Abandonware

[whiteb]

Pinball dreams, Pinball fantasies, and pinball illusions were released into the community by Digital illusions. The only copies they had (been a while since i read the article) were ADF and they made them available on their website...

The same mob now bring you BF1942 (Dice).... published by EA Games.

[Shatterhand]

You know, I think the Home of Underdogs it's a good example of what truly is Abandonware.

They list games, and if the game is old, and isn't being selling by the publisher anymore, they offer it to download it. If the game is being sold somewhere, they offer a link to buy it. If an author or publisher asks to remove the download link, they do it.

Still they never said it's legal, which I think it's a good thing.


But yes, the word Abandonware lost it's meaning with time, as so many other words (Like, Gay ). Many sites use it as an excuse to upload new games.

[Drake1009]

They have a deal of their games non-downloadable and non-buyable because of the IDSA. Though it's sad that they can't offer downloads of some of them, and can't even get to know which games it is that the IDSA don't like there it's still a great site.

[P-J]

Originally posted by fisken uno
BTW AFAIK the games on BTTR are NOT "abandonware"

In my personal opinion, they are.

How can you be expected to pay for a piece of software for which you can be 100% sure of receiving NO support for?

They are technically 'abandoned' since for most games of the time, the support was included in the price.

[CPC464]

I disagree

Games on BTTR are NOT abandonware BTTR try their hardest to obtain gaming permissions from various comapnies to place their games on their site. Lets face it if all games and progs that were not supported any more was "ABANDONWARE" then webmasters would find it a lot easier to upload anything they wanted.

Classics like "Secret of Monkey Island" are not supported but I see no permissions from the company to say that anyone can upload this game to their site.

@ Dizzy

Why not say Windows 98 is abandonware because M$ don't support it anymore

Maybe not but I use Win98SE and I can still obtain the latest windows updates from their site

[Drake1009]

The BTTR team works hard on getting permission to put the software on their site. They might not be supported anymore but they still do the courtesey of asking permission.

Abandonware is a term which some people thought up for justifying putting old games which most developers don't care about any longer on the net. It's by no means a way of saying that it's legal. It's just classified by some people as games the companies probably won't mind doing anything about if you put up.

[Unknown_K]

What is the deal with major software like Windows 3.1, and windows 95? The company is still around but won't support or sell them anymore. I am sure every IBM, Compaq, DELL, etc made during that era had a liscence from MS when they were sold, so could you just load the OS from a downloaded windows cd and still be legal?

[CPC464]

The Microsoft licensing system works like this.

When you buy an OS (Dos/win95/98/98SE/ME/2000/NT/XP) it's not the actual software you are paying for it's just the licence to use the software.

Each licence you pay is for that individual piece of software for that 1 computer.

So it's legal to keep putting a licence bought OS on your PC but not legal to put the same software on another PC.

[Mr Creosote]

The Microsoft licensing system works like this. [...]

That's not completely correct. It is in fact how Microsoft wants it to be. Recent court rulings opposed this, though: All licenses of Microsoft software (including OEM ones) can now be sold, transfered and done with whatever the license holder likes. I'm not sure if this is valid EU-wide or only in Germany, though.

[Drake1009]

Well in Denmark OEM is still limited to one computer. Non transferrable between computers.

You can buy non-OEM versions which are more flexible though.