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Changes to OpenTTD Distribution on Steam

openttd.org

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Re: Changes to OpenTTD Distribution on Steam

#131

Post by Krutonium »

squeaky-clean wrote: post #34
Krutonium wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As someone who has been involved in OpenRCT2, which is another Chris Sawyer/Atari game, from what I can tell, Atari has a very hands off approach to these things. We know they know about us - We saw their Head of PR giving away keys for RCT2 on Twitch while playing OpenRCT2, prior to the release of RCT World (What a terrible game sadly). As far as we can tell, it's basically a "don't cause us problems and we won't bo…

I remember reading an interview some years ago where they basically said they wouldn't try to shut them down, but they also did not appreciate the projects existing.

If I recall that correctly, Atari didn't want to do anything about it because it drives sales for TTD and RCT (in the case of OpenRCT2, it drives sales for 2 games even, since you need the assets from 2, and can also import more assets from 1, and even further, you can also use Classic as your base, so like, many many options), while Chris Sawyer didn't particularly like their existence, but not enough to go and force Atari to do anything about it.

Re: Changes to OpenTTD Distribution on Steam

#132

Post by ilyvion »

II2II wrote: post #81
tart-lemonade wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> As far as we can tell, it's basically a "don't cause us problems and we won't bother you" situation. In this case, the "problem" seems to be "we want to lazily cash in on an existing IP and you providing a better product for free on the same shelves as ours makes that difficult", with the "solution" being to agree to have the better (free) version bundled with the lesser (paid) version. I suppose it's better than b…

> In this case, the "problem" seems to be "we want to lazily cash in on an existing IP and you providing a better product for free on the same shelves as ours makes that difficult", with the "solution" being to agree to have the better (free) version bundled with the lesser (paid) version. At least they want to "lazily cash in". A lot of gamers like to talk about preserving history, yet are critical the moment busine…

I don't think anybody is blaming Atari for putting TTD on sale for money. Heck, I was even planning to buy it until they pulled the obnoxious stunt of removing OpenTTD.

And even that could've been okay if they actually explained what was going on, but it's all very hush hush, which does not instill trust and understanding. If they were transparent about motivations and reasoning, they'd likely catch a lot less flak for what's going on right now.

Re: Changes to OpenTTD Distribution on Steam

#133

Post by ilyvion »

LASR wrote: post #8
rasz wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

More likely they were jerks and blackmailed openttd into bundle on the threat of forcing them off steam altogether.

Yep. There is no being nice in the business of copyright. But to be fair, they’ve owned the original base game assets. Not to mention it’s a reverse engineered version of the base game.

> There is no being nice in the business of copyright.

Sure there is. The concept of "copyleft" is literally about using copyright to be nice.

Re: Changes to OpenTTD Distribution on Steam

#134

Post by ilyvion »

garaetjjte wrote: post #116
kmeisthax wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue isn't the game assets. The division between assets and code is something id invented so they could open up their old game engines while still being able to sell[0] copies of the original DOOM. But that boundary is entirely a choice of the developer, and a consequence of separability of copyright - if you make something, you can break up the rights and hand them out in different ways. Legally speaking, the o…

It might be challenging to show "substantial similarity" between assembly and C++ codebase after 20 years of evolution.

Unfortunately thanks to cases like https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tetris_Holding,_LLC_v._Xio_Int...> there doesn't have to be any direct code overlap for a game to be in violation.

Re: Changes to OpenTTD Distribution on Steam

#135

Post by literallywho »

Chaosvex wrote: post #99
larsiusprime wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

IceFrog was on the Dota2 team, and valve owns the trademark

It's far more complicated than that and ended up in court. They own the commercial rights after a legal battle with Blizzard (and Riot was in the fray, somewhere), who retained some rights to the name. Valve's 'Dota' doesn't legally stand for anything because it'd be a direct reference to Warcraft 3 (Ancients), just as TTD can be said to not legally stand for Transport Tycoon Deluxe. That's the entire point that you'…

IIRCC, Eul, the guy who made Dota originally, also works at Valve.

Re: Changes to OpenTTD Distribution on Steam

#136

Post by Tuna-Fish »

anthk wrote: post #129
Tuna-Fish wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the engines are fine. And if the assets are free, then it is fine to sell the engine with them. What I'm contending is if the assets are actually free. And just because they were all created by volunteers and contain no data from the originals doesn't mean that they are actually free. The rules around derived works are complicated, and too close homages have been found to be derived works, even if there is no ac…

Ahem, no. Not the case there. The artwork under OpenTTD fails under fair reimplementation for cohesiveness with the current extensions and modules. Ditto with FreeDoom with Doom: is not inspired but art-compatible so your Strain, Requiem, Back to Saturn and so on PWADs run the same without texture or styling clashes. Artistically speaking FreeDoom it's closer to Half Life and the like than Doom but here's the catch:…

> The artwork under OpenTTD fails under fair reimplementation for cohesiveness with the current extensions and modules.

I sincerely doubt that. Unlike the FreeDoom assets, it is too visually similar to the originals, and visual cohesiveness with existing materials (which were created to fit the style of the originals) is a point in favor of it being a derived work, not against.

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