LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

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WarpRat
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LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by WarpRat »

board to relive the good times of the past or is there an actual chance that this game may be revised?

I’m starting to think that this game will never be remade in either its 80's or 90's form. I hope I’m wrong but don’t think so.


Let me ask you this!


Should you happen to recreate this game in its “GLORY"? Will you need to pay some kind of patent fee? Obviously you don’t own this game.

Next question? Who OWNS THIS GAME? AND WHATS IT COST TO PURCHASE its RIGHTS??

I starting to believe a GREAT GAME has died already and some of us refuse to believe this. Maybe because we can’t find an alternative or just because we love the game so much that nothing ( even with bad graphics ) will replace it.


LETS BE HONEST!

Regardless.. I started playing this game in the mid 90's ( NEWB) and Ill continue to look for it untill Im a very old man. ANYWAYS. HAVE FUN DREAMING!

WARPRAT!
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Cossid
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by Cossid »

Spectrum has a MW3 clone that he's making rapid process on which is more the "80's" type game over at www.megawarsiii.com and I am quietly working on my SE-type clone/improvement in my own spare time.

As for rights, rights to the old game code itself are owned by EA, who aquired Kesmai and Gamestorm in 99. However, as long as we don't use actual assets from the original games, we will have no legal issues. The only potential issues would be trademark infringement, however the trademarks for all forms of Mega Wars expired long ago, and to the best of my findings, Stellar Emperor was never actually trademarked, and if it was, it has expired and is currently no longer in record.

In the mean time, this forum was meant as a place that will remain open to those looking for such replacements until they are available.
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by setalon »

Until Willis have something readt Spectrum has almost a full version of MWIII up and running... having a good ole time, we could use all vets of SE and MWIII to come play...while WIllis get his off the ground...
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by Mysticskyhawk »

Has anyone contacted EA ( :evil: Electronic Assholes :twisted: ) as we use to refer to them, about what they would be willing to sell SE for ? I would think its been long enough now they wouldnt really care, Mostly because as much as we all loved Mw3/SE it wouldnt hurt there current/future developments or compete with anything on there 08-2011 plan that I know of..

P.S. If someone does Email them about this, Please do not refer to them as : Dear Electronic Assholes as im sure this would not get a good reply or help us any with purchaseing info on SE..
:lol:
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by sross »

Mysticskyhawk,
The problem with buying the source code from EA (and I am willing to bet they don't even have it any more, making it a dead end anyway) is the architecture of how SE was built... it only worked on some proprietary OS called Aries or something ... (that was information from Kon, I received a couple years ago) ... if it was a properity OS, we'd also need that source code ... Of course, no one actually knows that for sure except people who were involved with development of the game (kesmai staff) .... but I do remember reading a thesis paper/article related to kesmai architecture that was published in the the earlier 80s, and it basically backed up what I have heard though various sources over the years.

For nostalgic sake, it would be awesome if someone could contact someone in EA and find out what the true history of the SE code base was (and I guess MW3;))

Regards,
Scott
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by sross »

And, to add to the discussion revolving around EA and Gamestorm, there was another game out there that was a SE clone - to an extent - starship troopers (it was only a fighting game) but I have to believe that was based on alogrithms/etc that was developed for SE, if not the SE code base.

Also I'd be more then interested in learning the fate of Air Warrior. That game, like LOK, was the corner stone of Kesmai. And they had an impressive user community; much bigger then SE. So, what ever happened to those games might help it finding the true fate of SE/MW3 code base?
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by Cossid »

It's been quite a while, but from what I recall, SE ran on a custom OS called AriesOS, but I have no idea just how customized it was. As I recall, it was based on IBM AIX Unix, though I have no idea which version.

I wasn't aware Starship Troopers Online had any code base with SE. I've never played it, so I can't state for sure it did or didn't, but it was developed by Mythic, the same company that developed Silent Death, so I doubt it shared any code with SE.

As for Air Warrior, it went offline in the end of 2001. As I recall, EA is maintaining those trademarks. To date, that is the only Kesmai trademark still alive in the system, LoK has been canceled, as well as GameStorm, and many others.

Interestingly, Stellar Warrior is the only game that appears to have ever been trademarked by Kesmai in the SE/MW3 series of games, and that of course is expired/canceled. I have yet to find actual proof that Stellar Emperor was ever trademarked.

As for the code, as I've learned, once a publisher gets involved in a buyout of a developer without maintaining interest, then most all hope is lost, and that was exactly the kind of buyout EA performed with Kesmai/Gamestorm. I'd be quite shocked if you could find anybody at EA that will even know what Stellar Emperor or Mega Wars is without being shown it's history first, much less know anything about it's source code or base.
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by Mysticskyhawk »

since EA had started buying up all the small game developers id think they keep the old codes somewhere, no big corp I know of ever gets rid of everything, AIRWARRIOR and MPBT I Loved as much as SE :) but all 3 games where different types there are a few games out there that are like Airwarrior www.Warbirdsonline.com and I think aceshigh is still flying. Mechwarrior was a a Good MPBT replacement for awhile but thats been done for a few years now not sure if there is anything even close to mechwarrior anymore, and Eve is the closest thing ive found to SE, but if it could bring 5 games from the past back 1.StarControl 2.SE 3.MBPT 4.Magestorm 5.Starshiptroopers
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by sross »

apparently there are multiple lok projects exist out there (using google). Air warrior seems dead due to EA still holding the game.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Legends_of_Kesmai
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Air_Warrior
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by Mysticskyhawk »

:) anyone Interested in the new Star Trek MMO coming out ?
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by Crimson »

I will chime in here a bit to give some background in regards to what transpired just as SE was shutting down.

We approached Kesmai and EA at the time, and received the go ahead to make them an offer for the coding, and the licensing to recreate the game. We opted to NOT grab the code base, as they wanted significantly more than we were willing to pay at the time. Primarily some of our issues revolved around the flight model, and the "predicative" nature of only recreating packets when turns (commands) were transmitted to all the clients within the same space (OMG, now I am rambling...) ANYWAYS, back to the gist of this, they were receptive to us recreating the title on our own platform with our own code, and at that time did NOT wish to interfere with us using the name OR content.

NOW, that was a long long time ago, and I think it was rather "off-the-cuff" at the time, so I am not certain HOW it would stand up today.

Anyways... glad to see some work going into this, I miss those days immensely!!!
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by Spectrum »

That is good to know.

We looked into who owned the MW3 name, and possible copyrights we were not able to find the current owner.
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by Cossid »

It was my impression that Kesmai (now EA) owns the rights for both Mega Wars III and Stellar Emperor, CIS was just a licensee of the game (which is why the game was in multiple networks in earlier years).

However, neither name was a registered trademark. Note, there are certain protections for unregistered established trademarks, but they do have an expiration, and from all the research I've done, that appears to be somewhere between 2-8 years.

As for actual code, I'm not sure I'd even care to see it anymore. I've spent enough time running numbers over the last two years in the PM module that I've got a fairly good understanding of what is happening, there really isn't much mystery left in it. On the flight and combat side, while exact numbers won't be known, I don't feel it will be difficult to get to the "close enough" feel.

As for prediction, time has mostly solved that problem for us. Broadband means we can send more data more frequently. Even at 1/3 second (333ms) updates, we can still likely make the game playable at dialup speeds, depending how many ships are visible. The problem with prediction is the variance in transportation time for each packet. My plan, primarily, has minimal prediction. Server always has to be the defacto for anti-cheat.
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by Spectrum »

Our research could not find the actual owner, EA has a page with their listed copyrights, MW3 and SE are missing from that list.

Kesami is gone, from what we could tell EA bought Kesmai for the technology and dropped the rest. There are some references to Kesmai on their SEC filings and showing they closed the division. Maybe Kesmai retained the rights and those went poof when Kesmai was closed.

If the owners of Kesmai put the game code into the company as part of the basis, then the ownership went poof when the offices were closed.

That is why we made an effort (with an atorney) to find the actual owner. If the owner shows up, my effort has records of how we tried to find the owner, we will negoiate a deal at that point if they can prove actual ownership beyond a reasonable doubt.

With the company changing hands so many times we feel it would be difficult to impossible to show ownership.
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Re: LETS BE HONEST..is this a ..........

Post by Starblazer »

Old code is still code. Having worked at Compuserve back in late 90's before Aol merged with time warner I worked on the old beasts that ran all CIS programs including MW3, these servers were digital VAX like servers "one of the best dam computer companies and also one of lamest for selling out to compaq". Compuserve was religious about backups and more backups, not just for restores but for legal issues. One wonders if somewhere in AOL's archives the code still sits.
Also most dont know it but the air warrior code and some of the coders actually joined another company called cornered rat software. But I believe the coders are long departed from the company. It was used in their game called Battleground Europe or wwii online In fact from what I understand that code went from gamestorms servers to the Rats and a different operating system unix or windows of which Im not sure.. Battleground europe still exists after 10 years but they arent doing so well, server crashes and client CTD's are decimating thier sub. ranks. It used to be much more stable, then they started adding graphics/netcode packages from other companies and its gone to hell.
It really doesnt matter about what Operating system the original it was used on, redirect librarys and header functions can be made to adapt the c code to the new operating system. But the work involved .. well thats another story.
It makes one wonder if the SE codebase could still be of help.
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