Silicon Knights ordered to destroy Unreal Engine games
Silicon Knights has received a court order to destroy all game code that used the modified Unreal Engine, and recall and destroy any unsold copies. These include Too Human and X-Men: Destiny.
Silicon Knights has gotten another heaping helping of bad news: a court order to cease production of and destroy all games that use the Unreal Engine. The document, signed by district court judge James C. Dever III on Wednesday, requires that the company destroy all versions of game code that used Unreal Engine 3 by no later than December 10, 2012.
The order (via NeoGAF) explicitly names Too Human, X-Men Destiny, The Box/Ritualist, The Sandman, and Siren in the Maelstrom. It also requires Silicon Knights to cease producing or distributing those games, and to recall and destroy any unsold copies. The company is required to destroy any other games using the licensed engine, any versions of Unreal Engine 3 still in its possession, and any information obtained from licensee restricted portions of the Unreal Network. Finally, it owes Epic an additional $4.7 million, a combination of prejudgment interest ($2.3 million), attorney's fees ($2.09 million) and assorted costs ($278,000).
After Silicon Knights modified the Unreal Engine and called it the "Silicon Knights Engine," the company became embroiled in a lengthy legal battle with engine creator Epic Games -- which it subsequently lost to the tune of $4.45 million. The company has suffered two sets of layoffs, one before the legal loss and one after. At last count, only five employees remain, including studio head Denis Dyack.
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replySteve Watts posted a new article, Silicon Knights ordered to destroy Unreal Engine games.
Silicon Knights has received a court order to destroy all game code that used the modified Unreal Engine, and recall and destroy any unsold copies. These include Too Human and X-Men: Destiny.-
This is so sad. SK have created some great games. It sucks to see them fall apart like this.
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again, how many of the key people who created those great games like eternal darkness are still there? It's like still having a hard on for Rare when everyone who was worth something left years ago.
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Yeah, I know. I still feel a shiver of excitement when I see the company's name and think back to Eternal Darkness and the Metal Gear Solid remake.
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It is because Denis Dyack has slowly gone insane
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Everytime I head his name I cringe. I had a coop interview with him years ago and he was a douchebag.
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That is totally insane. They have to destroy all of their code on games that have like shipped and sold years and years ago. At this point it seems like this is gonna be a black mark against Unreal and Epic also. I mean I can see monetary damages but have them destroy all their hard work seems like kicking 'em while they're down.
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ya its kind of a dick move if you ask me..
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Holy shit dude. :/
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Perhaps the rights (including the code and any future profit) to the games in question should just be awarded to Epic as some sort of a settlement or punative damage. I'd imagine that Dyack would be too proud to just hand something over like that.
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...and nothing of value was lost.
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Those who seek to preserve the history of video games beg to differ.
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Quick! Buy up the copies of the already released games! They are going to be rares like that ET game they destroyed years back. :(
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I tried to send him like 40 magazines (EGM, Nintendo Power and misc) but it was super expensive and then I moved and it got bumped down my priority list and then roushi quit the shack.
I still have them collecting dust, too!
:(
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I still miss my back issues of Nintendo Power. I had the complete set of the first 5-7 years of the magazine, but lord knows where they are now.
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good. Them suing Epic for among other things, the right to own and sell licenses for use of the "Silicon Knights Engine" was insane. "We don't like your engine so we are suing you for the right to call it our own and sell it to other people". WTF?
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The judge must have played X-Men Destiny.
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hehehehahaha.!
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Silicon Pirates!
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You can't stop the signal... ughhhhhh
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We really need to figure out how to tell the courts to go FUCK THEMSELVES.
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This is a setback no doubt about it. If they kept good documents about the design process and other resources tied to the engine they could be alright switching to a new engine. I am sure they probably somewhat separated the game renderer/engine portion of the code base from their game logic.
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wow. they lost that case in pretty devastating fashion.
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