They're the publisher. Ironclad games is the publisher.

Still, exciting!

Didn't we have this story a few months ago?

Regardless of anyone's feelings on this, it doesn't become more newsworthy the more clones you report on.

Were we're not green is in housing energy ratings, sustainable energy and pollution. Even the USA leads us on sustainable energy, which is pathetic considering how many great options we have for it.

Recycling is all well and good but is only part of the picture.

They finally released a new Dark Castle recently! So much nostalgia . . .

New one seems pretty good, from the demo. As punishing as the original.

Interesting, I just left Norway after working their 19 months (a normal job, and teaching at a hogeskole for a semester), and would have thought that Norway, being socialist and emphasising education and so forth would have decent pay for teachers. That's depressing.

What's the variation in pay from primary school teaching through to university??

I believe we should discourage that, with an iron fist. ;)

Fair enough, it just seems to me that the effort would be much better spent working on a new, original game than defending the old clone.

And technically you can do both, but in my experience the people to take the complaining route do not do both at the same time.

A painting in your own style of a bowl of fruit != making a Tetris clone but swapping the art out.

Why do so many Slashdot commenters come up with a variation on an analogy for the same issue? It's been done to death! And yes, yours is no more original than the others :P

It's not about big picture creativity, it's about ANY creativity! Making something that's a clone of someone else's product and enjoying the crafting is one thing, selling it and then complaining when it gets pulled is something else entirely, regardless of your legal right to do so.

And the same applies if you're doing it to learn, you turn and use what you've learned in something else, you don't stop and complain. Or, do you? Yes, that's a question for you . . .

Of course, you make the simple game first, that's just common sense.

Having done that however, would you move onto the complex game idea you want to do, or stop to defend your derivative, "practice run" game?

If you want an easy way to make your own games, I highly recommend Game Maker. If your goal is to make the games, rather than getting your game tech skills up, it's far and away the easiest. Even beyond that, it's a super fast way to prototype game ideas.

Sure, and then when your derivative "getting a sense of how things work" gets pulled, you take the knowledge you've gained and keep working, you don't stop working and try to defend your derivative work.

Assuming I'm understanding your question correctly, I enjoy shiny things more when they're bought with money I got doing something creative rather than derivative.

When the best RTS games all let you spawn multiple multiplayer installs off one game disc? Even Blizzard was in on that action, how times have changed . . . I'm not complaining really, games these days are a hell of a lot more convenient, but still, it makes me nostalgic.

Since the issue here seems to be the legality of it (IMO the DMCA has no power over game mechanics, FWIW). Anyway, how can people find satisfaction in making clones of games? Isn't the joy of game development in making a game that you truly believe in, that puts your unique ideas out there? If the game you truly believe in already exists, just play that rather than making a copy . . . or at the least put your own spin on the idea rather than just copying someone else's idea verbatim, changing the art and calling it good.

There's an enormous number of games that you're missing out on! Check out any random flash portal for an easy example of exactly what I mean (e.g. kongregate, newgrounds, armor games), but there are also plenty of downloadable games (plant tycoon, diner dash and anything Popcap come to mind) in the same broad niche. Also check out the huge number of $10 games on Steam. It's a thriving sector of the industry.