Quick update.. good to see some of the top most vote links have had a few hundred increases over the last few months. Presumably either because of me posting this in lots of places or just lots of people out there thinking the same thing of "why aren't these hugely successful & popular old games being sold anywhere when so many lesser games of the same era are?".
I noticed something interesting this week. Much like with the Civilization series, Firaxis & 2K presumably have full control over the Colonization franchise too. Yet classic Colonization on steam is not under their control? I expected it to look similar to the Civ4 Colonization page:
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Yet it instead looks like this:
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GoG is similar...
Civ4Col:
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Classic Col:
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I don't know Retroism.. but I do know Nightdive as they've been behind some awesome retro remasters and remakes (eg Doom 64, System Shock and Blade runner) and specialize in acquiring abandon ware games stuck in licencing hell and selling them with or without improvements. So why is classic Colonization under their control and not 2Ks? I feel this is confirmation of our suspicions that when 2K acquired the rights to the Civ and Col franchises in the 2000s from Atari (formerly Infogrames formerly Hasbro) that for whatever reason the older existing Microprose titles were not part of the deal and got left behind in Atari's infamous IP dungeon. Presumably these guys rescued (ie made a deal) classic Col from Atari similar to the recent events with Slitherine rescuing the Master of Magic licence from Atari (and now getting MuHa to do a remake). Or I guess there's also the possibility that maybe 2K did get them but weren't interested in doing anything with them and these guys made a deal with them instead?
Either way presumably whatever situation classic Colonization was in, is probably the exact same one that Civ1, Civ2, and Test of Time are currently sitting in. Clearly someone with some swing/power who had a lot of love for Col basically took notice of the problem, saw a retro business opportunity, and did something about it.. if we could just get someone to notice the rest! I might see if I can contact these guys to ask about how they got Col and mention the Civ situation. I'll try their forums, twitters, and emails if I can get them. I'll probably be ignored but like I said above, I can't hurt to ask! If anyone has a way to speak with Firaxis too please let me know, I know they're a developer effectively powerless in this but it would be interesting to get their thoughts on this Civ1&2 issue, and maybe they can speak to 2K.
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