Removed

#1 Here comes the obligatory post about wasting one's time on a project that has a high probability of being shut down. Flagship may have closed, but HanbitSoft own the Hellgate IP now. Not to mention, last I heard they were working on an expansion regardless of the server shutdown. Though that expansion, supposedly, will only be distributed in Asia.

#2 But there is always hope for HeavenPortal, a hellgate like game based in London Ontario Canada.....

#3 Your the cliche Scott Burns.

#4 Scott, even if it gets shutdown how much you learn from a project like this cannot be given a price tag.

I joined Sam because I love Hellgate London, 3D Max, and Torque. So I can't think of a better way to spend my time.

#5 @Greg: You're right, the learning potential is very valuable. But if you created your own IP of the same genre as Hellgate, then you could get that same learning plus have no risk of being sued because you actually own the rights to the story and world.

#6 I imagine we will replace the graphics eventually. It should be noted no copyrighted assets are distributed with our client or anywhere else on my website so we will not be in breach of any copyrights. We only share our IP.

#7 @Sam: So you're saying that you're making new art assets, but still using Hellgate IP?

#8 Yes I am personally using Hellgate IP. I am using their textures, their models their animations their everything. I'm done talking about it.

#9

Quote:I'm done talking about it.

Not a very mature way to go about ending the conversation. The advice people have given here is not meant to make you feel discouraged or quit working on the project, but so that you can realize that you don't need to use someone else's IP to make a game, and actually help you succeed. But since you're done talking about it, then so am I. Best of luck with your project.

#10 To spell it out this project is a hack and completely illegal. I apologize for being short Ted but probing questions about the use of IP are really irritating. Your mentoring isn't really necessary and I would close the thread if only possible.

#11

Quote:I apologize for being short Ted but probing questions about the use of IP are really irritating.

Apology accepted, since I'm not trying to irritate you, but let me spell something out to you: The reason why the questions are probing are so that it can be put up front that the project might get shut down for legal reasons, and that way other people can choose to either avoid it or enter into it with you with their eyes wide open.

You're not the only person who will be working on it, and avoiding these questions don't help anyone but yourself. Or do you think that some artist who gets on the project would enjoy seeing all their work get canned because it's based on someone else's IP?

I wasn't trying to hound you or anything, but what a lot of people who want to do these projects -you included- don't seem to understand is that you're asking others to work on something that is potentially doomed even if everything is done right game-wise, and thus making all their hard work mean nothing. You may believe in the project, and to that I say fine, just use a similar IP that is original, which isn't hard to do, and then the IP problem goes away, simple as that.

You don't have to agree with that, or even like it, but that's the truth. Now, as I said in #9, I'm done with this thread too...

#12 Zzzz

#13 Sam, I worked at Flagship Studios. This isn't going to work, Hanbitsoft will definitely come and shut the project down. Also, do you have any experience using it? Hellgate: London was very high in detail and I have some doubts of you being able to render a bunch of 10k poly models on screen with lots of particles using the Torque engine. Also, which Torque were you thinking of using, TGE or TGEA? Having seen what the Prime engine handled (thats the Hellgate engine btw), I don't think TGEA can match it in detail.

#14 Heya Taylor,

All of this would be put to rest if a couple of the coders that use to work for Flagship Studios would release a LAN Patch for Hellgate London. :)

I will not put it past fans to get it working. Look at all of the hacked MMO servers that show for games like Ultima Online and World of Warcraft.

Great game you guys made Taylor, it is just to bad you didn't support it. Subscription base was the biggest mistake, you would of sold millions of copies of the game if it was released like Guild Wars, and Diablo. A new expansion every few years would of been great.

#15 Thanks for the post. I believe Hanbitsoft would shutdown the project if I were to actually do something illegal like releasing their game files out over the Internet (which I refuse to do). I just have a website with empty claims.

We are using TGEA. On your note about the rendering capabilities of Torque I guess this really puts some tight constraints on the amount of detail we can put into our game which is disappointing. I think it's reasonable not to expect the same rendering capabilities of a $100,000+ leading industry game engine.

It's just a hobby and a lot of fun and maybe it's about time I took it offline.

#16 Hello there everyone. I know its getting a little warm in here. My understanding of the situation is that if we do not provide players with any of the game assets, do not make any money off of this, and do not use the name Hellgate anywhere, we are not crossing any legal boundaries. In order to play our client, players will need the game's file libraries. Our client will simply modify them. Modding has been going on with all video games for a long time, and as far as I'm concerned, this is just a gigantic mod. Besides the fact that we are in no way interfering with the sale and distribution of Hellgate in Korea. We were assured by Tiggs that we could not play the game at all over Korean servers. If anything, our project would increase sales of the game here in America, since, once again, players will need the game's content library to play our client.

#17 im going to repeat myself..

But there is always hope for HeavenPortal, a hellgate like game based in London Ontario Canada.....

You dont have to use anything from HellGate at all. The Genre is alive and well. and You can easily make a inspired version without all this fuss.. Really, have you thought out the that simply just creating a original IP based on HellGate, a quick location change, title change, and slight reorganization of names and abilities.. and you have your own game. Just becuase the BladeMaster is now called a Swordsman or Gladiator, or the Engineer is called a Droner.. If you guys are just modding, then call it a mod, and move along with it, but all this heat about arguing and such is pretty much just a legal battle that no one wants to see. Simple solution, just create a unique IP inspired by Hellgate. Get new models made up, program your own engine, most of Hellgates features are all supported either standard or with resources that are all available with some searching. And let it rip.. Torque can easily support up to 64 plus folks on a fps style server, and thats by default.

#18 You have an excellent point Edward. Believe me, I have been wary of the legal aspects from the beginning. But that is why I have made sure we have not breached the copyright as we have planned this out. As to why we chose Hellgate instead of a similar, original IP of our own design...

To be blunt, Americans and Europeans got the shaft. With the sale of the IP to Hanbitsoft, we were left with a somewhat broken version of single player. Most of us had spent the year of Hellgate's lifespan on the forums proposing improvements to the game and trying to make things better for everyone. With 2.0, it seemed the turning point had been reached. I felt a large measure of personal frustration. In Beta, Bill Roper replied to our claims that the skills needed work by stating in an interview that we weren't finding the right builds for our characters. When questioned about keeping singleplayer up to date, he said "Well they should just go play online."

Now I'm not saying Bill is a bad guy, because I don't know him. But to be told things like that and then to have the game shut down is infuriating. I found out after the shutdown was announced that the company invested time and resources into an XBox 360 playable version of the game, before it was anywhere close to being finished. This, in my opinion, was bad decision making. I think Bill was too used to being at Blizzard, a company with near unlimited funding and resources. And for us to be denied any sort of interaction with the version of the game that is going to continually receive updates, when some of us paid over $200. I'm babbling. And they may not be good reasons. But they are the reasons for this project. Large numbers of the Hellgate community are coming to us, just as frustrated. We are trying to provide a service to that community, a service that an official company was unable to provide. And we are attempting to do that without making a dime, or taking Hanbitsoft's glory. We won't apologize for that.

#19 As for the LAN patch, nobody from Flagship Studios is allowed to touch the code for Hellgate, nor are they allowed to release anything for it. As for the hacked MMO servers, that's nice. The way those were achieved is because they did packet sniffing. Seeing as the servers are no longer operational, and the Korean and SEA clients are very different from the NA/EU ones, doing it through this method is near impossible. Not to mention the server's randomization code that tells the client which level randomization seed to use for the level (from how I understood it while working there).

Anyways, as much as I like Tiggs, I don't think she fully understands what is being done here. She is not a developer in any way, nor is she in any authority to give you an official ruling on the subject. My advice, make your own game with your own assets that plays and feels like Hellgate and I will be here cheering you on. Your argument of it selling copies is probably not worth mentioning. Seeing as plenty of people who use these free/hacked servers just go and find a torrent of the game and download it that way.

If I learned anything from working with Hanbitsoft, it's that they have excellent lawyers and refuse to back down from anything. Once they get wind of this project, I hope you guys do the smart thing and obey the law. Again, I support you wanting to make a new game like Hellgate, I love the idea. I just hate the idea that you're going to be using Hellgate's assets because you are too lazy or inexperienced to create your own.

Anyways, I'm leaving this thread because I don't want to get into a heated debate about the legitimacy of what you are doing. I will continue to read it though.

#20 @Taylor I'm going to talk this over with the development guys on our forum. I'll let you know what happens.