[Singh]

This thread is purely to discuss the Interplay IP auction. It is NOT a thread to discuss what to do with the IPs, Freespace 3, etc.

As you are aware from the other thread, Interplay's Intellectual Property is currently up for sale. These are the following facts as I have gleamed them:

a) The auction is for the ENTIRE IP lot and it is not being sold piece meal or even by leagues.
b) The auction bids must be submitted by 27th of September 2016.
c) The IP list can be found here: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0Bx7rn7kEXNCaYm11VzB0Y3FkZmc/view?usp=sharing Credit to Kinslayer

I have been in contact with Wedbush securities regarding the Interplay IP Auction. They will be sending me the process letters to put in a bid shortly.

Unfortunately this i a very short timeframe of one week in order to place a bid. I have some resources on hand that I can use to support this bid on the order of possibly $4-5k that I can wrangle shortly while I can also try to look for some investors locally. It isn't much of a bid, it will very probably NOT succeed, but I am determined to put in a bid with whatever I possibly can.

If anyone is firmly interested in contributing anyway to this process, please let me know by my email [email protected]

For HLP's Admins: I would like to request a @hard-light.net email if you already have one working. If you do not, please let me know and I'll see about getting something a bit more formal to set this up with.

Addendum #1:
I just want to make it officially clear, my main goal with attempting to get these IP rights is to make the entire thing public domain or similar, with the eventual goal of working with community groups like HLP or worthy developers to ressurect some of these titles from the dead if needed - or indeed, just simply bringing them up to modern spec or even just compatibility with Windows 7/10. It's a vague goal for the moment, I am aware, but given the limited timespans, it is one that will develop into more details as time progresses.
 
So far the help I need is the following:
a) Information on a law firm or lawyer or group that can help with the legal underpinnings of this process, especially IP law, etc
b) Signal boosting: people interested in helping to ensure that Interplay's IP do not fall into the hands of companies that will squander it.
c) Trust. Most of all, I need a way to prove, conclusively, that there can be trust placed in me. If there is any idea or way to do this, let me know.

Addendum #2:

Given the sources of my funding sees this as an investment, I'll be placing this as a single, private bid to avoid complications in the future. The goal is still to get things to be put into the public domain, but with some form or method to recoup initial costings. Apologies for the trouble so far.

[Singh]

I have received an official invitation to bid for the IP. Unfortunately due to the time frames involved, an Indiegogo or Kickstarter campaign would be very difficult, since they would payout later than Oct 17th, which is when the company requires for this entire thing to be closed. There is also the very good chance that Interplay can simply outright refuse to sell the entire rights should we make a bid.

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B0moObeV64NAQWJwcDZWc20tazQ/view?usp=sharing

I am going to attempt to make a bid anyway. Unfortunately, due to the nature of the sources of where I'm getting funding from, it makes things a bit complicated in regards to what I can do with it over the long term, since I would need to recoup the initial cost. It is very likely under such an arrangement that the goal would be to put these games on steam or Good Old Games in some form at a reasonable price and gradually recoup the initial cost that way.  However that is assuming such a bid be successful, which is likely to not be. We shall see.  Anyway, for the moment I will be putting this as a single, private bid to ensure there are no complications with regarding to promises of open source, given part of the funding is from family that see it as an investment more than anything else.

[Phantom Hoover]

The games are already on Steam and GoG, and if they were going to make back the sale price within any reasonable timeframe why would Interplay be selling them?

[mjn.mixael]

Here's hoping that no one else is interested and this is the only bid going into the hat...

[MP-Ryan]

Interplay refusing to sell the whole rights might not be a bad outcome.  It would allow time for the community to try to engage with them on the FS rights only/specifically, since there's clearly interest around here. Unfortunately I can't financially contribute to this bid, but should it be successful and we look at crowdsourcing a refund to you from the community at large I'll look into chipping in at that time.

[darkrift]

Although your open source non profit mentality is admirable, hate to break it to you in that the rights won't go for such a pittance as your bid. The old Descent catalog alone was generating  500k in sales per year not counting the still Beta Descent Underground which will tremendously boost its sales especially when some of the ports around hit smartphones.

A simple WiiWare, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 port of the IP's crown Jewel Earth Worm Jim sold more than 6.5 million copies and this is before smartphone gaming even took off.

The smart phone market is bigger by more than 10 times than the entire Xbox/PS/Nintendo/PC market and has been bringing hundreds of millions to billions of revenue for top titles.

Just because Herve Caen and company are too lazy to actually put some effort to porting and recreating content for smartphones does not mean there is not a massive market for some of the top tier titles in this IP. There were more than 23 million copies of descent games sold world wide for instance and that number will reach 25 mil soon.

On a final note, Wedbush Morgan is the listing company brokering the deal. Wedbush is a pretty large private equity and investment firm. They don't take on small deals even in the low end of seven figures. The nice person brokering your deal averages 50 mil per transaction having been involved in more than 3 billion dollars in PE deals.

Not saying a sale for a big 8 figure type $ amount is a done deal by any chance but high seven figures as starting bids would be more likely. If a sale won't work out, the Caens will have to do some work and actually develop smartphone versions of their titles to fully tap the potential of the classic and still popular IP's in that catalog.

You're better off bidding on a single IP of a company involved in a bankruptcy court liquidation which is not the case here. That's where you may stand a shot with a few thousand dollars.

[Singh]

Although your open source non profit mentality is admirable, hate to break it to you in that the rights won't go for such a pittance as your bid. The old Descent catalog alone was generating  500k in sales per year not counting the still Beta Descent Underground which will tremendously boost its sales especially when some of the ports around hit smartphones.

A simple WiiWare, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 port of the IP's crown Jewel Earth Worm Jim sold more than 6.5 million copies and this is before smartphone gaming even took off.

The smart phone market is bigger by more than 10 times than the entire Xbox/PS/Nintendo/PC market and has been bringing hundreds of millions to billions of revenue for top titles.

Just because Herve Caen and company are too lazy to actually put some effort to porting and recreating content for smartphones does not mean there is not a massive market for some of the top tier titles in this IP. There were more than 23 million copies of descent games sold world wide for instance and that number will reach 25 mil soon.

On a final note, Wedbush Morgan is the listing company brokering the deal. Wedbush is a pretty large private equity and investment firm. They don't take on small deals even in the low end of seven figures. The nice person brokering your deal averages 50 mil per transaction having been involved in more than 3 billion dollars in PE deals.

Not saying a sale for a big 8 figure type $ amount is a done deal by any chance but high seven figures as starting bids would be more likely. If a sale won't work out, the Caens will have to do some work and actually develop smartphone versions of their titles to fully tap the potential of the classic and still popular IP's in that catalog.

You're better off bidding on a single IP of a company involved in a bankruptcy court liquidation which is not the case here. That's where you may stand a shot with a few thousand dollars.

I think you're right on this. Given the nature of it and the short time frame...yah, may not be worthwhile and probably a waste of time for Wedbursh too.

Thanks, it's important to know where one is in the perspective of larger things. This may have been a foolhardy pipe dream, but at least I attempted it briefly. Thank you.