Master of Magic license

[Blake00]

Does anyone know what happened to the MoM license after the Atari bankruptcy? I can't find any articles saying who got it. Seems like there was a bidding war over Master of Orion and other Atari licenses but no mention of MoM??

http://gamepolitics.com/2013/07/22/warga...i-auction/

[Tiltowait]

Sounds like it didn't get any takers. This was 3 years ago. So the investors still own it? I don't know enough about bankruptcy.

[Anthony]

Sounds like it didn't get any takers. This was 3 years ago. So the investors still own it? I don't know enough about bankruptcy.

It might have been sold as part of a package of assets, or it might still be owned by the leftovers of atari, not doing much except gathering the occasional payment. Might try to find out who gog.com sends checks to, or if they just bought some permanent license.

[vicwaberub]

Does anyone know what happened to the MoM license after the Atari bankruptcy?

Look here

[Tiltowait]

That is a newly issued trademark, I don't think it has anything to do with the Simtex computer game from 1994. There's no indication that this company owns the MoM intellectual property. Their website says they develop mobile games. http://www.extremepro.com/

[spottedshroom]

Oh boy, here comes a mobile freemium port! It should be called Yramragville.

[namad]

I'm not sure it matters, the brilliance of master of magic is the mechanics which as far as I know aren't part of the IP.

The theme was great too, the quality was high, the art was great for 1994, but not 2016. If worlds of magic wasn't a buggy program that barely ran and crashed every 5 seconds it'd be great proof that you don't need to own the IP to do Master of Magic justice.

I wish someone would remake the game who actually knew how to code software that didn't crash. It's a pretty straight forward set of instructions on how to make a successful game but everyone wants to deviate from the basics (in say age of wonders or warlock master of the arcane which combine a bit of homm or civ into the MoM stew).

[b0rsuk]

I think one of major reasons why none of the descendants quite scratch the MoM itch is relative lack of ambition.

MoM feels hugely ambitious and large scale. Yes, it's a Civilization clone at heart, but show me another game which has spells like Zombie Apocalypse, Flying Fortress (removed before release, but still!), Move Fortress, Summon Demon Lord, Meteor Storms, Eternal Night, Planar Seal, Doom Mastery... they aimed BIG with their global spells. MoM has summoned creatures which can easily level whole cities on their own. It has POWERFUL flying units which are out of reach of melee units. It has whole two planes (two worlds!) linked by magic towers. Yes, it was to bypass a technical limitation, but it was done in a wonderfully thematic way. All this came at the price of terrible, awful, abominable bugs - but they didn't care. MoM was a wonderfu, very creative and extremely buggy mess. Probably the buggiest of all succesful games. It was Roguelike level of creativity forcefully crammed into a game with mainstream* production qualities.

It also oozes atmosphere. You have powerful wizards contacting via magic mirrors. Spell research takes place of technology development.

It has incredible buildup and potential for power development. You often start next to nodes which will absolutely slaughter you if you attack them, and that will last for years.

* It's a lie MoM had great graphics back in 1994. I was around and I considered graphics bad. Remember 1996 had games like Quake, Descent II, Warcraft II (640x480). 1994 had Warcraft 1, Heretic, DooM II, Magic Carpet. Heroes of Might and Magic 1, noted for nice colorful graphics, was 1995. The only shining part about MoM graphics was pixel art and artwork. Global map and combat map looked bad back then.

[Blake00]

Does anyone know what happened to the MoM license after the Atari bankruptcy?

Look here

Looks like those extreme pro mobile gaming guys lost the MoM license in February and now something very interesting is happening!

One of the members of my MoM facebook group has informed me of some interesting news:
https://trademarks.justia.com/883/98/master-of-88398560.html

Atari (back from the dead of course) have now applied for the Master of Magic trademark again only a month ago!

I thought Atari were out of the game publishing thing and were doing casino apps and their VCS console but I now see they are back in game publishing these days and were involved with the recent Blood re-release and appear to have their hands in the pots of a few other retro series. And it's been pointed out to me that their current CEO Fred Chesnais was once running the show at Mircropose..


So what are they up to with the MoM trademark application then I wonder..

[Blake00]

I tweeted the Atari CEO about yesterdays discovery! They will no doubt ignore it but feel free to comment & like it which should pester them even more haha

https://twitter.com/Blake1981/status/113...6579960833