16 replies to this topic

[Sille]

I was woundering why the Warhammer in the game looks so diffrent from the real one and weapon layout is fully diffrent?

Edited by Sille, 05 May 2016 - 05:54 AM.

[Bud Crue]

Try Google search: mwo fasa harmony gold copyright unseen. That or something like it should lead you to a discussion of the issues. Short answer: copyright dispute.

[Orville Righteous]

FASA kind of took the shape of the mechs from various anime series and created a weapon layout around it. They didn't include the chest mounted missiles on the Macross Tomahawk. There was also an issue with copyright, which Bud Crue mentioned, that changed how they looked further.

[paws2sky]

Pictured above is the Tomahawk (Marcoss), AKA the Excalibur Destroid (Robotech). The BattleTech Warhammer was ripped off of er based on er inspired by uh yeah this design. There was a big IP lawsuit, as Bud Crue mentioned.

The current incarnation of the Warhammer is what you could probably call a compromise. It's there in spirit, if not original form.

-paws

[ImperialKnight]

the answer is literally a story of epic proportions. but yeah, in summary "copyright dispute"

[Koniving]

Sille, on 05 May 2016 - 05:54 AM, said:

I was woundering why the Warhammer in the game looks so diffrent from the real one and weapon layout is fully diffrent?

Short version -- its illegal to use that design without a lawsuit, even in Battletech.

[Rogue Jedi]

Longer version,
when Battletech first started ^{(as Battledriods before a lawsuit from Lucas Film who had already trademarked the name Droid)} they purchased licences for Mech designs from a number of Japanese companies.

Years later another company started producing toys based on original Battletech Mechs, the company behind Battletech sued, then were counter sued with regards to the designs from Japanese sources, it turns out the company who sold the rights may not have had the rights to sell them, the case was settled out of court and part of the agreement ^{(we do not know the full details)} was that those designs would never again be used in Battletech so they became known as unseen, the artwork could no longer be used but the Mechs still existed.

Over the years there have been redesigns, the latest of which are now in MWO.

[Major Tomm]

Copyright laws only cover exact duplicates in the case of imagery 2D or 3D. PGI kept true to the spirit of the Warhammer (it's a nice mech!), but the design is original, and, as you noted, looks very different from the Studio Nue version, the true creators of the unseens in Macross.

The nitty gritty is the legal status of Harmony Gold's license to Macross is dubious. Harmony Gold’s license for Macross came from Tatsunoko Production, but Japanese courts ruled that it was Studio Nue (creators of the series) that controls the Macross intellectual property. The license Tatsunoko was given was for international distribution outside Japan only, and does not allow them to control the intellectual property.

Harmony Gold is known for making broad ranging claims on the Macross copyright and trademarks in order to extract payments from other companies. Harmony Gold claims in Federal Court that Hasbro's SDCC 2013 exclusive set "G.I. Joe vs Transformers The Epic Conclusion" violates their copyright license and trademarks on the animated Japanese Macross TV series (1982–84). On September 23, 2013, Harmony Gold's suit against Hasbro was dismissed, and Hasbro was allowed to continue to sell the sets.

So it turns out that Harmony Gold is pretty shady in their dealings and neither they nor Tatsunoko have the copyrights they claimed too on the unseens. Harmony Gold's founder was also found guilty in fraudulently inflating broadcast rights to create millions of dollars in kickbacks. Prosecutors estimated the illicit profits between 1988 and 1999 amounted to US$170 million. In 2005, Swiss investigators froze 150 million francs at a UBS branch in Lugano belonging to Harmony Gold, Wiltshire Trading and other companies.

It's just worth noting that all this was going on while HG was disputing the negotiated rights FASA had aquired.

[Koniving]

Major Tomm, on 05 May 2016 - 03:48 PM, said:

Ground control to Major Tomm, you've really made the grade and the papers want to know whose shirt you wear.

Now its time to enter the capsule if you dare.

Welcome to MWO both of you.

[-FLY]

If I am not mistaken, the unseen will be shadow hawk, phoenix hawk, marauder, locust, am I right?

[-FLY]

I must say...MWO is brave to bring the unseen into the battlefield....especially the phoenix hawk, I have seen the original mech which is bery similar to the macross transformative mech which can transform into a jet. The new design was very cool, it is a prove that PGI is very creative on redesigning a lawsuit affected materials into a new and idealistic product. way to go PGI!!!!

[Rogue Jedi]

the ghost of char, on 06 May 2016 - 03:45 AM, said:

If I am not mistaken, the unseen will be shadow hawk, phoenix hawk, marauder, locust, am I right?

there are a lot more than that, for the full list look here:
http://www.sarna.net/wiki/Unseen

[Koniving]

the ghost of char, on 06 May 2016 - 03:45 AM, said:

If I am not mistaken, the unseen will be shadow hawk, phoenix hawk, marauder, locust, am I right?

SHK, Thunderbolt, Phoenix Hawk, Marauder, Locust, Wolverine, Griffin, Warhammer, Rifleman, and a few others.

[S 0 L E N Y A]

the ghost of char, on 06 May 2016 - 04:00 AM, said:

I must say...MWO is brave to bring the unseen into the battlefield....especially the phoenix hawk, I have seen the original mech which is bery similar to the macross transformative mech which can transform into a jet. The new design was very cool, it is a prove that PGI is very creative on redesigning a lawsuit affected materials into a new and idealistic product. way to go PGI!!!!

The original mech is not similar to the Macross version, it IS the Macross version.

The artwork from the first 2 boxed sets of Battletech was taken directly from various Macross products (mostly from box art from plastic model kits)

The art began to slightly alter the designs by the time the first Technical Readout (3025) came out. The heads and torsos of the Phoenix Hawk, Crusader and all the mechs derived from the Macross Valkyrie series started to look a little different. The Marauder, Archer, Rifleman, and Warhammer more or less remained very true to the originals. However FASA was still operating under the presumption of a valid license for the Macross designs. As such I suspect that any of the early design differences for the Phoenix Hawk and co. were not a conscious attempt to differentiate the designs from their original counterparts, but rather because the artists kinda sucked.

[Rogue Jedi]

Boogie138, on 06 May 2016 - 04:39 PM, said:

I suspect that any of the early design differences for the Phoenix Hawk and co. were not a conscious attempt to differentiate the designs from their original counterparts, but rather because the artists kinda sucked.

or to give a lore friendly explanation, the models were produced at different factories likely on different planets, by different factions, naturally Mechs produced in multiple locations are not identical, refiting a factory from producing 1 Mech to another the factories would of course try to reuse what they could from previous designs they made, possibly resulting in some parts looking a bit different but saving a large amount of money on the refit of the factory.

take for example the diferances between the originals and the "project Phoenix" ^{(Battletech not MWO)} reseen designs, they looked completely different to the originals despite the fact that they were functionally the same Mech

[S 0 L E N Y A]

Rogue Jedi, on 07 May 2016 - 04:20 AM, said:

or to give a lore friendly explanation, the models were produced at different factories likely on different planets, by different factions, naturally Mechs produced in multiple locations are not identical, refiting a factory from producing 1 Mech to another the factories would of course try to reuse what they could from previous designs they made, possibly resulting in some parts looking a bit different but saving a large amount of money on the refit of the factory.

take for example the diferances between the originals and the "project Phoenix" ^{(Battletech not MWO)} reseen designs, they looked completely different to the originals despite the fact that they were functionally the same Mech

Ehhh I sincerely doubt the BT developers had that in mind.
A romantic idea sure, but it does not surplant the practical explanations.

[Koniving]

Boogie138, on 07 May 2016 - 02:21 PM, said:

Ehhh I sincerely doubt the BT developers had that in mind.
A romantic idea sure, but it does not surplant the practical explanations.

Interestingly, I'm doing something similar with a 3D art project of mine. I'm making models of mechs based on several different artists, and I'm having each "produced" in different locations.

For example a common mech produced for multiple factions, the Atlas, is going to have a few different looks.
The Atlas D, produced mostly by the Davions is going to look extremely different than the Atlas K, produced by the Kurita. Which is also very different from the Atlas S, produced by the then married Steiner-Davion forces. Atlas S-2 developed by Steiner exclusively and the K2 -- the completed, properly done Atlas that Kurita originally wanted to do, finally came out for the Kurita.

These are each going to look distinctly different in my productions of them.

Of interesting note would be that Shadowhawks supposedly have a drastic change in physical size between the 2nd generation SHK-2... and the 5th generation SHK-5. Drastic armor differences are explained away in the mech being almost two meters taller and a quarter of a meter thicker than its predecessor.

Now, obviously the fact is "Zomg we're scared of a lawsuit, so poof! Here it is."
But at least they have fluffed it to some extent at least with SHKs.