Bethesda claims Interplay could only use the Fallout name

But it seemed so Steampunk like rather than 50's Retro style technology.

 

Well that's all up for debate but there is certainly a lot of story potential here.

The Dutch Ghost: Well, after UFO's became more apparent in 3 (I recall references previously but nothing like Zeta) I think something as grounded to reality as Tesla's work could get a pass.

 

The possibilities for Interplay are endless...

 

Well, Tesla died in the 1940s, still working on crazy inventions until his death, after which his papers were confiscated by the government. I'd say that more crazy Tesla ideas actually being realized fits the Fallout universe. The Tesla Tower idea was still pretty futuristic in the 1950s.

 

Can someone link the FOOL concept art? I seem to have missed it.

It really seems like the Franchise is stuck between a rock and a hard place. Like Little Robot said, should we be content with the makers of PoS, or Failout 3?

 

But...Bethesda already made a "Fallout in name only". Why would they want Interplay to do it again?

 

Actually I meant the look of the place on the concept drawing which I for some reason can not find anymore.

Although...



Hmm, perhaps I misunderstood.

Edit:



Guess I was wrong.
Sorry, for a moment I thought it was more steampunkish.

 

I've been lurking here forever but finally wanted to try asking cause I'm so confused about everything I have ever read regarding these Bethesda/Interplay lawsuits

I've heard a bunch of conflicting reports that don't cite any real sources and I'm wondering if people just made it up or are speculating. For example, I definitely remember reading that Interplay claimed Bethesda violated their contract and thus the Fallout license reverts to Interplay and Beth can only make two games (or something like that). I also remember reading that Beth lost an appeal regarding FOOL but then I heard the appeal they lost had nothing to do with FOOL and instead had something to do with the collection called "fallout trilogy" which included a 'deceiving' name along with 'unapproved packaging'.. also something like that. Even though they lost, that product is no longer on the market and has been replaced by a 'fallout collection' the includes something like "fallout is a copyright of Bethesda Softworks/Zenimax" (just saw this at Target like two days ago)

I'm just not sure which is true and what's to believe other than the facts, and AFAIK the facts are that Interplay itself had to raise X millions of dollars to get out of bankruptcy (which they didn't), Interplay had to raise Y millions of dollars to continue developing FOOL or lose the license (which they also didn't), Interplay had to be well into production of FOOL by a certain date (which they weren't, they could've made that concept art the day before the lawsuit for all we know.. it's nothing special), they couldn't outsource it to an external developer (which they did, but apparently they found some loophole to do this), and I'm sure there is more. I know the folks around here hate on Bethesda because of FO3, and seriously their current claim about not having the rights to any content other than the title sounds shady.. But how can anybody side with Interplay here? The only good thing I have to say is that their lawyers are pretty darn great @ dragging this on and bending the rules for so long

Besides the fact that a MMO Fallout game is just a bad idea, who in their right mind wants this iteration of Interplay to release any game that is Fallout related? This is Titus aka the maker of Superman 64 (the worst friggin game ever made) using the Interplay name as a way of avoiding creditors after they went out of business. Big wow having Chris Taylor working on it. The last video game that guy had anything to do with was FOT which is pretty crap and ironically also a game outsourced to a foreign dev team by these Titus chaps

 

Heh, maybe i should buy those shares. IF FOOL someday comes out i would be a millionaire! if not? who cares it's just 6c per share..

I hope that Beth/zenimax will finally understand that there is great community hoping for good fallout games. Good=failouch3 isn't the math your looking for, I take the freedom to say WE aren't looking for.

They should give a blowjob to a shotgun! If i had a "button" i would nuke them shitheads for ruining something like Fallout.

Yeah, that mad part in my nick isn't there just because it's fun or cool.

Epic rant for epic games!

 

It (was) Christmas, so it's definitely okay to be drinking

I think Bethesda already kinda knew that so that's why they hired Obsidian to develop New Vegas. Obsidian had to work within the confines of the engine which was built for Oblivion/Fallout 3 and with that in mind they did the best they could. The animations suck, the character faces all look the same, and there is only so much you can do with the quest system but hey if this is the game that came out as Fallout 3 back in '08 I think a lot of the members here would've reacted a bit differently. Not saying they would've approved. I read a comment a couple weeks ago that said 'it still isn't canon to me but it's a step in the right direction' and coming from a member here that is a pretty good compliment.

Truthfully though, the vast majority of FO3/FONV buyers never even heard of the original games. So if FOOL hypothetically did come out, there would instantly be angry players since apparently it isn't a shooter. Also, it's PC exclusive which is a death sentence these days (Wow and SC2 don't count.... they have a large hardcore fanbase. FO has a hardcore fanbase for the originals but they are very small and very much a niche)

 

They weren't in bankruptcy and assuming they were and had such a limit, had they not met it, they would be likely be liquidated. And I don't see what that would have to do with Bethesda anyway.

Everything else you've mentioned is part of the on going legal case, unless you are on the Bethesda or Interplay legal teams it's impossible to know the truth at this point. Interplay argues they met all of the requirements while Bethesda argues they didn't. Also, they are able to outsource development to a studio (the contract linked to above makes references to external developers). Interplay is still the main developer, Masthead is simply outsourcing support.

You might want to brush up on the case/legal system a bit more, no one is dragging this on. The court set deadlines the two companies have to follow to submit evidence, argue their case, etc.

There are only two ex-Titus employees working at Interplay, pretty much everyone else is from the Interplay era including the legal team, developers, etc. You should also look into how publicly traded companies and creditors work since your interpretation is way off the mark.

You might want to fact check, Chris Taylor was involved with projects at Vivendi after leaving Interplay. Even if Fallout: Tactic's was his last game, it was still a pretty good game, not as great as 1 or 2 but still good (also from the Fargo era btw). Taylor's contributions to the Fallout universe extend far beyond Tactic's to boot.

Bethesda released games like Home Alone, IHRA Drag Racing (any one in the past decade), Star Trek: Legacy, Rogue Warrior, etc. Your point? Quality always fluctuates among large companies, it's impossible to keep a 90 Metacritic score on all your releases if you have multiple studios, licenses, etc.

Edit: And name one console MMO other than Final Fantasy 11 which was even close to the million subscriber mark on consoles alone. No one knows what kind of game it will be, it'll likely be some form of a shooter than a traditional game so neo Fallout fans should fit in just fine. Plenty of PC MMO's that have no name behind them have managed to do pretty well.

 

We are talking about Interplay. Remember. They been in charge over Fallout long before Bethesda and see what we got instead of Fallout 3 ...

On the other side. As said MMOS with "good" story are rare. Actually I dont know any. But I am biased anyway which I admit. And I have not played that many mmos or mmorgs or what ever they are called.

 

BOS wasn't a project that had direct support from members of the original team if memory serves right. By potential I mean in terms of how quests can be delivered. You release with X number of quests and later through updates add X more. Ideally they would all be free due to the monthly subscription. You can also have multiple quests within a game that are on par with the main quest in terms of quality and appeal since they can be released down the line.

That reminds me, Earthrise got a release date a few days ago for February 2011 in Europe, they even found a publisher as well, Iceberg I think.

 

Well, one of the FO1 designers did work on it, but only as a level designer, so he didn't have that much of an influence.

 

What are your sources regarding Titus and Interplay? Interplay was completely shut down in 2004. All of their internal development teams were terminated along with every single game that was in development. Interplay didn't even have an office for several years, unless you have some sort of insider information I'm calling BS and saying that NOBODY other than the Titus Caen brothers survived from that period considering they were fined for not keeping on payroll pre-shutdown.

Interplay=Titus. Srsly. Just the same as Infogrames is now calling themselves Atari. It's just a company that owns the assets (well the ones they didn't sell) from the former. Chris Taylor doesn't count. Plus he sucks. And he is very fat.

And please name one successful non WoW (or everquest before it or even .... going way back Ultima Online) PC MMO game. I'm waiting. All I hear are crickets. There aren't any unless your Korean or something and even then they pirate all their PC games.

Fallout Online... That's such a 1999-esque name. Who s the genius that came up with it?

One last thing, even if it were true that only two people from Titus work at Interplay you MUST think about that rationally and realize that the two you speak of are the two who run the company and ran Titus before it. Honestly, don't make it sound like they have insignificant roles. Again, unless you know something that I do not, for all we know they were the only two Interplay employees for years (which I'm 99.99% sure was the case anyways)!!! Plus Interplay are releasing Titus games to services like PSN right now. Interplay is just a name and a bunch of IPs owned by some French arseholes. End of story.

 

EVE Online is quite successful, to answer part of your inquiry. Since the ol' Wikipedia only has information from 2008, take this as a low number. Their profit was around $5 million annually, and that's just from EVE. The playerbase has exponentially grown since then, so yeah, you aren't going to see the ridiculous amount of profit like Wow, but then the highest they charge for their game is $20 for the first month. For having only one actual game under their belt, that's pretty good so far.

 

While you might not be a fan (and fat as he may be, I think he's a cool guy), and while obviously the current Interplay doesn't have much to do with the old one, I'd say that Chris Taylor and Mark O'Green do count.

 

You didn't even bother answering any of my questions and instead resort to trolling but I will entertain myself a bit more.

My sources are Google, Bing, and my personal assistant, Jeeves.

They did have an office, it's all public record and you are welcome to look it up if you wish, I believe one of the investor members even posted pictures of it after they moved out into their current offices. They were not shut down in 2004, they were only barred from letting people work as a result of wage issues. If I remember correctly they were facing bankruptcy at one point as a result of these issues but were able to sell Fallout last minute and avoid it all.

That's not how it is at all. Atari isn't around in its original state, the Atari today isn't the one Bushnell founded in the 70s. Interplay is still in its original state, it's the same company that Fargo founded in the 80s. Your comparison won't work here. Yes, Interplay in terms of resources has changed quite a bit in the past decade, I don't think anyone is arguing against that.

And the Atari of today owns all their old assets? Cool story, bro.

He's a pretty cool guy from the few conversations we've had. Sorry to hear your experiences haven't been so good.

Lets determine success at near 1 million (or over) subscribers.

• Runescape
  Guild Wars
  Entropia Universe
  Aion Online
  Evony
  Any Acclaim MMO before the company was dissolved by Disney
  Final Fantasy 11
  Clone Wars Adventures
  Star Trek Online

And the list goes on, technically any MMO that is able to sustain itself and its company is a success but I'll spare you.

What would you prefer it be called? Fitting name if you believe it's "1999-esque" given that's how long Interplay has wanted an MMO be they under Fargo or Caen.

Herve Caen was the only one who ran Interplay, Eric was at Titus and I don't think he joined Interplay until later since we really didn't hear anything about his projects until last year with Legendary Wars so I'm simply guessing with that one.

And does it matter if they run the company, they are businessmen, what do you expect them to do? Given the state of the company, they were able to bring back a respectable number of old employees, do things with the licenses, etc so don't act like they aren't doing what Fargo or anyone else would have had they been in control of the company in that state.

Please name a Titus game released on PSN, they have only released Prehistorik Man on the App Store and DSiWare, two games in comparison to how many Interplay ones? It's quite obvious that you haven't even bothered doing basic fact checking, you also have no idea how a company works, especially ones that are publicly traded and have trivialized important events for any business to go through. These business ideals you have aren't grounded in reality at all.

Nothing I have mentioned above is insider information, it's all publicly available via these forums, The Vault, the SEC filings, and various posts on gaming sites from previous years (Gamespot especially is a good source). You have a lot of research ahead of you and resorting to personal attacks against people or organizations won't help.

Ah, but he probably didn't have the same sway as say Chris or Mark currently would have? I'm guessing it must answer itself given the end results. =/

 

Come on man leave Chris alone...without Chris you could argue there wouldn't be a Fallout, or at least a Fallout we recognize. If you check his wiki page (http://fallout.wikia.com/wiki/Chris_Taylor) you notice some smart-arse has written -

"His wang is aproximately 7.9 inches, thick. It stands at a womping 8.4 inches while errect."

That is fucked up, Chris Taylor is a fine game designer.

@Ausir - can you please fix it.

 

Fixed it. Remember that it's a wiki, though - you could have simply fixed it yourself.