sarien.net is going, going.... gone

[lance.ewing]

I assume that you are all aware of sarien.net and Martin Kool's Javascript AGI engine. The sad news today is that it is no longer. Activision have asked him to take all the games off his site for legal reasons. If you go to www.sarien.net you can see the full letter that he received. This is really sad news. It would have taken Martin a long, long time to build that engine. 

[Collector]

Sad, but not unexpected since Activision is getting revenue from the old Sierra IP via the likes of GOG and Steam.

[lance.ewing]

Sad, but not unexpected since Activision is getting revenue from the old Sierra IP via the likes of GOG and Steam.

Yes, not unexpected as you say.

Martin is considering restarting it with fan made games but he needs a list of what people think are the best (or "gems" as he described it). So does anyone have any suggestions? I would say that the selection criteria would be that it is a full game, has great graphics, good puzzles, good story... and isn't objectionable.

[MusicallyInspired]

I liked it better anyway when it was just a series of AGI chat rooms with a bunch of different AGI-styled EGOs (some official, some made from scratch) as Good Old Adventures.

He probably crossed the line when he made that iPad app.

[gumby]

Hmmm... I may be looking at some problems with Activision as well if/when I get my Zork game completed.  I think Zork may be the only Infocom trademark that Activision is still holding on to. 

This is unfortunate news indeed.  However, adopting fanmade games makes good sense.  I tend to agree that the criteria for selection should be completeness, clean graphics, sound, etc.  The word 'polished' comes to mind.

I haven't been on sarien.net for a while & I can't remember what games the engine supported - was it both AGI & SCI - or just AGI?

[lance.ewing]

Martin had long term plans to add SCI0 support but he never made a start on it. It did run pretty much all the AGI games. His approach was conversion rather than interpretation though.

It does cast a shadow on quite a bit of what we are doing I guess.

[Collector]

I think that only the remakes could be at risk, but they have such a low profile that I doubt that Activision is even aware of them. Of our tools, perhaps the template game technically is their IP, but the lack of game specific logic makes it such a small target.

[gumby]

Hmmm... I may be looking at some problems with Activision as well if/when I get my Zork game completed.  I think Zork may be the only Infocom trademark that Activision is still holding on to. 

Apparently Good Old Games is selling the Zork Anthology (Zork I, Zork II, Zork III, Beyond Zork, Zork Zero, and Planetfall).  Looks like it went on sale this month.  So Activision is still holding on to rights for Planetfall as well (probably Stationfall too).

[MusicallyInspired]

While IA doesn't have a fan license like TSL, AGDI does so their remakes are safe and sound. Actually they had the license way before TSL did.

[Collector]

AGDI also had the license for a good part of the development cycle, unlike POS. They also acquired it under VU, not Activision.

[MusicallyInspired]

Sarien.net is coming back with ActiVision's authorization. Apparently they're letting him have the first games of each series online and then a link to the Steam page so people can buy the rest of the series. He was also asked not to put the games on the iPad, though, as ACtiVision may or may not choose to put them for sale there themselves.

ActiVision didn't mention LSL, however, because apparently they sold that IP to CodeMasters. Martin is double-checking to see if they or CodeMasters care whether or not the LSL games are ok on Sarien.net and the iPad.

http://www.martinkool.com/2011/01/sariennet-full-story.html

[gumby]

Great article.  I think that the way Martin & Activision handled the whole thing is perfect.  Nobody loses, everyone wins.