these cases, from a purely legal perspective, the modders seem to have a pretty strong case.
No, they have a spectacularly weak case. The touchstone in trademark cases is the likelihood of consumer confusion. Halo and HaloGen are both video games. They take place in the same universe, with the same factions, the same characters, the same look and feel, and the same storyline. There is no way you can argue that this isn't likely to create confusion between what is and is not officially sancti
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Assuming that you need to buy a copy of Halo to use the mod
A very poor assumption, considering that this is a mod of C&C Generals, and not Halo.
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- why don't they contact Microsoft to see if they can come up with a licensing deal?
- why not take advantage of the work they have done, rebrand it, change the graphics slightly, and simply make it into a D&D Mecha type game?
Re:Too bad... (Score:4, Interesting)
Not necessarily true.
First, Microsoft clearly loses nothing from this mod, since it's unlikely to displace their sales of their own properties.
Second, the goodwill generated by the Halo mod - nostalgia, fondness for the franchise, etc. - may well have sold more copies of Halo for it... without Microsoft having had to lift a finger.
(Then there's also the small bit about not pissing off all of the Halo fans who wanted to see the mod.)
So it seems kind of ridiculous for Microsoft to make this move. I'm guessing that its primary interest is in retaining control of the dogma surrounding the Halo universe. Doesn't seem sufficient justification to me, but at least there's a core of rationality here.
- David Stein
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It's an intellectual property thing; CS was a thing the makers dreamt up themselves...totally their own material. Many mods are, and very few mods based off someone elses IP doesn't get stopped. This Halo RTS thing is a bunch of modders too lazy/uncreative to think up their own IP, thus they nick someone elses and use that for their mod. All well and cool, but if Bungie wants to create their own Halo RTS, t
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This is still lame, but technically within MS's legal rights.
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Hmmm (Score:1, Interesting)
Re:Hmmm (Score:5, Insightful)
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Yes that was ment to be taken sarcastically...well the halfassed part.
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Or maybe they ignored it since it will probably drive up and hang on to the user base of Halo... then when the net effects of it arent creating such a result or is conflicting with their attempts to market similar (planned?, existing?) features through their gaming/online services / new releases, they put their foot down.
Sound kinda like doing nothing about "leaked" versions of Vista - until after the release when they have used up its marketing and exposure worth and want people to buy the "finished" vers
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I hate to be cynical, but it is not like MS hasn't played dirty in the past. A lot. But in all fairness, we need more info. My guess is MS won't be forthcoming with any.
oh the irony (Score:4, Informative)
Re:oh the irony (Score:4, Insightful)
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Re:shazbot (Score:2)
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Wait... (Score:5, Interesting)
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It's kinda like that diorama of the 47 Roni
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Great....Anywhere else to get it now? (Score:2, Interesting)
If only I knew this before they closed it all down (I wish that said by the end of the week!), is someone going to host this on a torrent site somewhere? Thanks.
This Stuff Bothers Me (Score:2, Insightful)
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at one point in time I had heard this stuff was protected under copyright as long as the author(s) had no intention of selling it. I know for a fact that is the way parody laws work. I can't see much difference here.
Someone should develop a game about Microsoft shutting down independant game developers who develop independant games based on Microsoft licenses. They could even hide the actual game within the game, and it would b
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The starwars and startrek fan movies are infringing too, but George Lucas and Paramount respectively have basically said that they won't do anything against them as long as they're not being sold (of course, there's no legal binding on that, so for all intent and purposes they could have a change of heart tomorrow and s
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Ok, I know you're a troll, but I'll bite. Here's your cite: Common Sense.
If Person A goes around using Company B's copyright, and giving it away for free, why would Customer C later be willing to pay for that copyright, when they can get it for free elsewhere? Answer: They wouldn't. The copyright would have been devalued by the efforts of Person A.
Much as I would have loved to see this Halogen project work, if MS had decided to make a Halo RTS
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You aren't thinking like a corporate lawyer:
"It's our IP. If somebody wants to use it, they should pay us for a license. A lot. If we let somebody use our IP for free, then why should anybody pay us for it? Maybe somebody, someday, would have wanted to pay us to do this, but they won't because we let somebody else do it for free! Or maybe w
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Since Microsoft has an army of salaried lawyers at its disposal, I assume they have standing orders like:
"When you are not currently working on a case, browse the web to see if there is someone who is possibly infringing on Microsoft's IP. If you do find someone, send out a letter. If they back down, fine. If not, see if you can make a profitable case out of it. Since your salary is already paid, this can never hurt."
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One nitpick: For their own personal benefit? These guys weren't selling this mod and making money off it as far as I can tell. And while they are fully within their rights to demand this sort of thing, it's not really necessary at all, and they could've even offered them a license. Oh well, I just wish they would change the mod instead of scrapping it altogether, it looks like it had a lot of promise. Hell, they could've even attempted to buy out the development team and product if it turned into something
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Of course MS embraces opensource software. Embrace, extend, exterminate. Though I don't think they've got screeching, laser-shooting pepperpots for that last bit...
RTS Halo Mod Stopped by Microsoft (Score:4, Insightful)
Why invest three years in a mod when you know the environment is hostile?
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I can't name the number of 3rd party mods I've played to Quake/Enemy Territory over the years.
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"Because its assumed nobody will care -- as is the case with "normal" 3D video game vendors like ID Software."
Again, only if it's original IP: CounterStrike was an original mod...it did not steal the environment from, say, Blade Runner. Same for ActionQuake, Team Fortress etc etc etc.
"Nobody cares" only happens if it's original IP (and if it's goo
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That's a good question. Bungie (and Microsoft) have been historically non-hostile with regards to Halo properties (see Red vs. Blue, for example). However, in just about every case where Bungie/Microsoft have given implicit or explicit approval, the authors of such works came to them before-hand (or soon afterwards). So, given that Bungie is fan-friendly, and that there are probably more than a few Microsoft and Bungie employees
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Why torpedo three years of someone else's work when it's no skin off your nose to just leave them alone?
Schwab
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Copyright owners don't want fan projects, they want money. Do you really think if fan's walked up to the company to ask for their blessing they would? It's ridiculous 99% of the people out there in control DO NOT GIVE A FUCK about the fan's, they only care about the bottom line.
Similar things have happened with other projects... Chrono Trigger Fan remake and BnetD come to mind, where people wanted
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Isn't this legal? (Score:2, Insightful)
Maybe get some legal advice? Stopping development on a pet project just 'cause someone says you can't do it seems overkill.
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Hell, if they had just dropped MS an e-mail three years ago, they could have been refused permission straight away, and spent the last three years developing a game using original IP. And then, if it turned out to be any good, they might even have made some money off
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Yeah, that's true. It is easier to work your ass off for three years trying to get a project finished, then watch the whole thing go to waste, than it is to just ask a question before you start.
Oh, no, hang on, it isn't.
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They might need to pony up some funds to get rights for a game or movie, but I'm guessing Larry would be pleased with a good fan written story. (Heck, he let Roddenberry use one of his stories for an animated Star Trek episode...)
Randy
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-Rick
Mail protest@microsoft.com and let 'em know. (Score:2, Interesting)
- Jynx
Nothing new (Score:2, Insightful)
To be fair, these mods do undercut the future marketability of franchise products. Lets say they did pull off an extremely popular, successful Halo RTS game - now Bungie just has more comp
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Historically, I imagine it's helped, more than anything. Consider all the Star Wars fan films. Consider Star Trek New Voyages.
Really, how, exactly, is this competition? It's even a different genre, fercryinoutloud. "Oh, I love RTSes, but the StarCraft story just sucks ass, so I played Halo instead. But now that there's a Halo RTS, I won't have to buy Halo 3!"
Microsoft is retarded (Score:1)
This shows Microsoft is not a game company, and is not to be taken seriously for gaming.
Smarter companies like Bethesda do the exact opposite: they release the tools they used to make the game themselves, and support and advertise modding. As a consequence, they get free workforce to im
Re:Microsoft is retarded (Score:5, Insightful)
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Grow up.
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(hence the "grow up" comment, rather than something more like "respect my rights as a minority!")
Also, you know that although this was a Halo-themed mod, that it wasn't a mod of the Halo game, right? It has nothing to do with using Microsoft's tools to create a mod -- this deals explicitly with the issue of using Halo characters to create a separate work (in another company's engine t
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Fools need to move to Freenet. (Score:2)
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At Microsoft... (Score:2, Funny)
These guys are making an RTS Halo Mod, sir.
Gosh... isn't that..?
Yes sir, it's what we call 'a good idea'.
Jake, call the lawyers. This must be stopped at all costs.
They're already on their way, sir.
Halogen should've followed Roosterteeth's example (Score:2)
Red vs Blue? (Score:3, Interesting)
Ok, fine, it wasn't a game, it's a TV series, but isn't that reasonable competition for, say, the Halo movie?
Not to mention that this actually hurts MS more than it helps them, though it probably won't have much of an effect.
Can anyone give me a moral and/or legal downside to leaving the mod team alone? Or maybe signing some rights over to them, if you need to make it legal?
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It's just that in this case, the advertising happens to be free, for both of them.
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Furthermore, the team behind the mod KNEW this could happen. Everyone who steals ideas know it can and does happen. Especially in the mod scene; you've all heard the stories abou
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At this point, it was hard to keep reading. I don't consider it "stealing the idea" when it's an obvious homage, and everyone knows what the source material is.
This bit is actually completely uninformed. Trek in particular has, at least recently, allowed a blatant fan series [startreknewvoyages.com] to go on unhindered. There isn't a good legal reason for it, but there is a tacit agreement [wikipedia.org].
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There are compromises. You could grant such rights under a license that says "We can stop you whenever we want."
Seems to have worked well for Star Trek.
Tremulous (Score:3)
MS is making their own (Score:2)
Foxed. (Score:2, Informative)
If you're going to make a mod based on other people's junk, you better be prepared to go underground, or release it from some country that doesn't give a frack about WIPO - and then hope you never vi
The Project Could Move to Epic (Score:2)
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If, however, you create a mod with you own ideas, universe, units etc, no-one will stop
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Re:Microsoft sucks (Score:4, Insightful)
That's right, because Halo and Halo 2 were both complete flops, weren't they? Hardly shifted a dozen units between them, right?
I say they reprogram the whole thing on a Quake 3 engine or something
I'm now fairly sure you never read the article, but, to give you the benifit of the doubt for a second and assume you did, could you explain what you mean by this comment? Because, as you are no doubt aware, this was a mod for Command and Conquer using Halo IP, not a mod for Halo. Could you explain (A) why microsoft would give a flying fuck which non-MS game these guys wrote a mod for and (B) exactly why you think it would be good idea for these guys to start over again with their RTS mod by dumping the RTS game they were trying to modify and attempting make an RTS using an FPS game engine? Just curious.
minus any actual mention of the word Halo of course.
And of course they're free to do that. As I have said eleswhere in this discussion, if these devs had just, I don't know, maybe come up with an original idea, instead of ripping off MS's IP, then maybe they wouldn't have just had to watch three years work disapear down the drain.
Oh I know, it's MS and they're evil and yes, they suck. But I just can't see what they've done wrong here. The Halo IP is a huge asset for MS, and the law of the land as currently written alows them to defend it. I cannot for the life of me see why anyone would expect them to do anything different. If you are making a game using someone elses IP then you are relying entirely on their good will. These devs never even asked permission. If I was about to embark on three years of hard work, I think I might ask the copyright holders permission first.
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Yeah, if it was Halo concepts copied on another game engine, the company would be within its rights to stomp on it.