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What does Cryptic has access to currently from the IP (Phoxe?)

SystemSystem Member, NoReporting Posts: 178,019 Arc User
edited March 2010 in The Academy
Hi.

After reading countless threads asking from this and that around the forum, i have only one big question to ask Cryptic:

What do you have access to? Only the CBS IP library, or with the Paramount IP?

And for supplemental questions :D :

- If you have access to the library - why it takes a long time for CBS and/or paramount to allow designs of ships to be used in the game?

- ditto with music - do you have the rights to it?

If Cryptic can answer these question, i think about 80% of the threads in the forum will change from "I WANT (insert item/ship/trait/whatever) TO BE IN THE GAME" to "WHERE DO WE SIGN THE PETITION TO GET THE (insert item/ship/trait/whatever) IN THE GAME?"

Thank you for bringing us STO nevertheless Cryptic.

And Atari? While you want to milk us dry, do it properly ya? And don't forget the Klingons too!
Post edited by Unknown User on

Comments

  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Seaotter wrote:
    Hi.

    After reading countless threads asking from this and that around the forum, i have only one big question to ask Cryptic:

    What do you have access to? Only the CBS IP library, or with the Paramount IP?

    And for supplemental questions :D :

    - If you have access to the library - why it takes a long time for CBS and/or paramount to allow designs of ships to be used in the game?

    - ditto with music - do you have the rights to it?

    If Cryptic can answer these question, i think about 80% of the threads in the forum will change from "I WANT (insert item/ship/trait/whatever) TO BE IN THE GAME" to "WHERE DO WE SIGN THE PETITION TO GET THE (insert item/ship/trait/whatever) IN THE GAME?"

    Thank you for bringing us STO nevertheless Cryptic.

    And Atari? While you want to milk us dry, do it properly ya? And don't forget the Klingons too!

    Paramount is owned by CBS and CBS Paramount is a division of CBS Corporation. This includes CBS Paramount TV and so on. Perhaps CBS is only letting some of the IP to be licensed for the game?
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    I'm pretty sure CBS and Paramount are entirely seperate entities now. Paramount holds the rights to the Star Trek films but now needs permission or lisencing from CBS in order to produce future Trek films. At least that's how I understood the corporate split when it happened.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    I'm pretty sure CBS and Paramount are entirely seperate entities now. Paramount holds the rights to the Star Trek films but now needs permission or lisencing from CBS in order to produce future Trek films. At least that's how I understood the corporate split when it happened.
    2006 is when they split but I am sure they have some kind of an agreement between CBS and Paramount when it comes to Star Trek. From how the game content is created it appears to me to be made out of all the shows with some influence of the movies but not as much as the TV series. That being said what we want should come more from the TV series and not so much from the movies.

    This is just what it appears to be to me. IMO.

    Added Text: Seem to me you can get lot more content from the Series because how much can you get out of 2 and half hour movie compared to a 5 year series? It makes sense to me to use the series where there is a lot more content you can get for the game.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Airwen wrote:
    2006 is when they split but I am sure they have some kind of an agreement between CBS and Paramount when it comes to Star Trek. From how the game content is created it appears to me to be made out of all the shows with some influence of the movies but not as much as the TV series. That being said what we want should come more from the TV series and not so much from the movies.

    This is just what it appears to be to me. IMO.

    Added Text: Seem to me you can get lot more content from the Series because how much can you get out of 2 and half hour movie compared to a 5 year series? It makes sense to me to use the series where there is a lot more content you can get for the game.

    hence my question - how much is accesible by cryptic? Just part of the TV series? that plus the movie? All of tv series? selected items?

    this is the fundemental question to all the 'want' threads in the forum coz if they don't have the legal right to use it, why are we asking them to put it in?
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Seaotter wrote:
    hence my question - how much is accesible by cryptic? Just part of the TV series? that plus the movie? All of tv series? selected items?

    this is the fundemental question to all the 'want' threads in the forum coz if they don't have the legal right to use it, why are we asking them to put it in?
    I see what you want to know, I just don't know if Cryptic is going to tell us all that. The reason being they may want to keep what they have secret so not to elude what is coming next after this first big content patch. I would imagine they have access to quite a lot of TV series content. This game will be endless when it comes to TV series content it would take years and years to get all the TV series content incorporated into the game.

    Not to forget about the TV series Enterprise, what a great expansion that would be a blast to the past of the NX-01.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Airwen wrote:
    2006 is when they split but I am sure they have some kind of an agreement between CBS and Paramount when it comes to Star Trek. From how the game content is created it appears to me to be made out of all the shows with some influence of the movies but not as much as the TV series. That being said what we want should come more from the TV series and not so much from the movies.

    This is just what it appears to be to me. IMO.

    Added Text: Seem to me you can get lot more content from the Series because how much can you get out of 2 and half hour movie compared to a 5 year series? It makes sense to me to use the series where there is a lot more content you can get for the game.

    Sovereign in-game didn't come from any series.

    Some of the mission arcs come from movies (the whole "destruction of Romulus" story arc is from the ST(2009) movie, and didn't happen in any preceding series}.

    Remans (race) are also from the movies (ST:Nemesis, to be exact).

    Some of the ships people have been screaming for are fromthe series, but not inthe game (Nebula, Excelsior) - some of the other popular ones are in the game only as lookalikes (Norway/Oslo, Steamrunner/Zephyr, Excelsior/Vesper).

    They also had to take soem one-shots that were only seen in their respective shows ONCE (Cheyenne (TNG, 2 episodes), Prometheus (Voyager, 1 episode)) over ships that would arguably be more popular.

    So, the ship/race/story choices aren't limited to either movies or series, which kinda destroys the theory that one branch or the other disn't participate in the game. Not to mention the numerous shout-outs in-game to ALL of the various movies/series, in everything from character names (Sulu, Siskel, O'Brien, Quinn), ship names, mission arcs, and other trivia.

    A love for the IP is shown, it's probrably along the lines to time/licensing that prevented a lot of what people want in the game from being included at launch. In today's Development Hell, it takes time for quality - ESPECIALLY when you have a corporate overseer - in this case, CBS/Paramount.

    As to WhAT Cryoptic was able to license... well, it wouldn't be intheir best interest to say (not oto mention there's probrably a nondisclosure in their agreements with CBS/Paramount), so I doubt they'll ever come out with what exactly they have rights to as part of the IP. Really, we don't Need To Know...people will scream for their pet likes no matter what you do. They could tell everyone that what's inthe game now is ALL they have rights to...and people would still scream fdor <insert race/ship/character here>, it would just change from strident demands to "online petitions" that amount to the same thing, and have just about as much effect as the demands (that is to say, none if the dev team has any senste to them).

    What you propose wouldn't stop anything, just change it to another form - a form in which, by generating the perception that the devs just don't care/CBS doesn't care, would be very detrimental.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Callasan wrote: »
    Sovereign in-game didn't come from any series.

    Some of the mission arcs come from movies (the whole "destruction of Romulus" story arc is from the ST(2009) movie, and didn't happen in any preceding series}.

    Remans (race) are also from the movies (ST:Nemesis, to be exact).

    Some of the ships people have been screaming for are fromthe series, but not inthe game (Nebula, Excelsior) - some of the other popular ones are in the game only as lookalikes (Norway/Oslo, Steamrunner/Zephyr, Excelsior/Vesper).

    They also had to take soem one-shots that were only seen in their respective shows ONCE (Cheyenne (TNG, 2 episodes), Prometheus (Voyager, 1 episode)) over ships that would arguably be more popular.

    So, the ship/race/story choices aren't limited to either movies or series, which kinda destroys the theory that one branch or the other disn't participate in the game. Not to mention the numerous shout-outs in-game to ALL of the various movies/series, in everything from character names (Sulu, Siskel, O'Brien, Quinn), ship names, mission arcs, and other trivia.

    A love for the IP is shown, it's probrably along the lines to time/licensing that prevented a lot of what people want in the game from being included at launch. In today's Development Hell, it takes time for quality - ESPECIALLY when you have a corporate overseer - in this case, CBS/Paramount.

    Again, I wasn't starting a contest here about game content, I was just stating my opinion.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Airwen wrote:
    Again, I wasn't starting a contest here about game content, I was just stating my opinion.

    Didn't say you were - and I went back and edited my post since I got distracted from the main point.

    Which is that us knowing what Cryptic's licensed would just change the demands into another form - one that is potentially worse than what's going on now in terms of people's perception. Soemtimes, silence IS the best option :)
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Callasan wrote: »
    Didn't say you were - and I went back and edited my post since I got distracted from the main point.

    Which is that us knowing what Cryptic's licensed would just change the demands into another form - one that is potentially worse than what's going on now in terms of people's perception. Soemtimes, silence IS the best option :)

    Thanks for the insightful text above.

    While silence is always an option, it is also nice to know what is happening in the game itself.
    Maybe we should get percentages rather than absolute numbers - but then another can of worms will be opened eh?

    It WOULD be nice to know, just to keep the louder minorities a bit more quieter?
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Seaotter wrote:
    Thanks for the insightful text above.

    While silence is always an option, it is also nice to know what is happening in the game itself.
    Maybe we should get percentages rather than absolute numbers - but then another can of worms will be opened eh?

    It WOULD be nice to know, just to keep the louder minorities a bit more quieter?

    Sure, it's nice - it scratches that itch that all humans have - called "curiousity". Remember in the legends what happened to the overly curious...:)

    Seriously, NOBODY tells you of all of what they're doing, or what they have all the rights too - it limits them when they get the resources to license additional things. When they do, people then start screaming "What, you added that? Why didn't you add <such and such>? We want <such and such>!" It never ends - which is why the truism that "you can never make EVERYONE happy".

    Too much openness leads people to build their expectations higher based on what's been released - that's why hype machines exist, and that's why the better-known players in the software industry don't tell what's in store at all - just release drips and drabs to prevent people's expectations from getting too high. Those companies? Valve and Blizzard, for two - ythey are EXPERT at managing people's expectations. Think on it - how much, really, do you kow about Starcraft II? When is HL2: Episode 3 coming out? Do you know ANYTHING about it? Just that it's coming,. in Valve's case - and in Blizzard's, the info you know was released over two years and is STILL incomplete.

    More openness is fine - to a point. Too MUch Openness, however, leads inevitably to disappointment - and that makes for bad PR.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    Music and actor likenesses/voice are separate licensing issues. Which means that Cryptic would have to cough up the cough to license it. But Cryptic seems to be able to use anything else that ever been licensed for Star Trek. I see bit and pierces from everything: all of the TV series, movies, latest comics, books, and even the JJ Abram movie.
  • Archived PostArchived Post Member Posts: 2,264,498 Arc User
    edited March 2010
    From what I've seen so far in game, STO has permission to use pretty much any existing properties in Star Trek and limited rights to expand upon the license for their missions. But besides the Spock voice heard over the comm system during the Guardian of Forever, they haven't used any other major character in any game missions have they?

    They've used Miral Paris, and one of the O'brien offspring at Memory Alpha, but I don't think they count when it comes to possible likeness issues when it comes to using main characters from any of the series in the game.
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