31 replies to this topic

[BadgerWI]

Just as the title says. What's the hold up with the unseens? I'm not talking about the big 12 (warhammer, archer and what not) Those are so tangled up in the courts that Harmony Gold couldn't lease the rights even if they wanted to. I'm talking about the one's Fasa got the rights too back in 2009. The Shadow Hawk, Girffin, Thunderbolt and the rest of the crusher joe and dougram mechs.(http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Unseen ) Why couldn't our 55 tonner be the Shadow Hawk ? I don't want to have the reseen one that looks like you gave a crayon to a toddler on meth. I want the real deal. So if they have the rights what do you suppose the hold up is?

Edited by BadgerWI, 01 May 2013 - 02:42 AM.

[Ens]

the answer is already in the link you posted:


"Legal difficulties"

[Escef]

First of all, FASA didn't get those rights, FASA had already folded up shop by 2009. It was either WizKids or Topps (or maybe the license holder, Catalyst Game Labs) that did it.

Secondly, having the right to use the art in a table top game does not necessarily mean that the right to the mechanical/character design has been licensed for video games. And even if it has, do they have the right to sub-license it to other companies? PGI is not a part of CGL or Topps, nor does it produce MWO under contract to them, but rather they procured the rights and are producing the game independently. (Or at least this is my understand of how the contracts have been worked out.)

[SgtMagor]

I'm a big fan of the original unseen, but PGI has done good things in upgrading the look of the mechs so far from FASA designs. don't really care about unseen mechs anymore.

[BadgerWI]

Woo hoo I won an award! I'm going to print that out and put it on my fridge. My wife is right there with you she thinks I'm ocd too. :-) I geuss I don't like the ambiguity of the official stance of "maybe someday" I want to move on really I do. But much like someone with a missing dog that tiny hope that they might come home drives me nuts. If they just said "No" I'd see my dead dog and move on with my shiney new 100 ton puppy. I do love the mwo redisigns.

Edited by BadgerWI, 01 May 2013 - 05:05 AM.

[TungstenWall]

Though PGI might be able to get away with unseen/reseen, if for any reason some 1 decided to sue them, the game could be ended, regardless if they win or lose in court.

A large enough company (i think the makers of Robotech is one) could constantly bleed PGI dry just by forcing them into a court room repeatedly.

It is best to avoid unseen/reseen like the plague atm. The only way to get them would be to design all new mechs with new names and new battle stories.

[Ryokens leap]

Ugh! Stop asking for the unseen. Frankly it's been refreshing to play with some of the less used chassis. It would have been nice if the Atlas was shelved for a while longer but as the Timbereolf is the face of the Clans, the Atlas is the face of the IS.

[Barghest Whelp]

Well, then what about reseen? We seriously need a 55 tonner. And some of the unseen variants would totally fill a gap which totally need to be filled.

That, and also reasons, and stuff man! LOTS OF STUFF MAN!

[Bishop Steiner]

Ryokens leap, on 01 May 2013 - 09:48 AM, said:

Ugh! Stop asking for the unseen. Frankly it's been refreshing to play with some of the less used chassis. It would have been nice if the Atlas was shelved for a while longer but as the Timbereolf is the face of the Clans, the Atlas is the face of the IS.

How is the Unseen an overused Chassis? They have not been featured in any MW title since Crescent Hawks Revenge. Including them would be the refreshing thing, even if I am not going to hold my breath for it.

I do agree that I would love to see just about ANY Chassis besides those favored in MW4 (and even most of the ones from 3) for variety though. A Marauder or Warhammer would do that just fine, but so would a Cyclops or Crab.

Just sayin'

[Enervation]

i found a comfy seat cushion for my place on the fence about this topic.
While i would be thrilled to run a marauder, i made one (with lighter armor of course because of the 15 ton difference) out of the Flame dragon, and it wasnt as snazzy as i was hoping it would be.
I do agree that we need a 55 ton mech (preferably one with jump jets) and the unseen/reseen seem to have a corner on that market, but if PGI has to put up the old fisticuffs just to get rights for it, let alone design it out of porportion and with wierd hitboxes, i think ill settle for something more mundane...
Or a Banshee. I would love a Banshee, preferably one ripped from the dying hands of a Drac.

[aniviron]

Sure, some of the unseen would be nice, but honestly, PGI/flyingdebris have done such a great job on the mech designs that I don't care. None of the mechs we have now look bad- and almost all of them look substantially better than the ones from TROs, miniatures, and previous games. They look so good I would trust them to make new mechs. They look so good that there are people on this forum who have used the in-game models on 3d printers to make new miniatures.

So sure, I bet PGI would do great things with the unseen. But no matter what's coming, it'll look great. It's one of the few predictions I make with confidence about this game's future (can't wait for clan mechs! I'm hoping Summoner, but there is no way the Timber Wolf won't be first).

p.s. BadgerWI, you are making me miss my home state so hard right now. :[

[DirePhoenix]

Escef, on 01 May 2013 - 03:00 AM, said:

First of all, FASA didn't get those rights, FASA had already folded up shop by 2009. It was either WizKids or Topps (or maybe the license holder, Catalyst Game Labs) that did it.

Secondly, having the right to use the art in a table top game does not necessarily mean that the right to the mechanical/character design has been licensed for video games. And even if it has, do they have the right to sub-license it to other companies? PGI is not a part of CGL or Topps, nor does it produce MWO under contract to them, but rather they procured the rights and are producing the game independently. (Or at least this is my understand of how the contracts have been worked out.)

Topps has the rights to all Battletech/MechWarrior imagery in print media. Catalyst Games has to license from Topps in order to have images for their sourcebooks. PGI has no rights to any existing art. ALL art/designs in MWO has to be new art created exclusively for use in MWO. All art in MWO currently, including the non-"Unseen" are new designs created for MWO.

The only thing in contention with the "unseen" is the art originally used to portray these 'mechs. Not the names or the stats. PGI has to create new designs for all the 'mechs they have in this game anyway, so creating new art for the "unseen" as well should not be an issue.

The only reason PGI should have to not include the "unseen" would be if the weapon hardpoints/configurations don't offer any more variety over other designs they have planned.

Currently the only 'mechs that I see that might be superfluous to an already planned 'mech is maybe the Locust, because of the Flea... maybe, depending on the Flea variants they make. If they make one with ballistic hardpoints in the arms, it's a dead-ringer for a Locust anyway.

The BlackJack comes close to being able to stand in for a Phoenix Hawk with the major exception that the Phoenix Hawk has fully articulated arms, which I would think would make a big enough difference.

A Cataphract is a (very) poor excuse for a Marauder (I guess the Capellans couldn't figure out what to do with those extra 5 tons they left on their Marauder factory floor), and not quite as flexible. Although you could give it the same weapons loadout, it really needs 2 energy hardpoints on each of its fully articulated arms.

You can almost make a Battlemaster from an Awesome 8V, but it doesn't quite feel right.

The Griffin might be troublesome to make, as I'm not aware of any well-known variants, and the standard version only comes with a PPC and a LRM-10. You could make that with a Centurion-AL, but then you're missing the characteristic jump jets.

You could almost make a Shadowhawk from a Flame, but again, missing the jump jets, which are a pretty important feature of the Shadowhawk.

[Sephlock]

They have... stage fright.

[qki]

Actually though - go to bg.battletech.com and look at the battletech logo. Then tell me, what mech is that?

[Sephlock]

qki, on 01 May 2013 - 11:26 PM, said:

Actually though - go to bg.battletech.com and look at the battletech logo. Then tell me, what mech is that?

Go look up the Harmony Gold site.

I was thinking "man, after all these years, they can't possibly still- ... oh."

[Bishop Steiner]

DirePhoenix, on 01 May 2013 - 11:09 PM, said:

Topps has the rights to all Battletech/MechWarrior imagery in print media. Catalyst Games has to license from Topps in order to have images for their sourcebooks. PGI has no rights to any existing art. ALL art/designs in MWO has to be new art created exclusively for use in MWO. All art in MWO currently, including the non-"Unseen" are new designs created for MWO.

The only thing in contention with the "unseen" is the art originally used to portray these 'mechs. Not the names or the stats. PGI has to create new designs for all the 'mechs they have in this game anyway, so creating new art for the "unseen" as well should not be an issue.

The only reason PGI should have to not include the "unseen" would be if the weapon hardpoints/configurations don't offer any more variety over other designs they have planned.

Currently the only 'mechs that I see that might be superfluous to an already planned 'mech is maybe the Locust, because of the Flea... maybe, depending on the Flea variants they make. If they make one with ballistic hardpoints in the arms, it's a dead-ringer for a Locust anyway.

The BlackJack comes close to being able to stand in for a Phoenix Hawk with the major exception that the Phoenix Hawk has fully articulated arms, which I would think would make a big enough difference.

A Cataphract is a (very) poor excuse for a Marauder (I guess the Capellans couldn't figure out what to do with those extra 5 tons they left on their Marauder factory floor), and not quite as flexible. Although you could give it the same weapons loadout, it really needs 2 energy hardpoints on each of its fully articulated arms.

You can almost make a Battlemaster from an Awesome 8V, but it doesn't quite feel right.

The Griffin might be troublesome to make, as I'm not aware of any well-known variants, and the standard version only comes with a PPC and a LRM-10. You could make that with a Centurion-AL, but then you're missing the characteristic jump jets.

You could almost make a Shadowhawk from a Flame, but again, missing the jump jets, which are a pretty important feature of the Shadowhawk.

Trebuchet makes more sense for making Unseen Chassis Analogues, as it has the ability to mount Missiles in the Torso, energy in the RA and JJ (Griffin) 2 Missile racks, energy and Ballistic (Shadowhawk/Wolverine, minus the JJ in the 7K model, though one could imitate the SHD-2K with an jumper) That said, none do it perfect. And yeah, the 3025 versions are underarmed for MinMaxWarrior Online, but so are pretty much ALL the Stocks.

[JudgeDeathCZ]

I agree that all mechs in MWO are basicaly their own created mechs from point of art.Why they can not make Marauder?I am pretty sure it will not be same as HGs one .

[Bishop Steiner]

JudgeDeathCZ, on 02 May 2013 - 04:10 AM, said:

I agree that all mechs in MWO are basicaly their own created mechs from point of art.Why they can not make Marauder?I am pretty sure it will not be same as HGs one .

Well, one thing to recall, all the MWO designs are recognizable from the Source Material, even if re-imagined. PGI has been given licensing rights by CGL and I believe Microsoft (who still hold the Video Game Rights, CGL the IP rights as a whole). That said, if PGi and CGL had a major fallout, and CGL wanted for whatever reason to sue, ALL of the MW:O mechs would fail the standards set for copyrighted/trademarked material (see the Jeep "7 Slot Grill" Court Case for details on the precedent).

Harmony Gold on the other hand, is actively hostile, and looking for any opportunity to sue. So the Mechs would have to be MASSIVELY different than the Original, which would largely defeat the purpose, as 90% of the Clamor for the Unseen is due to their Iconic Look, moreso than their Hardpoints, which TBH are not terribly unique in most cases, and in the Current MinMaxWarrior Online Meta, already Obsolete.

[JudgeDeathCZ]

So reseens have problems with IP too.They looks almost same as original

[Cubivorre]

JudgeDeathCZ, on 02 May 2013 - 04:10 AM, said:

I agree that all mechs in MWO are basicaly their own created mechs from point of art.Why they can not make Marauder?I am pretty sure it will not be same as HGs one .

IIRC, the art for some of those mechs were originally contracted out to some HG artists and whatnot. But I could be wrong. I usually am.

Edited by Cubivorre, 02 May 2013 - 04:32 AM.