Star Controller

I was reading some articles, when I found an article by journalist/Star Control fan, Chris Remo, titled “Stardock CEO Wardell Eyes Star Control, Orion, And More”:

As it turns out, that’s[Master of Magic] not the only lapsed property the Stardock team dreams of getting its hands on — and not the only one currently owned by Atari, for that matter.

“I actually pitched Atari on a whole idea for a true successor to Star Control,” CEO Brad Wardell tells Gamasutra, noting that the game would follow original series developer Toys for Bob’s Star Control II rather than the Legend Entertainment-developed Star Control 3 (”We just pretend that never happened,” the CEO says of that release).

…

Novato, California-based Toys for Bob has actually floated the idea of making its own Star Control II sequel, with co-creator Paul Reiche III indicating he has tossed potential design ideas around, but with the company now owned by publisher Activision the proposal seems to be stuck in limbo.
- Chris Remo, Stardock CEO Wardell Eyes Star Control, Orion, And More

Brad Wardell wants to purchase a bunch of video game rights, including Star Control.  Stardock is a great company and their game, Sins of a Solar Empire is a great real-time strategy game that has a great fanbase.  Their philosphy that copy-protection causes more piracy than it prevents is something that I share, along with many other PC gamers.

They know how to make good games and I realize that Star Control wouldn’t be the same without the TFB-twist that Paul Reiche III and Fred Ford have done with the previous Star Control games.  I remember Alex Ness writing on the TFB website that Paul has a bunch of ideas for the Star Control sequel:

Besides helping us convince Activision that there is a fan base clammoring for this game, the emails really fire Paul up. He’s been brainstorming ideas on his spare time for a possible sequel and come up with some really cool stuff.
- Alex Ness, June 28 2006

I would love to see Paul’s ideas come to life in a new Star Control sequel that they have complete control over.  One of the many things that make Star Control II unique is that it’s never too serious or cartoony; it switches back and forth with alien races such as the Kohr-Ah, Spathi, Ur-Quan, Zoq-Fot-Pik, etc.  Not everyone is a high-tech “let’s move in for the kill” starship captain.

I appreciate Brad’s ambition to revive these games, and I feel that the only people who should have the rights to Star Control should be Paul and Fred.  The open source version of Star Control II is called “The Ur-Quan Masters” because Atari owns these rights, but I still call it Star Control regardless of the legalities.

There’s nothing I can do to stop Brad from wanting to buy the rights to Star Control and if they do go through with it, I hope he contacts Paul and Fred and gets them involved in the project, allowing them to shape the potential Star Control any way they wish.  If they are allowed to have creative control over the project, I wouldn’t mind seeing a Toys for Bob/Stardock alliance.

I’m glad that there are other game developers out there who care about having a Star Control and there needs to be emphasis that only Toys for Bob can make this sequel and they’re the only ones who can do it right.  They need to take their time with it, without being forced to meet a ridiculous deadline.

I know that Stardock understands how hard it is to release an Intellectual Property game and promote it at the same time, and their experience with Sins of a Solar Empire shows that they know what they’re doing.  Brad, please don’t take Star Control away from the gods that created it.  I seriously thought about buying the rights myself and I realized that I have no legal-experience and very little cash to do it.  The only way I can see Stardock making a worthy sequel to Star Control II is if they work with Toys for Bob, and have their approval and guidance for every single thing in the game.  If they feel generous enough, they could give the rights to Paul and Fred, so that Atari can’t slaughter the name any further.  However that’s completely up to Brad, and I’ve never heard of people generously giving legal rights away.

If they do get the rights to Star Control and make a sequel that Toys for Bob does not approve of, I will not hesitate to call it “SCnot3-2″.

Full Story: Stardock CEO Wardell Eyes Star Control, Orion, And More by Chris Remo

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I’ve been thinking about my years of college and I don’t remember telling anyone about my failed attempt to spread the word of Star Control to other gamers.  It’s nothing spectacular because nothing really happened from it and the club ended before it even had a chance to start, so I guess it can be seen as a tragedy of some kind.

At the start of my second year of classes, I received an e-mail about the many clubs that were available for people to join.  There were many types of clubs, ranging from martial arts, foreign films, anime, music, dancing and last but not least, video games.  There was a club called the “Gaming Alliance” where people could play many types of video games.  This was a few months after Alex Ness first announced wanting to make a new Star Control game with Activision, and UQM 0.6.0 was released with netplay.  I wanted to join the club and show everyone UQM and get people to learn about the melee combat and start playing against different people.  I knew that it would take a while to get used to the combat, but I figured that it’s worth a shot at least.

So, I walked into the Student Center and I told them that I am interesting in joining the Gaming Alliance.  I wrote my name and e-mail address on a long list of potential club members and I was told that this is one of the clubs getting the most attention.  There were over 30 people on that list and I felt nervous about how I would show of UQM to everyone else.  I even made sure I had the 3DO intro and ending videos copied to the UQM folders to help show it off.  There are many retro gamers out there, and I hoped that it would appeal to them as well.

A few weeks later, I received an e-mail from the Student Center saying that they would like to see me because there is something they would like to talk about with me.  The person who deals with setting up these clubs told me that the person who started this club had to stand down as club president because of a personal matter and offered me the spot of club president.  We knew each other because I used to work as tech support at the college and I helped him a few times with computer-related stuff.  I happily accepted the offer, not knowing the responsibilities ahead of me.

As club president, I had to manage the club itself, in addition to my little plan of showing off Star Control.  Unfortunately, my classes continued to get harder and with the midterms getting closer and my need to find a job, I had less time to dedicate to the club.

I got an e-mail from someone who wanted to hold a Counter-Strike tournament, and a girl who wanted to interview me regarding gaming culture.  I even tried scheduling time in the evenings for the meetings.  I want to stick to the philosophy of “any game, any console, any time”.  I had the idea of people just showing off random games and everyone would play as many games as possible and nobody would feel lost in a single game and encourage people to explore other genres.  Because of my busy schedule, I never had the chance to start a single club meeting and I had to go back to the Student Center and tell them that I no longer have time for the club anymore and I had to resign.  They passed the rank of club president to someone else and I don’t know what happened after that.

I still think about it occasionally.  I imagined that I’d make a few people raise their eyebrows at me and I had no plans on concentrating on hardcore gamers.  I love talking about video games and watching videos of them, so I wanted to find a way to encourage people to find a game they like, talk about it and if possible, have other people download it for free and play it.  If the club members did like UQM, I would have mentioned TFB’s desire to make a new Star Control and I’d help them write letters to Alex.  Even though my plan ultimately failed, I’m just glad I tried at least.

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