Valve versus Sierra [Sep 20, 2004, 11:34 am ET] – Share – Viewing Comments
Valve vs.
Vivendi Universal dogfight heats up in US District Court on GameSpot (thanks
Democritus) reveals some details of a behind-the-scenes legal battle between
Valve and Sierra (now part of VU Games) over Half-Life and Half-Life 2 that's
been brewing for several years now. The article picks through details of a
recent court filing by Valve that reveals the current state of the litigation,
which has its next court date on October 8, though an actual trial is not
scheduled until March 21, 2005. Included are disputes over what
role Steam is to take in the game's distribution and who actually holds rights
to the Half-Life intellectual property. Here's a segment that summarizes some of
this:
In court filings, Sierra/VUG says that the current distribution of Half-Life 2 via Steam exceeds the scope of the current software publishing agreement between the two parties. It is apparently seeking the court's assistance in compelling Valve not to use Steam as an avenue of distribution.
On Friday, when asked if Valve was remained intent on making Half-Life 2 available to gamers via Steam, regardless of what was determined on October 8, Lombardi replied, "Yes."
Interestingly, and in spite of the ongoing legal dispute, Sierra/VUG still wants to work with Valve in the future and is asking the court via filings to force Valve to work with it on whatever is next in the development pipeline. It asks the court, in filings, "for a declaration that Sierra and VUG have the right to a fourth engine license pursuant to the terms of...the 2001 Agreement."
According to Lombardi, "We're going to meet the obligations of our current agreement."
Re: Hate It? How'd You Make It Better?
Sep 21, 2004, 00:48
Sep 21, 2004, 00:48
An extra program just to launch games from a single developer is simply stupid.
Well, it's a good thing Valve is offereing Steam liscences to whoever wants them.. Pirates of the Burning Sea will be distrubuted through Steam and that game has NOTHING to do with Valve. Likewise, any game that's made on Source will probably be Steam enabled.
I really don't think every developer is going to whip up one of this little cost-prohibitive programs. I would imagine that there would be a couple of additional ones (Really though, it's not something that any joe company will want to spearhead.. the bandwidth costs alone! *shudder*) but one coming out from every major developer would be insane!
IMO, we'll see most of these kinds of programs growing from companies who put teams and funding together specificly for this kind of thing, rather than being offshoots from game developers, but that's just me
This comment was edited on Oct 19, 2024, 06:08.
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