Infograms is hypocritical and evil. INFOGRAMS: PLEASE READ.

[Kaak]

Now if someone wants to change parts of the product or to use parts of the product in any other ways as intended, the involved group or person has to ask for a written permission from the copyright holder or his legal representation (in this case Infogrames).

This is infograms statement. Yet they single one person (or a couple anyway) out and persue legal action against them This is absolutely rediculous. Mod packs are flying through the internet, and most have names attached to them. Mods have always been an important part of the Civ experience and, in my opinion, help sell the games because they extend playability. When someone enabled editor functions, they were praised rather than chastized by Firaxis. Firaxis made no negative statement, saying only that they weren't responsible after modifications were made.

Infograms is already developing an atrocious reputation with the civ community for the obviously rushed and unfinished state of civ3. INFOGRAMS: I am horribly disappointed. This situation could have been handled many different ways. I think your representatives acted in a rash and inappropriate way. My opinion of you and your company has sunken to a new low. I will never again buy any infograms product, and I hope that others follow suit and join Yin's boycott.

[Dr. Nick]

This is hellish... does Infogrames not realise that what kept Civ2 going for so long were scenarios and modpacks? Next thing we'll hear is that you can't make a map without written permission by triplicate sealed by the King of Sweden.



Infogrames is going to kill Civ3 and erase it off the market out of their own greed... the reason they don't want mods is to add them later and charge us more money for them. What awful sods. Marketing skills, these people from Infogrames need to return to college.

[Kaak]

It is a bit rediculous. We really should make their actions widely available on the web

[cassembler]

People, you're blowing this out of proportion. Obviously, this guys doing the German translation would have cost Infrogrames money. BOTTOM LINE. Snoopy posting some graphics changes is not. Posting a great scenario (if one could) online will not cost Infrogrames money. Posting 12 new civs, 30 scenarios, and a fully-featured patch in a single download will cost Infrogrames money (down the line). You guys understand?

It's all about money. They don't care about mods unless it interferes with (read: is better than or comparable to) a product they plan to develop.

$.02

[cassembler]

BY THE SAME TOKEN, a cease and desist order is kinda harsh, especially considering the fact that they made efforts to contact and work with Infrogrames.

[cassembler]

I will never again buy any infograms product, and I hope that others follow suit and join Yin's boycott.

I agree, though I still strongly support Firaxis, and will still buy Firaxis products (that I'm interrested in) even if they were sold by Bill Gates personally.

Ok, sorry, that's like $.06 now.

[Kaak]

I don't have anything against Firaxis, but as far as this costing infograms money, i just don't see it. It is just a mod, IE you would still have to purchase civ3. it seems to me it would save them money in the translating progress, as i'm sure that the project would have been open for their use...

[Rasputin]

dont know the full story here but it seems to me that persuing legal recourse over a tranalsation of a game is a bit harsh. no one is asking for any money for theses mods, but i bet infogrammes will... its all like the eventual MP patch, it is jsut the search for more money !!!!

[Frank Johnson]

Fan translations are common place in console games, where some games, anime, etc.....never make it from Japan to the US.

This is much less invasive, considering you still need Civ3 to use the translation. The action taken is definately knee-jerking and I hope these guys can go underground and continue. :P

[Alexander's Horse]

At the moment I'm designing a huge turd and I intend to call it Infogames.

[yin26]

cassembler:

How would this make them lose money? You still have to have a copy of the game to make the mod worth anything to begin with. Honestly, care to explain that for me 'cause I don't get it...

[Defkon]

middle men.

My only guess is that games sold to germany are handled by some special distributer, not infogames itself or some odd part of the company. And so i guess by having a German buy the english version and moding it to german, they distrubitors to the german public are cut out of the loop.

but that's just my guess.

the real question is: what's ok? and what's not?

You can't expect your citizens to follow your laws, if they're not posted somewhere. (currently the EULA reads like "by owning this game we can sue you for anything we want" so it doesn't mean jack) Nor can you expect to be a sucessfull ruler if each of your citizens must fill out forms in triplicate before they can go to the bathroom.

clearly they need to fire their PR people and hope the replacments can manage to change their image.

[yin26]

And so i guess by having a German buy the english version and moding it to german, they distrubitors to the german public are cut out of the loop.

This means that the *only* loss in sales would be to those gamers who planned to buy both versions of the game ... an English one and a German one? That just makes no sense. You would then have to make the case that a number (significant enough to blow your public image, I guess) of Germans expressly bought the English version knowing they wouldn't have to wait for the German release.

And that brings up the point once again: A copy of Civ3 is still being sold. If all they are doing here is protecting some middle man, then this has absolutely NOTHING to do with protecting Firaxis' copyright rules. This is ALL about funneling the same amount of money into the neat piles they want them to pile in.

And in the end, that will result in small piles of money than would otherwise have been there. For now I am certain a number of Germans will NOT buy the game at all or will simply download the Warez version, which is easily found in a number of places.

While I am normally against warez, I just might find it justified in this case. Screw Infogrames for treating its money base like common criminals. Please, Lord above, sent economic ruin on the heads of those arrogant ******.

[Defkon]

is civ3 for sale in germany with only english text?

online, or mail orders wouldn't count of course.

if it is then your agrument is true.

but often times the middle men actually play a large role and dont share in the same piles of cash that your thinking.


For example: Lets say i make a game, and I pay you to sell it in your stores. (not often but it does occure). If people buy from an american store and import it, and patch it, then i kinda wasted my money paying the guy to carry the game.

OR

Lets say you paid me to be the exclusive guy to sell my game in your region, and i said ok. but then everyone bought the game from a different region and just "moded" it, cutting you out of the loop. You'd be pretty pissed and come and ***** to me about stealing your money, and selling behind your back to your customers. Depending on the contract you might even be able to sue me, or at the very least i'd get a very bad reputation as being a back staber and have a very difficult time in the future of finding distruibuters, which would be very costly.

[kailhun]

Originally posted by cassembler
People, you're blowing this out of proportion. Obviously, this guys doing the German translation would have cost Infrogrames money. BOTTOM LINE. Snoopy posting some graphics changes is not. Posting a great scenario (if one could) online will not cost Infrogrames money. Posting 12 new civs, 30 scenarios, and a fully-featured patch in a single download will cost Infrogrames money (down the line). You guys understand?

It's all about money. They don't care about mods unless it interferes with (read: is better than or comparable to) a product they plan to develop.

$.02

I agree with you that this is the reason Infogrames took action. But the action they took is still out of proportion. An e-mail/letter would have done as well. In fact under Dutch law the fact that they didn't try this 'normal' approach first would mean that their case would be thrown out of court until they did.
Secondly I'm not sure the agreement that was signed would stand up in court as it could be argued that is was signed under duress. The agreement probably also has a clause stating that an american court has jurisdiction in the matter. But I don't know the position in International law when fighting an agreement such as this on the grounds of duress. German courts might still have jurisdiction in that matter.
Thirdly, Infogrames are still [censored]. Just because what someone does was motivated by money doesn't make it allright. The dollar/bottom line is not almighty. The excuse offered by (mostly) Americans when companies misbehave is that they're just doing business. That in my eyes is not an excuse. It just means that besides being mean and greedy you're also a ****. It is quite possible to behave while doing business.
Fourthly, the fact that adapting the game is a large part of Civ III, not to mention the gaming community in general (Doom wads, Baldur's Gate home-grown adaptations), means that it is up to Infogrames/Firaxis to make clear to the players/fans what is acceptible beforehand (making the German version is wrong, but I suspect making a Swahili version is quite allright). And if something goes to far, contact the player/fan in question in a civilized manner.

To sum up. Infogrames is wrong in two ways. One by encouraging adaptation and not making the boundaries of this clear. And two in the aggressive way they handeled the situation.

My apologies for the fact that this comment turned into a rant.

Robert

[added later: I find the fact that the word **** gets turned into **** by the forum software highly amusing. I wonder if the same thing happens to faeces.]