Miller: T2 lawsuit "knee-deep in BS" News

Always Innocent, Always Wins....great quote

tbh I wouldn't be surprised if they scurried money away and just released a bunch of demo reels for the price of mere millions of dollars...

Or be surprised if they have a version of the game ready but want to go bust, break ties with T2 and try and resell it to the highest bidder...

What i'm not so sure about is who in their right mind would want to deal with them in future in terms of publishing

"we've been in a dozen lawsuits ... but we are always innocent"

Hmm... talk about bad luck!

I wish this guy would just stop talking. It doesn't really matter whether he is right or wrong, he just sounds like an angsty teen instead of a professional businessman.

"I've told you, Dougal.... those funds were just resting in that account!"

Quite ironic, having link to buy DNF beside this article...

edit: Actually, that quote is a much better tagline than "Always bet on Duke":
Duke Nukem Forever: He's always innocent, and he always wins!

Time to kick ass and spend pension funds...


......and they're all out of funds....

I think T2 have simply sat down and said

"When you exhaust all other possibilities, whatever remains, however improbable, must be true. Hence all that money we poured into Duke Nukem must have gone to a swiss bank account as it can't have been used to produce the crap 3DRealms showed us!"

And so they sue to get the money back. Seems reasonable to me :)

This is what T2 gets for not Betting on Duke.

"Time to kick ass and spend pension funds...


......and they're all out of funds.... "

:D

"Do readers here realize that filed lawsuits are entirely one-sided statements, based on knee-deep BS and with more spin that a top?" Miller asked Shackews.

Ah, I think I understand, so lawsuits are kinda like this press release (and indeed the entire development history of Duke Nukem Forever)?

The failure to produce anything of worth after so much time and so much money has screwed them they're not going to get much sympathy because the funding was pulled. Of course it was pulled! In this climate T2 can't afford to keep throwing good cash into this kind of black hole.

That said, I feel sorry for the staff that lost their jobs particularly as I dare say having 3D Realms on your CV will be like having "Hobbies: strangling stray animals and stalking my superiors".

@cragtek
"I've told you, Dougal.... those funds were just resting in that account!"

"It was there for a very long time Ted... a good long rest".

People, stop writing Take-Two as "T2". It reads like TERMINATOR 2.

@zoidberg
People, stop writing Take-Two as "T2". It reads like TERMINATOR 2.

No! You stop writing Terminator 2 as T2! It reads like Take-Two! :P

"Ah, I think I understand, so lawsuits are kinda like this press release (and indeed the entire development history of Duke Nukem Forever)?"

Good call :)

You can win a court case by having better lawyers than the other side - but still have dun the deed, just a thought.

"all but closed 3DR" implies they (Apogee) have done everything except close 3DRealms. Is that piece of text correct or is it another example of incorrect use of "all but"?

I also thought it was a terminator 2 lawsight

So wait, Apogee didn't agree on a contract with Take Two on an X360 version of Duke Nukem Forever so Take Two decided to talk to another developer for that believing that the original contract with 3D Realms would allow them to do so.
Apogee though, didn't like that, and thus decided to close down 3D Realms claiming it to be "out of funds" or whatever the reason was. That way all deals 3D Realms had are void and allows all intellectual property to be shifted to Apogee?

So basically, Apogee closed down 3D Realms so Take Two wouldn't or couldn't involve a diffirent developer for the X360 version.

???

http://www.shopto.net/page.php?page=dett...

@Spekingur

Nope Apogee closed down 3DRealms because they know that, should anyone actually get their hands on the duke code and assets, the true extent of the fraud will come out and they'd be finished.

Someone, somewhere has stolen an awful lot of money from T2 and they are rightly pissed about it.

kangaroo, could you call anyone involved with duke nukem forever ''professional buisnessman''?

Sounds like they've pulled a sex pistols/EMI scam . blatant fraud . I hope they get in the shit . give em 50 to life in the upstate Pen' .

sunyavadin . thats one of this years best eurogamer posts .

Countfrapula. I think they are outstanding buisnessmen . they appear to have got $12M for doing a few fake screenshots while at the same time accumulated enough interest to pay for fantastic lawyers , T2 will end up paying THEM damages and costs .

''That said, I feel sorry for the staff that lost their jobs particularly as I dare say having 3D Realms on your CV will be like having "Hobbies: strangling stray animals and stalking my superiors".''

Post of the year.

Actually, thread of the year simply for having that said quote AND father ted references. Pure win.

Seriously, though, no one from 3D realms gets sympathy for me. Who would hire someone when it took twelve years for a game to be made, only to be cancelled? I'm no business man but I surely wouldn't hire someone from that company. Why would you when there are far more reliable workers out there looking for jobs?

Seems some people haven't followed what's happened:

Apogee/3DR sold the publishing rights to another third-party (can't recall who off the top of my head), for which they received somewhere in the region of $400K.

Apogee/3DR were funding the development of DNF out of their own pockets, there was no funding forthcoming from the publisher for the ongoing work.

Take2 approached the original publisher and made a deal with them, not Apogee/3DR, to purchase the publishing rights for which they paid in the region of $13M.

The collapse of Apogee/3DR seems to be a bit confused, at this point, there seems to have been talks with T2 regarding possible funding to complete DNF, but T2 have apparently made demands which Apogee/3DR were not willing to accept. At this point, Apogee closed down 3DR to retain control of their own IP's.

In response T2 have tried to lay claim to those IP's, justifying that the publishing rights equates to ownership and have also claimed that the money paid to the original publisher is also due to them, from Apogee, even though the developer didn't benefit from the purchase of the publishing rights from the original third-party.

So, no, no-one has actually stolen any money, it's just T2 pissed at spending a small fortune on something that's failed to materialise; they're now looking for their pound of flesh, but they're actually going after the wrong people, unless they can prove that the money did in fact end up at Apogee/3DR. Whilst I can't see it being unlikely that at least part of the money went to them, I can't see it being anywhere near the whole $13M that T2 are after.

Let's face it, even if Take Two win, I doubt 3DRealms or whoever will get any sympathy. They have shown to be grossly incompetent, and will be lucky to get jobs anywhere that doesn't have a double yellow arch logo.

And would it be a bad thing for Take two to own those IPs? It's not like 3Drealms actually did anything with them worth a damn in over a decade, so keeping them would be pointless. I doubt 3D realms will ever be in the position to use them again, so might as well give up the ghost now.

YenRug .
stop ruinning things by being right ( possibly ) We gamers were promised a game 12 years (or whatever ), now we want an angry mob of pitch fork wielding torch bearing peasants storm the castle and spill blood and guts all over the place . lets just enjoy .

@CountFapula

But this is exactly where you're wrong, Apogee currently have at least one other team of developers working on other games featuring DN; are they just supposed to hand over the rights to something they created to someone else, thus losing control of something they're already working on?

What do you expect T2 to do with the DN IP? Churn out one bog-standard FPS after another, with no respect for what went before? You could argue that that would at least be doing something with it, but is it the right thing to be doing with it?

Yes, Apogee sure had respect for their own IP, not bothering to do much in what, 12 years?

I bet you nothing comes of this ''new team'' working on DN , either. Almost guarentee it. I'd rather see Take Two take the license because at least they seem competent, unlike anyone involved with that company.

Not that I care too much about Duke Nukem, time has passed that fad by, but it's always amusing to see lazy game ''makers'' (who barely churn out one game in over a decade, so I use that term loosely) get their come uppance. I can't say the game or them as a company will be missed. And hate to tell you buddy, but bog standard is all Duke Nukem games have ever been. At least the company who made Bioshock would be able to produce something worthwhile. As it is, Duke Nukem's name is a joke in gaming circles right now. It should be telling that the only time people talk about DN any more is with sarcastic remarks to do with the last vapourware title. No one seriously cares or wants duke nukem any more, it's just a joke now, like 3D Realms and Apogee.

YAY! Gamers talking about game development as if they know what they're talking about as they once read an article in "edge" magazine.

.. do go on.. i could do with a laugh this morning.

smelly, I do know if you worked as a chef but didn't cook a meal for 12 years, you would be fired.

I do know if you worked in retail but didn't serve any customers for 12 years, you would be fired.

I do know if I worked for a magazine but didn't write any articles for 12 years...well I'm sure you can see where this is going.

It's common sense that should tell you a company has to be really unprofessional to take so long on a game and even then it never releases it. You don't need to be a developer to realise that, just have a bit of common sense and intelligence.

im sure somone is telling the truth- so help me zod!

"Im not on trial here" - Dr Zoidberg circa 1999

"I'm no business man but I surely wouldn't hire someone from that company"

Well not being a businessman is probably why you would make an that sort of statement. There might well be a bunch of talented people at 3DR, but they aren't all in charge of the company are they? Tarring everyone with the same brush is just short sighted.


@smelly

Oh come on, at least add something of substance to the discussion instead of sitting in your tower. The whole DNF development cycle has been a proper cluster f*ck and you and I both know that. Its no good suggesting that gamers who nothing about development are way off the mark here, unless you know something that is escaping all of us that demonstrates this was actually a great project with no major competance issues at the top....?

Kanga, fair point, but they don't seem to have a lot to show for being excellent.

I'm just saying if I had to hire ex 3d realms or say ex infinity ward, I do believe that the companies they were involved with would have some clout with me.