Do you think that old dos-based games should be freeware nowdays?
- Thread starter 777
- Start date
Wolfe Tone
Which Way Did He Go?
Yep. NES, SNES, Megadrive, Commodore, Amiga etc. games should also be released freely. Although I'm not sure how old a game should be before it is should be availbible freely.
I think it would be a generous thing for the owners to do. In some cases the owners are not about or in dispute.
In others such as maybe Moo1, they do not want to give up the rights to the concept and characters as there could be future renditions.
The game is basically freeware now legally (IMO) as it is on known DL sites and nothing was done legally to stop it. Not even a cease and desist order AFAIK.
A few have given others the OK to redo them to work on current systems. That is the best way, let someone have the code to fix the bugs and bring it up to snuff.
Hoping that some of the curent projects see daylight.
In others such as maybe Moo1, they do not want to give up the rights to the concept and characters as there could be future renditions.
The game is basically freeware now legally (IMO) as it is on known DL sites and nothing was done legally to stop it. Not even a cease and desist order AFAIK.
A few have given others the OK to redo them to work on current systems. That is the best way, let someone have the code to fix the bugs and bring it up to snuff.
Hoping that some of the curent projects see daylight.
Moff Jerjerrod
Deity
Of course the answer should be yes. However, and sorry for the cynicism, big corporations sense this nostalgic yearning and there for want to ban such free distributions. They do that so that they can resell old software titles. Greedy greedy ....... 
t0mme
Great Red One
Wolfe Tone said:
10 years sound reasonable. I'm really down with everything pre-'95.
Volstag
Chairman of the Bored
A lot of them are free, and readily available at: http://www.the-underdogs.org
Judge_Deadd
No, I'm not back
Yuri2356
Test Screening
Yes. Games that are no longer being produced and marketed should definatley be distrubuted freely after a period of 10-15 years. Copyright problems could be avoided by having the original manufacturer support the free downloads themselves, it could be paid for by sprinkling the download pages with a few advertisments.
Been going there for months now, excellent selection!Judge_Deadd said:
Chukchi Husky
Lone Wolf
Old games that are no longer made and no longer available to buy in shops should be made available for free download...
Rockstar have made the first two GTA games available for free download...
Rockstar have made the first two GTA games available for free download...
The Person
Deity +2
I support the idea of "abandonware" as well. It's a huge grey zone, but it's incredible how little the corporations seem to care about it. It's half-hearted at best. The discussion on this issue never ends.
Yuri2356
Test Screening
UFO 2000 is a fan-made expansion to X-Com that allows multiplayer.777 said:I found UFO 2000 from Abondonia (thanks for Judge_Deadd) it's year is 2004, could someone explain this game? Is it UFO copy with imp. graphics?
Won't have time to check it...
Judge_Deadd
No, I'm not back
Yes, I got some good games off it, such as Blood.
Plexus
Architeuthidae puericomedentis
I like Abandonia and The Underdogs for all my abandonware. 
Lord Draegon
Awoken
Yeah they really should, but alot of companies are putting in collections of their old games for sale. And Rockstar is cool giving GTA2 for free, but there are still stores selling it right now, and if somebody buys it will be so funny. And yeah very few companies care about abandonware and/or emulation.
The Person
Deity +2
HOTU has a bigger number of games, but Abandonia has lots of games not found at HOTU. No wonder, as HOTU's policy doesn't allow any best-selling games.Plexus said:I like Abandonia and The Underdogs for all my abandonware.
