Boulder Dash ROM will not be released

[Rev]

http://atlantaarcadecollectors.com/IntelliVision_Games/IntelliVision_Games.htm

 

Anyone wanting D2K or D1K at reasonable price (around 70) go to this site in link. I've talked to the guy, he should have in stock.

[SoulBlazer]

I never expected a ROM for this anyway. We never saw a ROM release for the Atari 2600 homebrew version of Boulder Dash that came out last year, either in free or retail form, cause the publisher is still active and they would need to OK it.

[Albert]

I never expected a ROM for this anyway. We never saw a ROM release for the Atari 2600 homebrew version of Boulder Dash that came out last year, either in free or retail form, cause the publisher is still active and they would need to OK it.

We never announced that a ROM for the 2600 version of Boulder Dash would be made available.

 

..Al

[SoulBlazer]

We never announced that a ROM for the 2600 version of Boulder Dash would be made available.

 

..Al

I know, Al, which is why I was surprised one was mentioned for the Intelivision.

[+DZ-Jay]

I believe Elektronite was expecting to sell it for the upcoming LTO Flash! cartridge. I seem to remember that DRM was a big "feature" there, and one of the main attraction was to be able to sell Boulder Dash in ROM format with copy protection.

 

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/227859-project-l/?p=3036371

http://atariage.com/forums/topic/227859-project-l/?p=3035821

 

It wasn't promised, but it was at least mentioned that they would try.

 

-dZ.

Edited June 20, 2015 by DZ-Jay

[bikeguychicago]

This is what I hear in my head when reading these 'discussions':

 

Granted everyone is entitled to their opinion of how independent releases should be done (home-brew or otherwise). However, as an Intellivision home-brew/independent-release supporter, I find that the constant bickering between various authors and publishers has been off-putting in my desire to purchase certain titles and I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels this way.

 

I'm not sure if this issue has contributed to the increase in cost of newer games. But I would think that a unified effort between all content creators involved would seemingly streamline the process of releasing games and reduce the overall costs involved in doing so. I know some titles will have a premium cost due to licensing costs, etc. However, it seems that most Atari releases (at least those on AtariAge) generally have a base cart-with-manual price and a CIB price, with the prices at both tiers seeming to be constant, regardless of the platform.

 

I understand that the doing this means that grey-market games can't be released in this manner but, honestly, they are probably better off as ROM-only releases anyway.

Edited June 21, 2015 by bikeguychicago

[Keatah]

I have zero interest in programming intellivision.

Awww, Really? not even a little interest?

 

I currently enjoy the 6502 Assembly and Applesoft Basic environment on the Apple II and have for a long time. Since 3rd and 4th grade actually. But you never know. I may take an interest in Intellivision - which was my 2nd most fav console aside from the VCS. Computers were in a separate category so they don't count here.

 

 

However, as an Intellivision home-brew/independent-release supporter, I find that the constant bickering between various authors and publishers has been off-putting in my desire to purchase certain titles and I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels this way.

 

That's right. I find it rather disheartening and overly petty. This is supposed to be a hobby and I prefer the innocence of youth.

 

When I was a kid I knew little to nothing about the 'politics' of game programming, licensing, and publishing and releasing. All we wanted was the next game with new graphics and new sounds. All we were interested was doing BMX, shooting model rockets at the neighbors' houses, and trading warez. And of course playing the games.

 

From time to time I'd wonder why they didn't make this or that game on this or that machine. And it would invariably come down to a technical reason having to do with custom chips or memory mapping or speed. Something. We totally ignored the rights and licensing crap. That was politics and lawyer and business stuff. Shit that got in the way.

[+DZ-Jay]

This is what I hear in my head when reading these 'discussions':

 

Granted everyone is entitled to their opinion of how independent releases should be done (home-brew or otherwise). However, as an Intellivision home-brew/independent-release supporter, I find that the constant bickering between various authors and publishers has been off-putting in my desire to purchase certain titles and I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels this way.

 

I'm not sure if this issue has contributed to the increase in cost of newer games. But I would think that a unified effort between all content creators involved would seemingly streamline the process of releasing games and reduce the overall costs involved in doing so. I know some titles will have a premium cost due to licensing costs, etc. However, it seems that most Atari releases (at least those on AtariAge) generally have a base cart-with-manual price and a CIB price, with the prices at both tiers seeming to be constant, regardless of the platform.

 

I understand that the doing this means that grey-market games can't be released in this manner but, honestly, they are probably better off as ROM-only releases anyway.

 

Unified effort will be very difficult because there are differing and actually competing interests and motivations among the participants in this hobby.

 

As far as I know (but who's counting these things), since the very early days of the Intellivision home-brew scene, there have been three different efforts by three separate teams in bringing new games (or even old unreleased games) to collectors, and they have all broken down at different points mostly due to arguments about money.

 

It's sad really, that we can't enjoy the toys of our youth and partake in their spirit in the same innocent way we did once.

 

I very recently saw a post by someone in Facebook calling me a douchebag for pointing out that there are people exploiting the community. I thought it was a rather astute observation. This individual also said that we won't ever get any more "professional quality releases" after he stops publishing. That "us against them" and "my tat is mightier than yours" attitude is part of this problem.

 

Oh well.

 

-dZ.

Edited June 21, 2015 by DZ-Jay

[Thomas Jentzsch]

Yup.. "piracy concerns".. Get over it. This is a niche product in a niche of its own.

Still, we had to agree with FSS on not releasing the ROM for Atari 2600.

[+DZ-Jay]

Still, we had to agree with FSS on not releasing the ROM for Atari 2600.

 

I completely respect that, and it's perfectly understandable from FSS' perspective. However, you didn't blame your customers for not buying enough copies and presented the lack of ROM as a direct result of it. That makes a big difference.

[Thomas Jentzsch]

Still, we would not have released the ROM before we we got back our investment.

 

And Boulder Dash for the Atari 2600 took almost a whole year to sell all 250 copies. So maybe there is hope and the Intellivision ROM will be released eventually.

[+DZ-Jay]

Still, we would not have released the ROM before we we got back our investment.

 

And Boulder Dash for the Atari 2600 took almost a whole year to sell all 250 copies. So maybe there is hope and the Intellivision ROM will be released eventually.

 

There would be, except for the threats of "I'll take my ball and go home" that seem to happen often.

 

Taking a whole year to sell 250 copies seems about normal. That's pretty much how long it took Christmas Carol to sell as many. I remember the first 200 copies sold in about six months, the next 100 took another year after that.

 

Expecting to sell all your copies immediately after release does not seem to be appropriate.

 

-dZ.

[freewheel]

 

This might help with these two statements

 

There is a misunderstanding. Boulder Dash® was co-published with, not licensed from Frist Star Software. But there are additional on-going costs. Now, take into consideration soft sales and I will leave it at that.

 

From Elektronite's perspective, sure. I guess I was more aiming my comments at FSS. Or the combination. Or whatever.

 

See, right now ROM revenue is zero. It could be greater than zero, with practically nil cost. The game is done. Even selling a single copy of the ROM for $10 and splitting the profits makes more money than zero - and I believe the plan was for $20. This has nothing to do with how many physical copies have been sold (unless the plan is to hold out until more physical copies are sold, but that's not how the statement was worded). Sell 10 copies? There's another $200 we didn't have otherwise. Sell 100 copies? $2000. Etc. But even if you only sell that one copy of the ROM, you're still ahead. Unless your bandwidth costs are circa 1960.

 

The fact that (ego/licensing complexity/hurt feelings/phase of the moon/I neither understand nor care) prevents this just blows my mind. To me, even $0.0001 > $0, every time. Obviously there's a lot I don't understand about business, because in this case apparently $0 > $X for a positive value of X, because the cart didn't sell well enough. This is why I don't run my own company.

 

Perhaps if the community would support more original releases, and not expend 95% of its excitement on ports/licenses/clones, we wouldn't be in this situation. I really feel bad for Elektronite, because the exact same amount of effort could be spent on just as good of games, without the licensing bullshit eating into profits, jacking up costs, and ending up with this ridiculous situation where $0 > $X.

[freewheel]

I view the Boulder Dash announcement is simply transparency. Various games have previously been announced as "we'll release a ROM if the CIB sells enough...". Well, it didn't. We don't get a ROM. End of story.

 

The (very big) difference here is that with the other games, it was "we'll release a FREE ROM if the CIB sells enough". At least that I'm aware of.

 

For BD, the plan was to SELL DRM-encumbered ROMs. Even with 0 CIB sales, there's still profit to be made selling the ROM. And just about zero downside. But see my previous post - I'm bad at business math.

[freewheel]

 

There would be, except for the threats of "I'll take my ball and go home" that seem to happen often.

 

 

You put my exact thoughts into words. This seems a lot more like that than anything. Whose ball it is and who's taking it home, I'm not quite sure of.

 

Maybe FSS is afraid of diluting their trademark on their highly lucrative 30 year old property that's already raking in millions annually. That seems to be the attitude of most rights holders in my (mostly 3rd hand) dealings with them.

 

And people wonder why there's a strong lobby to limit copyright etc to much shorter terms.

 

In any event, maybe this will spur people to support more original content for the system. It feels like every other release ends up being mired in controversy and drama of some sort. A man can dream...

[+Gunoz]

See, right now ROM revenue is zero. It could be greater than zero, with practically nil cost. The game is done. Even selling a single copy of the ROM for $10 and splitting the profits makes more money than zero - and I believe the plan was for $20. This has nothing to do with how many physical copies have been sold (unless the plan is to hold out until more physical copies are sold, but that's not how the statement was worded). Sell 10 copies? There's another $200 we didn't have otherwise. Sell 100 copies? $2000. Etc. But even if you only sell that one copy of the ROM, you're still ahead.

 

Not taking any sides here, just passing along info from the Facebook post. If I'm understanding correctly there was mention of having to pre-pay FSS for 150 ROMs to be produced.

Edited June 21, 2015 by gunoz

[freewheel]

 

Not taking any sides here, just passing along info from the Facebook post. If I'm understanding correctly there was mention of having to pre-pay FSS for 150 ROMs to be produced.

 

Makes sense. And I'm not trying to take "sides", per se, but that pretty much confirms who's being irrational here. You can't sell a zero-cost ROM unless you meet a minimum quota. 50 copies at $20 each? Nah. A $500 profit (all numbers made up by me) for zero work on the part of FSS just ain't worth their time.

 

It's indicative of a person/organization that still doesn't really understand digital media. It's why you still see the same type of people insisting on DRM, even though it's been proven over and over to not serve any actual benefit other than annoying legitimate customers.

 

"Producing ROMs". Heh. I'd like a job where I get paid to press ctrl-v up to a certain quota. The irony is that the per-unit cost, insofar as there is one, comes solely from their insistence on DRM.

 

I feel bad for Elektronite, because there is just so much extra baggage involved in dealing with licensed properties. Flogging a dead horse here, but these issues would not come up if the community would better support original (and just as good) content.

[+DZ-Jay]

 

Makes sense. And I'm not trying to take "sides", per se, but that pretty much confirms who's being irrational here. You can't sell a zero-cost ROM unless you meet a minimum quota. 50 copies at $20 each? Nah. A $500 profit (all numbers made up by me) for zero work on the part of FSS just ain't worth their time.

 

It's indicative of a person/organization that still doesn't really understand digital media. It's why you still see the same type of people insisting on DRM, even though it's been proven over and over to not serve any actual benefit other than annoying legitimate customers.

 

"Producing ROMs". Heh. I'd like a job where I get paid to press ctrl-v up to a certain quota. The irony is that the per-unit cost, insofar as there is one, comes solely from their insistence on DRM.

 

I feel bad for Elektronite, because there is just so much extra baggage involved in dealing with licensed properties. Flogging a dead horse here, but these issues would not come up if the community would better support original (and just as good) content.

 

I'll just throw this out there: Perhaps FSS didn't really appreciate the way that Elektronite represented their association or conducted its business, and bailed out.

 

I don't have knowledge either way, but it seems just as plausible as FSS not knowing how to do business in the new age.

 

-dZ.

[Keatah]

Since classic gaming on classic machines is a very tiny activity it needs to be handled that way. Today's classics game programmers must have realistic expectations. If they're looking to make a $million$ they need to look at a different platform. Maybe Flash & Java games on smartphones?

 

I also believe that the installed base of emulators far exceeds that of physical consoles and that's a market that shouldn't be ignored or used as "leverage" to encourage physical sales. And then there is multi-cart capability like Harmony. I know several people that game exclusively on flash-memory devices.

[freewheel]

 

I'll just throw this out there: Perhaps FSS didn't really appreciate the way that Elektronite represented their association or conducted its business, and bailed out.

 

I don't have knowledge either way, but it seems just as plausible as FSS not knowing how to do business in the new age.

 

-dZ.

 

I've been involved with talks over 20+ year old material that's literally sitting there rotting (ie: has not been used since the good old days), that the IP owner refused to even consider doing business with unless a minimum $10,000 licensing fee was presented up front.

 

Either explanation is equally plausible, but it wouldn't surprise me if FSS thinks BD is worth just a tiny bit more than it may be in reality.

 

[freewheel]

Since classic gaming on classic machines is a very tiny activity it needs to be handled that way. Today's classics game programmers must have realistic expectations. If they're looking to make a $million$ they need to look at a different platform. Maybe Flash & Java games on smartphones?

 

I also believe that the installed base of emulators far exceeds that of physical consoles and that's a market that shouldn't be ignored or used as "leverage" to encourage physical sales. And then there is multi-cart capability like Harmony. I know several people that game exclusively on flash-memory devices.

 

While I'm sure there are exceptions, I don't know of any homebrew programmers who expect to earn even minimum wage from their games. Maybe I'm just slow at this, but I've put 100+ hours into a game before it's even remotely close to a decent, playable, polished product. I do it for fun (and wicked street cred), not profit.

 

You're absolutely right about emulators. The problem is, (some) people still think that "piracy" is going to cannibalize most or all of their sales. To an audience that gladly pays $1000+ for Spiker! even though the ROM has been floating around free for nearly 20 years. Maybe they're right - piracy pretty much doomed the Playstation(s) to low sales and an early death after all. And nobody has bought music since Napster came around.

 

[Keatah]

I don't have knowledge either way, but it seems just as plausible as FSS not knowing how to do business in the new age.

 

-dZ.

 

Most companies are still overly paranoid about someone else making money off their work and exhibit a kind of psychosis when it is even a tiny, small, remote possibility. Just the thought clams them up. Things "media" are the worst, movies, games, music..

 

As far as I'm concerned they can DRM themselves out of existence.

[+Tarzilla]

I've been involved with talks over 20+ year old material that's literally sitting there rotting (ie: has not been used since the good old days), that the IP owner refused to even consider doing business with unless a minimum $10,000 licensing fee was presented up front.

 

Either explanation is equally plausible, but it wouldn't surprise me if FSS thinks BD is worth just a tiny bit more than it may be in reality.

 

I can relate to the problems of the IP holders (or in my case, the clueless licensing agents that have provided a barrier between the IP owner of the dormant product and people trying to resuscitate an old IP) most have no concept of modern promotion or even the Apple model of App Store. I tried with several different entities and offered to absorb the cost developments and promotion of the game, then split the sales from the 3 different App stores. In all cases they wanted money up front and in one case one of the agents wanted a negotiation fee along with the 20,000 license fee that he said was the IP holders minimum.

 

None of the above has anything to do with Boulderdash, but the reference to William and company having to prepay for 150 roms speaks volumes.

[Keatah]

I've been involved with talks over 20+ year old material that's literally sitting there rotting (ie: has not been used since the good old days), that the IP owner refused to even consider doing business with unless a minimum $10,000 licensing fee was presented up front.

 

Either explanation is equally plausible, but it wouldn't surprise me if FSS thinks BD is worth just a tiny bit more than it may be in reality.

 

20 years of rotting inside their brain is what it is. Senile corporate behavior. Warped and out of touch with reality. I think they're pretty dumb for not considering smaller deals that would add-up to more than a fantasy-like $$$ stars-in-my-eyes big break. It isn't going to happen.

 

But hey. It doesn't matter what I say, does it? I'm just one of your potential customers. Or not?

[Keatah]

I can relate to the problems of the IP holders (or in my case, the clueless licensing agents that have provided a barrier between the IP owner of the dormant product and people trying to resuscitate an old IP) most have no concept of modern promotion or even the Apple model of App Store. I tried with several different entities and offered to absorb the cost developments and promotion of the game, then split the sales from the 3 different App stores. In all cases they wanted money up front and in one case one of the agents wanted a negotiation fee along with the 20,000 license fee that he said was the IP holders minimum.

 

None of the above has anything to do with Boulderdash, but the reference to William and company having to prepay for 150 roms speaks volumes.

 

 

The wife tells agents that behave like so to take a hike. And she doesn't work with these up-front agreements. This up-front nonsense is just a way of transferring risk to someone else. A risk that should be partly borne by the rights holder. Because once it's done the IP holder (and especially the agent) doesn't care how well a product does on the market.