I'd be willing to pay to see those scum being sent to rot in gulags!

This makes me very sad. I will be watching this thread with my fingers crossed hoping some sort of agreement can be reached.

Wow, that svcks! This is why I always entirely make up my ideas, no risk!

I think the MERP team has the resources to make up their own land. Just invent your own history, places, and times. Either base it off one of the lands of Nirn, or make up an entirely new one working it into existing lore. I think you guys could still make something super awesome.

Yup, some team members will go down this route if all else fails. We've got back up plans .

You could always go with the Shannara series . It has some similarities to the LOTR setting.


That's great to hear!

Such a shame to happen to a potentially great mod.

Yeah it's a shame that companies who span the globe and are richer than rich find it interesting to come down to the common people just so they can see how they can make it worse for some thousands of people of the billions on this globe. Seems to me that capitalism is holding back creativity and without that we have Nineteen Eighty-Four.

Yeah. Trade one copyright issue for another? I really doubt the MERP team will be in a hurry to do that. And I rather think Atari probably hold the rights for games based on Shannara, unless they've reverted to Terry Brooks (who is a former attorney himself).

[edit]
Anyway, I really do hope the MERP team do well with their legal wrangling, and if not that they are able to apply their skills (and perhaps some assets?) to an original setting worthy of their talents.

Sorry to hear that. If all else fails, just Ctrl Shift F or something and replace the names, text and stories with original content. Doesn't make sense to delete years' worth of game assets.

I'm genuinely sorry to hear this. Very sorry indeed. We have to respect the law and copyright, but I didnt see the harm a free mod based on Skyrim or Oblivion would do harm to anyone in any way.

Do what I did with Mesogea. Make up an entirely new world and storyline and go for a TC. I decided on Mesogea a long time ago (1986 to be precise as a novel that is well under way) only knocking up a game for fun on a ZX Spectrum was a bit pants to say the least. Make sure you do what I did record absolutely everything to completely prove entire ownership. Put it in a letter and send it to yourself, date stamped. Then keep it. It's more interesting to invent your own world and YOU own it! With a great team (youve already got one) you can do some fantastic stuff. Tolkien based much of his work on Germanic and Nordic mythology (though there is a lot of classical stuff in there too). Classical mythology has provided a wealth of content for Mesogea and it's been great fun since the mid 80's writing the story, inventing the world and the story lines. Go for it. Whatever is done with the CS has to be property of Bethesda, fair's only fair, but your models, textures, story and all that goes with it, are your own to license as you see fit. No more worry over C&D letters (unless you want to send your own out if some big film company nicks your stuff)

Well you see I intended my comment to be sarcastic, though I admit I've never done well with sarcasm.

It really is a shame that copyright length has been extended and manipulated to serve the desires of large companies.