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Court Returns Stolen Stargate MMO To Founder

Posted by CmdrTaco on from the chevron-six-encoded dept.

An anonymous reader writes "A Maricopa County Superior Court judge has ended a bitter dispute over control of a Mesa video game company's assets, effectively giving the online combat game Stargate Resistance and the long-delayed MMORPG Stargate Worlds back to Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment. Fresh Start tried to remove all of Cheyenne Mountain's assets from its offices on Feb. 24, but was prevented from doing so when the police arrived. Networking cords had been cut and left to hang loose, and PC cases were empty shells that had been gutted of components such as hard drives. But time may finally have run out for Worlds, Cheyenne Mountain's signature project: The ruling comes as MGM Studios has apparently terminated the license it granted in 2006 for the Arizona company to produce video games based on the Stargate movies and TV shows."

33 of 128 comments (clear)

  1. Damn... by Kokuyo · · Score: 2, Insightful

    My friend will be very sad today.

    1. Re:Damn... by camperdave · · Score: 4, Funny

      Why, did his cat die?

      Yes. Didn't you read the summary: "Networking cords had been cut and left to hang...".

      All that cat5... sad, really.

      --
      When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
    2. Re:Damn... by supertrinko · · Score: 2, Funny

      Eli? Yes, he did play a lot of that MMO.

      --
      If it rhymes it must be true.
    3. Re:Damn... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      That was footage from this very MMO in the first episode of SGU by the way. They actually wrote something that resembled a game before imploding.

  2. How they managed to hide the sabotage by antifoidulus · · Score: 2, Funny

    They simply claimed that the gutted computers had all been upgraded to Vista. To the casual observer there is very little difference between an empty case and a computer running Vista.

    --
    Monstar L
    1. Re:How they managed to hide the sabotage by XLazarusX · · Score: 5, Insightful

      Love the ironic juxtaposition of your post and sig.

  3. Misread the headline by dkleinsc · · Score: 2, Funny

    At first I thought the court had returned a stolen Stargate, not a stolen Stargate *MMO*. Which would have been much bigger news, that's for sure.

    --
    I am officially gone from /. Long live http://www.soylentnews.com/
  4. So stealing does pay. by commodore64_love · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Not sure what Fresh Start Software's motive was, but if it was to block development of a Stargate videogame, they achieved their goal.

    --
    "I disapprove of what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it." - historian Evelyn Beatrice Hall
    1. Re:So stealing does pay. by Compholio · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Not sure what Fresh Start Software's motive was, but if it was to block development of a Stargate videogame, they achieved their goal.

      If one of the quotes from TFA is to be believed then my hypothesis would be that they are offended by Stargate's treatment of religion:

      Whiting then expressed optimism that Dark Comet would end up returning Cheyenne Mountain’s assets to him. He compared his situation in the “hostile takeover” to that of Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark in the first Iron Man movie, but said the motives for it were personal and even religious.

    2. Re:So stealing does pay. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Informative

      I worked for the company that Cheyenne Mountain originally licensed the engine for Stargate Worlds from. It seems that the farcical idiocy in that company went from the bottom to top, anyone with a shred of intelligence was judged as a threat and hastily fired. Any communication with that company started with us being blamed for their basic inability to design, manage or implement a computer game and any advice they were given was ignored. They eventually switched to Unreal, but unsurprisingly, they screwed that up too and blamed others for that also. In my experience, the founder of such companies is usually responsible for creating such a unproductive culture and that Whiting guy's comments ("I’m the brains behind this company. I’m the creative guy behind this company.") seem to confirm the image I had of a man devoid of any leadership ability or situational awareness. I have worked with arrogant old idiots who are full of "great ideas" and manage to get investment to make a computer game without knowing the slightest thing about the structure of a project or the people needed to complete it. I applaud "Fresh Start" software in its quest to turn that crippled pony into glue, as liquidation is the best thing for it. If you knew anything about the state of the project, you will know exactly why they did it, probably the only way to get their paychecks from the last few months.

    3. Re:So stealing does pay. by digitig · · Score: 3, Insightful

      If one of the quotes from TFA is to be believed then my hypothesis would be that they are offended by Stargate's treatment of religion:

      Whiting then expressed optimism that Dark Comet would end up returning Cheyenne Mountain’s assets to him. He compared his situation in the “hostile takeover” to that of Robert Downey Jr.’s Tony Stark in the first Iron Man movie, but said the motives for it were personal and even religious.

      In this field, that could be anything from which operating system they were using to which version of a storyline is canonical.

      --
      Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
  5. I mourn the loss by erroneus · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Star Trek was awesome in its day. Some will say that it still is. But what it had was not just a vision of the future, but a hope for the future. Star Wars gave us a new way look at things as well, but I can't say that it offered much more than intense entertainment. Stargate sought to engage the mind by tying old mysteries with new ones creating a galaxy and even a universe of awe and wonder that continued to expand beyond limits that were not imagined previously. Very few other sci-fi themes contained the qualities contained within Star Trek, Star Wars, Battle Star Galactica, Firefly and others, but Stargate, while it did seem to run its course, maintained those qualities in intense amounts. Had greed, politics and myopia had not taken its destructive toll, the potential of Stargate could have set a new standard for the genre.

    I mourn the loss... but it was lost long ago. We're just seeing the aftermath of some really crappy people.

    1. Re:I mourn the loss by g4b · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Very few other sci-fi themes contained the qualities contained within Star Trek, Star Wars, Babylon5, Firefly and others,

      fixed that for you.

    2. Re:I mourn the loss by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Informative

      Stargate blew. All of its plots refer to ancient structures and cultures, saying "aliens did it". When one gets old and tired, they get out a new culture, and label it with "aliens did it," and move on, as if they've done something clever. And the things they refer to? They aren't "mysteries." We know who built the pyramids, and why, and when, and largely how.

      What it was was bland, generic scifi fit for mass consumption. It lacked the campy retro appeal of the original run of Star Trek, lacked the talented writers of Star Trek: The Next Generation, and lacked the production values of Battlestar Galactica.

      They tried, too little, too late, to stop hemorrhaging viewers, by adding continuity, villains that looked like Twilight rejects, and lots and lots of big, but generally poorly executed space battles, but it was too little, too late. They managed two spinoffs. One was the same crap recycled, except set in a new location. The other was quite different from the rest of the series, which some might call "ballsy" or "daring", but those people would be idiots. Stargate: Universe is trying very hard to be Battlestar Galactica, but isn't quite managing it.

      To sum up, a quote attributed (probably falsely) to Samuel Johnson, "It is both good and original. But the part that is good is not original, and the part that is original is not good."

    3. Re:I mourn the loss by Qbertino · · Score: 2, Funny

      Very few other sci-fi themes contained the qualities contained within Raumpatrouille, Star Trek, Star Wars, Babylon5, Firefly and others,

      fixed that for you

      --
      We suffer more in our imagination than in reality. - Seneca
    4. Re:I mourn the loss by CAIMLAS · · Score: 2, Interesting

      Had greed, politics and myopia had not taken its destructive toll, the potential of Stargate could have set a new standard for the genre.

      I can't speak to the "greed and greed", but Stargate did set a "new standard" for the genre, to some degree. The show ran for a decade with (mostly) the same cast throughout. They were able to sustain essentially the same format for that entire time, without degrading the quality too substantially, and introduce new content throughout.

      Granted, this only really works with episodic fiction, but they still managed to maintain a degree of continuity and character progression from season to season (and episode to episode). Contrast that to ST:TNG, where by the 3rd or so season, things were starting to get a bit dull and repetitive.

      --
      ~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
    5. Re:I mourn the loss by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

      (posting anon as I already modded)

      FWIW B5 was the first science fiction show to have any kind of scientific realism when it comes to space battles, not to mention the fact that not all races had artifical gravity, hence the rotating station/ships. As for the story, B5 is about the only TV show to date, no matter what genre, with a well defined plot beforehand. The beginning, middle and end were all written before a single episode was filmed - due to issues with networks though, the fourth season feels very rushed, and the first half of the fifth is quite irrelevant. There are great episodes on the latter half though, Fall of Centauri Prime is one of my favourites of all seasons.

      Compare this to the re-imagined BSG, where the Cylons might have had a plan, but it became very evident they weren't letting the writers in on it. After what was the lamest and literally the most deux ex machina ending ever that was the final episode I didn't think I could ever be as infuriated after watching a show (well, Lost proved me wrong, but I digress).

      I'll grant that B5 certainly looks dated, and some of the acting is less than stellar (G'kar and Londo make totally up for it though in my opinion), but it certainly has been a much more influential series than BSG ever will, in promoting the whole "series as an arc"-concept beyond the realm of soap operas. BSG's contribution seems to be "despite a big budget, we can't afford camera stands".

    6. Re:I mourn the loss by g4b · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Well, opinions stay opinions.
      Don't get me wrong, I am a very open person, but reading BSG next to the other (really great) shows made me shiver.

      You are right, some actors were very bad in B5 - but some were genius (Katsulas, e.g.).
      Well this mostly also has to do with budget.

      Also, the storyarcs of B5 are still one of the best writings (in terms of WRITING) for any space opera, creating a very epic feeling until the show unfolds into season 5. Many things could have been done better, but we can tell that about every sci-fi show. I do not talk about Crusader or most of the silly movies.

      It was an experiment to slightly plan forward 5 Seasons of story and holding that promise, unveiling things which were planted seasons before. Some things of course did not work without some patchwork, like the unexpected change of captains and their meaning being "the one" in season 2/3.
      You do not have this in DS9 until S3. (I love both shows)

      To the question, which came first: It is very likely that Paramount used Straczynski's ideas to influence or even develop DS9 (since they had his first 22 episodes as writing already in '89), however Straczynski never wanted to sue them. You can read about that on wikipedia.

      Scientific ideas about how ships, stations, weapons, governments and societies work were very well made in B5. The choice to focus on 4 races was a good one. Of course, it was heavily LotR influenced storytelling, but it worked out.

      BSG on the other hand was sometimes terrible to watch - too much obvious but claiming-to-be-very-philosophical dialogues (the philosophical questions thrown up in a sci-fi-show should be between the lines), too much new age hypertheories, terrible nausea while watching space scenes, and again only a few actors were good - however none were as terrible as some in B5, I must admit.

      BSG deserves its credit to be a fine show. But it does not deserve to stand beside Firefly, Star Trek or Star Wars at all. B5 in my opinion does.
      I would add it to the second bestest, where Stargate Atlantis, Farscape, Earth2 and so on can be found.

      Well and there is Andromeda. We can agree about that one, I hope.

    7. Re:I mourn the loss by powerlord · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Personally, the series that tried the "hardest" on aliens being alien was Farscape.

      Farscape:

      1) Bi-pedal humanoid seemed common, but a) the makeup for those bipedal humanoids sometimes got rather intense. b) they weren't always humanoid (Pilot for instance) and c) motivations weren't always similar (just 'cause it looked mostly "human" didn't mean it was, and vice-versa). (well, and d) explaining why the most human aliens DID look that way, and that was part of the plot ... but we had to wait for the movie to fill in the last season of story).

      2) They explained it away in Episode 1 (think Babel-Fish), and even came back to the idea a few times (with 'us' the audience seeing how things sounded "naturally").

      3) Sex is one thing, procreation is another.

      --
      This space for rent. All reasonable inquiries will be entertained at proprietors discretion.
    8. Re:I mourn the loss by ultranova · · Score: 2, Interesting

      As all good science fiction does, current events and the human condition were examined, placing the characters in moral quandaries throughout the show.

      No, all good science fiction does not examine current events, the human condition, or moral quandaries. In fact I'd be thankful if less scifi writers felt the need to do so, especially since most of them aren't very good at it and even those who are tend to let the requirements of such examinations dictate the plot and the setting.

      I'd much rather see more examinations of possible futures and advanced super-tech.

      Religion, origins, etc. were explored while maintaining a reasonable level of scientific realism. Significantly, B5 had none of these things.

      Well, not much anyway, and that was its best feature. The parts that did examine them tended to be cringeworthy, just like they usually are anywhere.

      --

      Forget magic. Any technology distinguishable from divine power is insufficiently advanced.

    9. Re:I mourn the loss by CAIMLAS · · Score: 2, Interesting

      B5 gave you characters who you wanted to be.

      BSG gave real characters, all of which with their faults and strengths. Most of them (like most people) were unsavory to one degree or another, but

      Saul Tye, I disliked for the first several seasons. By the end, he was one of my favorites. Giaius Baltar was an outrageously unsavory character at the beginning, but by the end I could at least understand him, somewhat (even if I didn't "like" him, I could understand him.) The Chief is a 'constant' throughout the show, but he grows on your like a close friend; Adm. Adama, like a father. The opposite can be said for Kara Thrace.

      --
      ~/ssh slashdot.org ssh: connect to host slashdot.org port 22: too many beers
    10. Re:I mourn the loss by Belial6 · · Score: 3, Insightful
      It is justified because BSG was the the Maryilyn Manson of SciFi shows. It was a laundry list of "What's Edgy" that just comes out as posing. It's pretty clear that the way BSG was designed was by sitting down making a list of what sells to the masses. Heck, they stole a character directly out of Startrek Voyager. I'm sure you will say that they were nothing alike, after all, one was 7 and the other was 8. Totally different numbers! The entire show was one big cheesefest. Yes, they had a better budget than BSG, but it is clear that they threw money at the problem rather than skilled writers. The story was rambling, and didn't even maintain consistency of it's story through the first season. I wanted to like the show. I really did. Unfortunately, it just sucked. Actually to be fair, if they didn't call it BSG, I might have given them more leeway. Instead, they set a bar that they couldn't reach. Maybe they should have called it Galactica 1980 instead. It would have been closer.

      As all good science fiction does, current events and the human condition were examined, placing the characters in moral quandaries throughout the show. Religion, origins, etc. were explored while maintaining a reasonable level of scientific realism. Significantly, B5 had none of these things.

      I don't know how you came to that conclusion. The only 'scientific realism' that I saw in BSG was the lack of sound in space. Since that has been a harping point amongst nerds for some time before, it just came off as another of the checklist items of "what's edgy". Contrary to half thought out beliefs, there is sound is space. You can perform an experiment right now to prove it. Say "Test. Test. Test." Go ahead, try it. Was there sound? Yep. Are you in space? Yep. Sound may not travel through a vacuum, but there is definitly sound in space. So, should you hear it in a TV show? That is artistic choice. Certainly if the perspective is from a first person, you should not be able to hear a ship fly by. On the other hand, if you are getting a third person perspective, thus are already recieving information that no character is getting, it makes exactly as much sense that you can hear the ships as you can see them.

      On the other hand B5 was constantly making a point to work with science. From explaining why the different races ship blow up in different colors, to acknowledging that not every species breaths the same air, to acknowleding that they could have pests. BSG on the other hand just says "God did it".

      Which brings us to religion. There is nothing new in BSG in it's "examination" of religion. It is just rehashing the Christian mythos with nothing new added. How you missed religion in B5 is beyond me. The entire 5 year story arc was riding the religious theme. Perhaps you missed it because it wasn't the same old story you've heard a million times. Maybe it was because it actually examined the religion instead of just saying "God did it". From the beginning to the end, B5 examined religion through the Shadows. Not only examining good and evil from the mortal view, but questioning the good and evil of the gods themselves. Going even farther, questioning whether the ideas of good and evil even apply.

      Basically your analysis is that BSG's simplistic trendy addition of those subjects counts, while B5's deeper analysis of the subject going so far as to even question if the questions are even asked right, doesn't count.

    11. Re:I mourn the loss by quacking+duck · · Score: 2, Interesting

      I won't contest your assertions about the BSG finale because, frankly, I'm on the fence about it myself. However...

      (G'kar and Londo make totally up for it though in my opinion)

      Egads. They were the least believable characters! What's next: a gurgling puddle of slime in the staring role?

      Excuse me, but what!? I'll admit G'Kar became a little too comical in season 5, but watch season 2's "The Long Twilight Struggle", in particular the council chamber scene where G'Kar is forced to give up his seat after his race surrenders to the Centauri. His proud, defiant exit speech utterly robs Londo of any sense of victory, and you see it in Londo's face.

  6. who owns Fresh Start? by corbettw · · Score: 4, Funny

    Breaking in, stealing components, gutting computers. Who's the CEO over? Joe Arpaio's little brother?

    --
    God invented whiskey so the Irish would not rule the world.
  7. I hate Journalists by Herkum01 · · Score: 2, Funny

    They won a court decision and got something from someone else. Is there a limit on the number of characters in their keyboard? Is it too much trouble to even research the story to find out what is going on? It is like watching the last 5 minutes of "Iron Man" and going WTF? Who is the good guy, Stark because he won, or because he blows up stuff?

    This is why I hate to read the article, I am hoping some /. poster is going to do the work of posting the back history. The thing the "journalist" did not do.

    1. Re:I hate Journalists by Kagato · · Score: 4, Informative

      From reading the linked articles it seems like Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment was in Chap 11. Then someone (maybe a group of investors?) illegally sold the assets of the company to the new gaming companies for $100,000. It appears the court said that action was illegal both in terms of procedure and perhaps value as well. The motives are where the real dirt is, and I suspect you're not going to get a straight answer on that until after all the lawsuits are settled.

    2. Re:I hate Journalists by sabt-pestnu · · Score: 2, Informative

      It's even stranger, in that Gary Whiting, had ANOTHER company, Garvick Properties, LLC that went bankrupt. Due to Whiting's shenanigans, "Cheyenne Mountain Games, Inc" (a subsidiary of "Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment, Inc") got dragged into the bankruptcy. As near as I can tell, that caused the subsidiary to go bankrupt too.

      Meanwhile, Tim Jensen, one time president of Cheyenne Mountain Entertainment got caught by the SEC trying to move assets between two OTHER companies he owned/controlled. He's the one accused of orchestrating asset transfer in THIS case, too. Apparently the courts agreed in some fashion, since they forced the return of the assets. (Jensen is also accused of "Stalling Stargate Worlds for years", but it doesn't really sound like it was ready for prime time anyway....)

      The articles (as a whole) are real hazy about divisions between CM Games and CM Entertainment, which might well reflect some ambiguity on the ground.

  8. Pitty - it was a good game by gravis777 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    I was in the early alpha and beta testing of Worlds, as I had a friend at Cheyenne Mountain. It was the first MMO I actually liked. It was a little buggy, but the game was almost done when bankruptcy hit. This was complicated by some freeze being put on the accounts where, even though the money was there, they were not able to pay their employees. Shoot, the game was in Beta, there were just a few bugs to work out, the server farms were going online - the game was pretty much READY - and the inside word was that they were weeks (about two months) from going live. Quite sad what became of it.

  9. It's just a tv show! They're all just tv shows! by name_already_taken · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Yes, Star Trek brought to us a vision of the future wherein no matter where one roams in the universe, 1) Everybody looks human, 2) Everybody speaks perfect English, despite never having been contacted before by humans, and 3) Sex with alien species is considered perfectly natural. All I can say is... Ewwwwwwwww!

    Oh come on.

    To be fair, Star Wars, BattleStar Galactica, Firefly, Babylon 5, Dr. Who, Space: 1999, and a host of other shows all featured those characteristics.

    It's not because the shows' makers were unimaginative, it's because they are television shows.

    It's difficult to find actors who don't look like humans; audiences in the countries where these shows were produced mainly understand only English (there are no native Klingon speakers, no matter how many nerds learn the Klingon language); and sex keeps stupid people watching the show, helping the ratings. Ok, Dr. Who hasn't featured much, if any, sex, but that's because it was a BBC production aimed at families.

    --
    Putting moderation advice in your .sig lowers your karma!
    1. Re:It's just a tv show! They're all just tv shows! by delinear · · Score: 3, Funny

      Dr. Who didn't have out-and-out sex, but name one of his assistants that wasn't "hot". To juxtapose, try to imagine Mrs. Marple being the Dr.'s sidekick.

      I can think of one - but then again I guess it's what "floats your boat".

  10. Re:conspiracy. by delinear · · Score: 2, Funny

    Then whatever secret the government is hiding behind Duke Nukem Forever must be truly terrifying.

  11. Re:Crossover by meerling · · Score: 4, Informative

    DS9 was based on an earlier script for Babylon 5. You can google the lawsuits but let's put it this way, Paramount lost the lawsuit so badly they had it sealed and were forced to show B5 trailers at Star Trek conventions. If you have any idea how anti anything not paramount those guys are, you know they got pounded flat by the judge.

    (The version of B5 they had their hands on even had a shapeshifting security officer... )

  12. Re:So hard work doesn't pay. by Cyberblah · · Score: 5, Informative

    I was gone by then, but based on what I know of the people who started it, Fresh Start's goal was to continue supporting a game they believed in. While still at Cheyenne, they completed and released Resistance quickly under terrible circumstances (circumstances that I fled), only to be betrayed by Gary Whiting with a bankruptcy filing the instant they brought the company its first revenue ever. Then they managed to form a company to continue supporting the game. They kept the servers up and even released new maps and improved some of the graphics assets.

    This article is 100% Mr. Whiting's side of the story. While at Cheyenne I formed the opinion that he is a very shady individual, but I was pretty low on the totem pole, so I don't know what was really going on.

    What I know for sure, however, is that Resistance would never have come out without the people behind Fresh Start, and it probably would have been completely unsupported from the moment of release (possibly unplayable, with the servers down) without the formation of Fresh Start. So I'm going to give them a pretty fucking big benefit of the doubt.

    Oh, and based on the financial situation when I left, the people working for Fresh Start were probably getting paid next to nothing, if that much. So obviously "stealing" pays big time.