Ok Sabin, hope you can see I changed my line about the sound names. I got a question though for anyone knowledgable, other than Apple pulling the app, can this company be easily fined or sued since the companies are in different countries? Or would this just be a waste of time?
I kind of figured you'd have read all the pages and seen the mod-posted quote from Travis (again, developer and creator of FATE/Torchlight) about the sound files and the instructions on how to verify for yourself. I didn't think to make it a proper linkable quote and I guess that was my bad, but still.... Anyhow, just because you don't have those resources - doesn't mean the evidence ceases to exist. Fair enough, it just sounded (at first) like you were playing devil's advocate to... well... the devil A devil who had been already been discredited and squandered his chance to defend himself, thus needing no advocate. I would understand if this was some baseless witch hunt.. but the existing evidence is not just compelling, it's outright damning. As for suing? I don't think Travis (and, by extension, Runic) wants to sue -- they just want the game pulled, at least until all resources belonging to Travis/Runic are no longer part of the game. That's a pretty fair demand, a lot of other studios would have gotten the courts involved immediately. I guess if Apple and/or EGLS refuse to pull the game, that's when lawyers will start grinning and filing their teeth
Decoding the Mayan language, finding the true link between Homo and Australopithecus, being the only politician in the world who understands issues, compiling GIS works for the Forestry Serv- Oh crap, someone is wrong on the internet! My skills are finally needed! TO THE BATMOBILE!
I think that's something commendable on Runic's part. They aren't out for blood or trying to milk the situation for cash. They are simply trying to protect their own work. That being said, I would not hold them in any less regard if they decided to change their mind and persue whatever form of legal action is available in this situation. Hopefully it won't come to that and Apple will simply pull the app, but if Runic has to hire a lawyer to protect their stuff, then so be it.
Investigating Claims (Independent CSI officer) So anyway, I downloaded the ipa from google search (for investigating purpose only). As normal, I changed the ipa of Armed Heroes Online extension to zip extension. Then extracted it using The Unarchiver. A Folder is created. Going in, there is another folder called Payload, so I went in (using Finder), then, there are a bunch of sound_file#.mod files. Changing those to zip and extracted give me a big file of no extension. Ok fine. So I went and open sound_pkg.prop in TextEdit. Here it is: All the file names listed in this prop file is familiar. And lets scroll to the prominent accusation by Runic... *drumroll* That's the misspell filename: mechdwardeath1.wav=210 EDIT: CSI work is exciting, and I'm typing this while eating my breakfast. Managed to get a hold of Torchlight DEMO game from one of their mirror sites. EXE is recognizable by OSX as an archive so double clicking it enables to unarchive it. A folder comes up. Go in and unzip Pak.zip. A folder called "media" comes up. Then go to these folders (see the screen cap of my finder). And the filename as stated before: So there you go. Signing off while wearing my RayBan, Rocotilos Horatios. Disclaimer: I'm an indie individual developer and not affiliated with Runic/EGLs in anyway. And have deleted both binaries from machines after the investigation is completed (that is today).
Honestly, legalities would just be a waste of resources at this point, for Runic anyways. Even if they won. They approached the situation properly and level headed. While Apple may have let the game through (is it out yet?), the company is still responsible enough, and intelligent enough to act accordingly, so long as Runic provides the necessary proof. Once it is off of the App Store, that essentially stops sales to EGLS, at least from Apple's venue. Note that Runic is not actually losing money from this debacle, that is not the crux here, the issue is that EGLS is making money off of another company's hard work, which is, obviously, wrong. An appropriate analogy would be if/when a coworker gets a raised based off of your hard work. As a modeller / texture artist / UV mapper, I can tell you that it is incredibly easy to manipulate models after all of the hard work has been completed. Polygon reduction is a very straightforward affair, as is texture manipulation. Anyone unfamiliar with either process should simply sit out of the discussion (I would say 'debate' but, lets be honest, it really isn't anything close to that). - I'd also like to offer this aside; As artists, as creative folk would we rather be recognized for our originality or our skills of imitation? Personally I'd rather be remembered as 'the guy who created XYZ' instead of 'the guy who made that Torchlight Clone'.
Lol, one of the comments from the PCGamer article covering the story: http://www.pcgamer.com/2012/07/17/torchlight-game-assets-plagiarized-by-chinese-developer-runic-responds/
Honestly, I say, who gives a damn??? They should just come to some agreement that EGLS share the profit of their game! If Torchlight is so successful, and this game is basically a shot-for-shot port of the game (Since they essentially stole all of the code), then it should make a significant amount of money which could be shared. Money is a powerful thing!! After all, money talks.
Kotaku now has an article more to spawn soon i am sure. http://kotaku.com/5926795/creators-of-torchlight-ripoff-say-its-not-a-torchlight-ripoff
"I don't think we're interested in that. Who wants to go into business with someone who is dishonest out of the gate? How would you trust them to even pay you the appropriate royalty amount? Moreover, granting our blessing to use our assets to a certain extent means we also bless the game that uses them. I don't know anything about it, and I don't want to be in the outsourcing or licensing business at all. We want to make games that we are responsible for, and that if people dislike, it's our fault - not someone else we have no influence over." Travis posted this in the other thread http://forums.toucharcade.com/showthread.php?t=144322&page=7
The game is free. And many people dont buy iAP's for free to play games. Your arguement is invalid and I laugh at your stupidity.
It isn't a port. It's a different game. It just uses the assets we built. Would you really jump at the chance to work with someone who stole your work and then tried to pretend they didn't? I don't care much about money, except insofar as it lets us continue making the games we want to make. I DO care about working with people I like.
I actually feel so stupid for not knowing about torchlight before this whole issue. Travis, you and your team are admirable in the way you are handling this situation and I respect that. Btw gunna get torchlit as soon as I get my next paycheck. Also any plans for a legitimate torchlight iOS port?
Not at present. If we devoted any resources to that and took them away from completing TL2 I imagine a lynching wouldn't be far behind.
