The Old Republic and KOTOR 2 IP Rights

[Basroil]

Hello, this is mostly addressed at any Obsidian representatives who may be available for comment.

 

I am a law student and was just wondering how much in the way of rights a developer maintains over its creation in general. I'm sure it varies depending on the individual contract, but I assume the rights are all generally in the hands of the game's publisher, given the way the business seems to work. Particularly in terms of a monumental IP like Star Wars, I'm sure that any rights to anything in a developers game are forfeit.

I inquire merely because, given what has been revealed of the development of The Old Republic's plot and the advance printings of the book linking the KOTOR games to TOR and the massive scale of the retcons therein, I don't see how anyone could stand for what is being done with the key plot points of KOTOR II as its developer. Okay, I can, but then it's as a business decision rather than a principled one.

I simply find it rather galling that Bioware had the nerve to retcon everything of particular significance about KOTOR II's plot explicitly so they can steal Darth Nihilus' "gimmick" for their own villain in TOR to make the players' characters into special snowflakes for being able to overcome him. Also wrecking everything remotely interesting about Revan and the Exile as characters in the process.

I suppose, then, my main question is how much, if any, right Obsidian maintains over its creation (in this case, the entire premise of KOTOR II with the Exile's "wound in the force" and Nihilus' unique abilities. I doubt there is much, if any, given that these take place within an extant canon, but I suppose that, given my grasp of the law (which is admittedly only in its relative infancy), I have some wistful hope somewhere that Obsidian could file for injunctive relief and prevent Bioware from doing this to the only real interesting Star Wars characters developed in the past decade and deliberately wiping another company's work from existence in order to blatantly steal its concepts.

 

I'm afraid I've gone on long enough, at this point, and laid out exactly what my concerns are. I look forward to any sort of reply from Obsidian, if only for the sake of my own edification.

 

Regards,

Basroil

[The Yeti of 66]

LucasArts owns the rights to the game. If Obsidian had any IP rights, Bioware and LucasArts would need their consent to use their concepts and characters as far as I know. Typically in negotiations between content creators and producers/publishers (my experience is more grounded in film, so this probably isn't exact), even when things are sitting in favor of the content creator, the producer will 'buy' the rights of the product simply because they have the money and resources to get the product distribution, which the developer almost certainly could not do on their own. I doubt this is always the case, but with Star Wars? You can almost guarantee that they went into this hoping to wow everyone into getting the third game as a follow-up job.

[Walsingham]

Would it be worth writing to LucasArts legal team for an explanation. Phrase it as educational and you might get something interesting.

[ShadowScythe]

The writer of that awful novel explained his motives Here

 

Basically he didn't think the Exile's powers were relevant to 'his' story so he ignored them but apparently it doesn't mean she doesn't have them anymore. He never explained why the Sith Emperor had the same powers as Nihilus with none of the drawbacks or why He utterly depowered the Exile and killed her off in such an offensive way but whatever that's the best explanation we'll get I guess. I suppose he just couldn't get a handle on the nature of the Exile and SWTOR didn't really bring her up at all so he could just casually dismiss her from the canon. Ugh.

 

Just ignore it and somehow imagine the series ended with Kotor 2 I suppose.

Edited October 8, 2011 by ShadowScythe

[Hurlshort]

I would spend more time on your studies and less on nitpicking Star Wars lore.

[Volourn]

"I simply find it rather galling that Bioware had the nerve to retcon everything of particular significance about KOTOR II's plot explicitly so they can steal Darth Nihilus' "gimmick" for their own villain in TOR to make the players' characters into special snowflakes for being able to overcome him. Also wrecking everything remotely interesting about Revan and the Exile as characters in the process.

I suppose, then, my main question is how much, if any, right Obsidian maintains over its creation (in this case, the entire premise of KOTOR II with the Exile's "wound in the force" and Nihilus' unique abilities. I doubt there is much, if any, given that these take place within an extant canon, but I suppose that, given my grasp of the law (which is admittedly only in its relative infancy), I have some wistful hope somewhere that Obsidian could file for injunctive relief and prevent Bioware from doing this to the only real interesting Star Wars characters developed in the past decade and deliberately wiping another company's work from existence in order to blatantly steal its concepts. "

 

But.. you don't find it galling that Obsidian leeched off BIO's KOTOR to make easy money with a sequel?

 

Niot a big deal. LA owns SW so they can do what they want with it. Obsidian wasa contract hire. They wer ehired to work on a project for somebody else. That's not only legal right but moral right for LA to do with that they want with the property (within the confines of any contract signed obviouskly).

 

LA owes Obsidian (and BIO0 nothing outside of what is promised in said contract as long as it is within the law.