Interplay Claims It Could Take Back Fallout

[CD-R]

Fallout Tactics wasn't a bad game at all. It just wasn't enough to satisfy everyone who expected it to be Fallout 3. But for what it was - what it was meant to be - it was quite solid.

Agreed. The only real failings were a lack of QA testing and a departure from the established setting. (Tactics kind of exists in another parallel universe to the main franchise. Some of the elements flat out contradict main cannon, like the Calculator plot, some conflict seriously, the prevalence of real world weapons, for one, and southern rock for another.) But as a post apocalyptic X-Com type strategy game it's still very good.

Fallout 2 had real weapons. The Pancor Jackhammer and HK CAWS were in both games.

Seeing as how Interplay made this absolute abomination of a Fallout game, I don't think they should be allowed anywhere near the franchise.



There are two types of people who think Fallout 3 was the worst thing to happen to the Fallout franchise. Those who never played Fallout Brotherhood of Steel. And those who work for the Bawls* energy drink company.

*[sub]In Fallout Brotherhood of Steel all references to Nuka Cola were replaced with Bawls energy drink. I'm not making that up.[/sub]

 

[gring]

how about, they release the deal that was signed by the two companies. am i missing something? is there somewhere where we can LOOK at what exactly the deal actually WAS, instead of just listening to these two companies *****?

also, seems bizarre that interplay would sell them any rights, then try to make the exact same game years laters to surf off bethesdas success (or if it failed, their failure), but as an MMO, which takes a much higher budget to not only build, but to maintain.

really, just seems like two greedy companies fighting to the death for their juicy money maker, however that success came FROM bethesda and fallout 3, not saying the original FO's were bad, they were great, but interplays interest to make a current gen fallout game only came after bethesdas success. they had more then enough time to make their own FO3.

TL;DR: overall, i really dont have a side. not until i can see what the actual deal WAS, and not what these greedy rep's SAY they were.

 

[MadCapMunchkin]

To hell with Interplay. After the mediocre showings of Tactics and BoS, they thought the series dead, and couldn't sell it fast enough. Now Bethesda surprisingly brings it back to life, and Interplay wants back in on the picture.

Sorry, that's now how it works. You sold the license. It's Bethesda's now, move the fuck on, and stop acting like a 5-year-old.

Yep. Totally agree with you on that.

 

[Ausir]

Interplay did fail to meet the financial requirements, but their claim (which is pretty strong on this, actually), is that they failed to do so because Bethesda acted in bad faith from the beginning, never actually intending for them to be able to finish the game, and tried to stop them from making the game by any means necessary even before the deadline.

 

[Starke]

Fallout Tactics wasn't a bad game at all. It just wasn't enough to satisfy everyone who expected it to be Fallout 3. But for what it was - what it was meant to be - it was quite solid.

Agreed. The only real failings were a lack of QA testing and a departure from the established setting. (Tactics kind of exists in another parallel universe to the main franchise. Some of the elements flat out contradict main cannon, like the Calculator plot, some conflict seriously, the prevalence of real world weapons, for one, and southern rock for another.) But as a post apocalyptic X-Com type strategy game it's still very good.

Fallout 2 had real weapons. The Pancor Jackhammer and HK CAWS were in both games.

Seeing as how Interplay made this absolute abomination of a Fallout game, I don't think they should be allowed anywhere near the franchise.

Spoiler: spoilertube

There are two types of people who think Fallout 3 was the worst thing to happen to the Fallout franchise. Those who never played Fallout Brotherhood of Steel. And those who work for the Bawls* energy drink company.

*[sub]In Fallout Brotherhood of Steel all references to Nuka Cola were replaced with Bawls energy drink. I'm not making that up.[/sub]

Yeah, I knew about the Bawls thing, I'd just repressed it for years. Thanks, that's years of therapy down the drain.

Okay, yeah there were real weapons in Fallout 2, in fact there were two in the original game, the Winchester Widowmaker (though I believe that's actually a semiautomatic shotgun), and the Desert Eagle .44. There were a few others in Fallout 2, the FN FAL and the Bozar are the two that come to mind, though I suspect the .44 magnum revolver was another real gun. The Jackhammer is a "kinda", the gun did exist, but it never went into production. The HK CAWS in Fallout 2 is NOT the same weapon as the real world counterpart, like the P90c and (I believe) the G11, the CAWS in FO2 used a different ammunition from any real prototype. (It used a non-standard 12 gauge cartridge.)

The difference was, that ignoring the energy weapons, heavy weapons, and a handful of outliers, the bulk of the firearms in Tactics were either real firearms or very near approximations (though it did bring back the 9mm P90s and the 12 Gauge CAWS). I mean, I'm kinda chewing on minutiae here, but for the most part Fallout's setting followed a vastly different armament setting until Tactics came along, the bulk of the weapons were fictitious, and then suddenly we're equipping UZIs, Barreta 92s, M1911s, AK-47s, SIG 220s, Remington 870s and M79s... it did strike me as more than a little jarring... no offense. And in a way, it's one of the biggest (by volume) departures from the existing setting, up to that point. So, you're right, but...

Anyway, I may have just wasted five minutes of your life... sorry for that.

EDIT: I double checked, the G11 and the G11-e both used the "correct" ammo in Fallout 2. (4.7mm caseless)

I'm going to be blunt. You're wrong. The timetable was not to make the game quickly, it was to start by April 2009, which they did, and finish by April 2012. Bethesda tried to sue because they wanted the rights back, trying to make the claim that they weren't far enough along. This got thrown out because it was bullshit. Then Bethesda followed up with this suit saying they could only use the name Fallout and nothing else. Interplay has kept up there end of the deal.

It wasn't start, it was achieve X amount of funds and start. IIRC the claim was that they hadn't obtained sufficient backing by the deadline. I also don't remember reading about this getting thrown out, but that one's on me.

As for taking back the IP, if the MMO rights were part of the same contract as the one granting Bethesda the IP, it's possible that Interplay could get the rights back. This is because Bethesda's actions make for a fairly solid suit if they want to have the contract nullified. This current suit is practically the definition of Bad Faith Negotiations.

Bad faith actions, not negotiations. Sorry, that's a minor quibble. If the behavior is in bad faith it occurred long after the contract entered into effect, so if it is in fact bad faith negotiations, then you'd have to prove that this was in fact their intent from the beginning, which would be hell.

Anyway, if the contract is null there's a pretty solid case for Bethesda to demand it's money back as part of the ruling/settlement/mediation/live iguana wrangling session. Which in turn could get pretty messy. Honestly, given how far it's gone so far, I seriously doubt the IP is going to get passed back over to Interplay. Best case for Interplay it gains a permanent right to the MMO IPs.

I mean it's one thing to say that a contract was negotiated in bad faith or the parties acted in bad faith, but it's another to tell someone that just spent 50m on an IP that the IP has reverted due to actions that were entirely under the control of the company they bought it from.

 

[Alandoril]

Why not just agree to be co-developers?

Co-operation > competition.

 

[Starke]

Interplay did fail to meet the financial requirements, but their claim (which is pretty strong on this, actually), is that they failed to do so because Bethesda acted in bad faith from the beginning, never actually intending for them to be able to finish the game, and tried to stop them from making the game by any means necessary even before the deadline.

Except, if you turn it around... Interplay sells the IP with the provision that they get to work on an MMO. Then, they get the MMO ready to roll, but claim they're behind the mark in order to provoke Bethesda into telling them to stop. They deliberately provoke it into a court case by refusing to settle or mediate... and now they're looking at reclaiming the license because they provoked the other party into behaving in "bad faith"... call me crazy but that sounds like a plan.

 

[Starke]

Why not just agree to be co-developers?

Co-operation > competition.

Because it's not about developers. It's about who publishes. This isn't about developing games at all. This is about making money and getting (intellectual) property.

New Vegas proves that Bethesda doesn't care about who develops the game, only who publishes it. To a lesser extent Tactics and BoS proved the same for Interplay.

 

[SL33TBL1ND]

I'm with Interplay with this one, their legal foothold seems a lot stronger than Bethesda's.

 

[Nephilium]

Everyone keeps saying that good ol' Bethesda are being dicks about this, but no one seems to be question Interplays angle,. ok heres somthing for you all to think on. When Interplay sold the IP thay had no money, they where going down hill fast and as such the "at the time" dead fallout IP was never going to have another game under its belt. Off it goes to Bethesda who not only resurect the whole IP at there own cost but bring it up to AAA status and quality.

(Im ignoring the bugs for the purpose of this post. . . actuly no, with the ammount of bugs in most AAA titles nowerdays the bugs can be recognised and the game can keep its AAA title)

Ok so now fallout is big, a "household name" among gamers, now Interplay knowing the rights for the single play RPG fallout are gone is trying to wiggle out an MMO. Now heres a question and i want you to answer without looking it up, what was the last game released by Interplay?
Dont know or are Unsure? ok next question,
What was the last GOOD game Interplay released?
. . .
. . .
Yeah, there you go. Bethesda has put fallout back on the map, they Have made Fallout a big AAA title at huge expence, now the company that sold the rights to them that hasnt made a good game that you can name probebly since Fallout 2 wants to make an MMO and Advertise it as fallout Online, using the name that Bethesda have made big again but keeping all the profit for themselves.

Interplay may make a truely awesome fallout MMO that will up the sales of Bethesda's single play fallout titles and increase Bethesda's profits, on the other hand Interplay was responcable for Superman 64, and a bad fallout MMO could rip down the now quite good name of fallout that Bethesda have built up, loosing Bethesda revinue on an IP that they paid to buy, to develop and market.

What Bethesda is realy saying is "I cant take the risk that you might screw this up as you wont just screw it up for yourself, but for us too" and as far as im concerned thats fair enough realy.

 

[PizzaSHARK]

I just wish someone would program a Fallout game which doesnt crash every 5 minutes? Seriously just employ some decent programmers?

wow. you've totally missed the point of the article, are ranting on something that doesn't have anything to do with the gist of it (it's about copyrights, not the game itself).
and you should study up if you think every crash is caused by a programmer.

Except anyone that's played Oblivion, Fallout 3, or presumably New Vegas can flat-out tell you that the Gamebryo engine is a steaming pile of shit. It's full of bugs, and while it's easily moddable (its only saving grace), modding it predictably introduces more bugs.

See, Bethesda has this tendency to release games that have numerous bugs, and then they sit back and let their playerbase fix those bugs for them - why else would you have faithfully updated Unofficial Patch mods for Oblivion and Fallout 3? I'm sure there's one for NV as well, but I haven't bothered to check because I'll be damned if I'm gonna spend money on another Gamebryo game.

Bethesda also tends to make really shitty games that require intensive modding to make them worth playing again. See: Oblivion, Fallout 3. I seem to remember Morrowind actually being alright on its own, but that was back in a different day when developers actually had to make decent games because making a pile of trash might ruin them. Nowadays the big developers are big enough that they can generally make a load of crap and call it a game and know there are enough stupid people out there (ESPECIALLY if it's developed for consoles or at least co-developed for them) that they can expect to at least make their money back, maybe even see a profit - even if the game's no good. 2K Games did this with BioShock 2. Blizzard does it continually with World of Warcraft, and did it with Starcraft II as well (though SC2 is actually a decent game now that it's become popular enough in the e-gaming scene for them to actually warrant investing time in fixing it.) I fully expect them to do it again with Diablo III.

I don't really care who gets the license. If Bethesda gets it, we'll get a shitty game with tons of bugs that will take 6 months for the modders to make it playable. If Interplay gets it, it'll be a shitty game that ships with tons of bugs and probably won't be moddable so it'll be a waste of money regardless. Since they both want to make an MMO, it just means we'll get a shitty, buggy, massively multiplayer game that we have to buy off the shelf (or more likely through Steam) and then pay them even more money for the right to play their tepid, buggy walking programming abortion.

On the whole, the Fallout series lost what made it great when Black Isle folded. Fallout 1 and Fallout 2 were pure genius (even though FO2 could be broken by getting power armor right off the dick, which trivialized the rest of the game.) With mods that make it function like those earlier games, Fallout 3 isn't too bad - but at that point you're really just playing someone else's game, rather than Besthesda's. By time I get done modding my FO3 install, about the only thing that remains that was Bethesda's work is the game world itself, and even that's not much -- I have newer, higher-resolution textures, new sounds, new music, new actors, new zones, new weapons, completely overhauled stats and leveling processes, completely new additions to the game, and even the original bits have been updated and made to look better. About the only thing remaining is the original game's plot (which of course doesn't make too much sense when you're using an alternate start mod) and layout of the pre-existing areas.

The only thing you can trust big-name development houses like EA, Blizzard, 2K Games, and I guess Bethesda (is Bethesda even on the level of those others?) is to play it strictly as a business. They'll do whatever it takes to insure maximum profits, and that usually means halting development cycles well short of when the game's actually ready to go so they can ship it out and bilk as much money from retard (console) gamers as possible, then it's right on to the next part.

Maybe that's why I spend so much time playing indie games through Steam :-/

 

[erbkaiser]

People, keep in mind that his is not Bethesda vs the old Interplay. This 'Interplay' is nothing more than the latest name of Titus Software, the makers of the classic "Superman 64". They just bought the NAME of Interplay when it was up for grabs.

The ex-Interplay guys are now mostly at Obisidian and other companies.

 

[Ausir]

Ok so now fallout is big, a "household name" among gamers, now Interplay knowing the rights for the single play RPG fallout are gone is trying to wiggle out an MMO. Now heres a question and i want you to answer without looking it up, what was the last game released by Interplay?

The license to make the MMO was part of the deal when they sold the IP.

People, keep in mind that his is not Bethesda vs the old Interplay. This 'Interplay' is nothing more than the latest name of Titus Software, the makers of the classic "Superman 64". They just bought the NAME of Interplay when it was up for grabs.

The ex-Interplay guys are now mostly at Obisidian and other companies.

Two of the major Fallout 1 and 2 devs, Chris Taylor and Mark O'Green, are at Interplay, working on Fallout Online. And they did not buy just the name, Titus bought Interplay back in 2000, when it was in financial trouble, but was a functioning company.

 

[Darth_Dude]

Oh come on Interplay, give it up. You already sold your IP to Bethessa, and now that it's had a comeback you want a piece of the pie? Jesus Christ make a new game or something.

 

[Kenko]

Ohh this is funny, two big companies acting like children...

Companies act like children towards eachother. Nations act like children towards eachother. Its human nature.

Like when you childishly called a kid dying a moron for a reason that the article stated a few times might not be the exact cause of death?

Nice try, brah. I am dissapoint.

 

[Johnlives]

Why dont they both make the game and let us decide which is best?

 

[viranimus]

Im torn by this.

On the one hand. I think Interplay is in the right. If they had the right to make the MMO, they are entitled to utilize its conceptual property no differently than Bethesda was allowed to use the intellectual property such as art graphics, themes, etc to make the fallout games.

On the other hand, Bethesda has the developmental clout to produce games like a top tier developer. So in their hands You would see larger releases more frequently.

But on the other hand I personally dont like alot of the conventions that Bethesda implanted into fallout that stemmed from the Oblivion model. If I have to see another pointless empty nuka cola bottle pop up cluttering my targeting It will be too soon.

But on the other hand, Interplay has went dramatically down hill over the years in the way of production. Sure they might have produced two of the games that I played more than any other at two stages of my youth, but seriously what have they put out in the last decade? Even through their rebuilding process as far as I can tell all they have accomplished is rereleased ports of old games to the WII VC and produced one Iphone game. Outside of that theres been a lot of "plans" but theyve seemingly got plans for like 4 franchise games to come out in 2011 but no firm details, no screenshots, no release dates. It seems like entirely too many "plans" and not enough action to pull it off. (Side note: I hope to god they pull it off.. Ive been dying for a modern Descent game)

Honestly.. the best thing at this point, is keep the deal as it is. Let bethesda make the single player games. They are clearly making profit from it. Let Interplay have the ability to make the MMO. Honestly it will either make them or break them. If it doesnt get released within reasonable time frame, it frees Bethesda to come in and build their own MMO incarnation, which honestly Bethedsa really shouldnt be in too much of a hurry to jump into the MMO market with a shark like WoW still flipping around in there.

 

[Addendum_Forthcoming]

A Fallout MMO could ptentially make or break the brand of Fallout ... this is why it is so contested.

It's not a case of 'childishness' like so many *idiots* have proposed on this topic already. If you rub two brain cells together you'd realise that a Fallout MMO has the potential to make or break a company and generate huge amounts of revenue.

It could stand to make a mint and there's good reason two companies are fighting over the right to create it.

Furthermore ... a Falloiut MMO, if done poorly, could utterly destroiy not just the company that makes it but the label of Fallout ... thus bankruting one companyu, and making the IP a poisonous asset for years to come.

That is the meat and potatoes of the issue.