Bit confused on the Alien Quake mod situation from years ago.

[Spooner5020]

So I just finished the original Aliens Doom mod for the first time. I could see why it was such a huge deal for the time, so I decided I’d go back and try to finish Alien Quake. Alien Quake had been shut down or FOXED at the time as they called it and I was never clear why Alien Quake was the one that got Foxed and not Alien Doom. 
 

Apparently this wasn’t the only Quake mod at the time that got Foxed. There was also a Simpsons Quake mod that went through the same thing. So what was different about Alien Quake that that mod had to be shut down?

[DNSKILL5]

Foxed? As in ceased and desisted?

 

My guess is Fox or whoever didn’t care about Alien Doom (1994, one of, if not the first true TC for Doom) but cared about Alien Quake in 1997 because it may have made them afraid attention would be taken away from the Alien Trilogy game that came out in 1996. 

Edited May 30 by DNSKILL5

[ETTiNGRiNDER]

Take none of what I say here as definitive, as I wasn't involved nor do I have direct word from any people who were, but my understanding of the situation has always been that Aliens Quake (and other Quake mods that suffered a similar fate) was somewhat of a "wrong place, wrong time" type of deal where A) while early Doom modding was kind of a "gamer thing" that wasn't that well known outside of the scene, Quake was sort of in the spotlight and there was real concern among companies that user mods would compete with official products, and B) there was, in fact, such a product either recently released or in the works (that probably being Alien Trilogy?) so the legal teams were extra twitchy about it.  If they were aware of the Doom mod at that time, they probably ignored it as old news and old tech, not worth stomping on when it had already been in circulation for a few years at that point.

 

I do believe there were some Doom mods back in the day (specifically a Beavis & Butt-Head one?) that got hammered down similarly, but I'm vague on those details, maybe someone can fill me in.  I think it was a similar case with the notorious "Beyond Wolfenstein" mod of Wolf3D as well that happened to be on time to attract ire right around when Return to Castle Wolfenstein was coming out.

 

Theoretically, any TC based on a corporate franchise could suffer a similar takedown, but in most cases companies either aren't aware or have weighed the possible negative backlash as not worth what they'd gain out of it.  It sometimes seems rather arbitrary what attracts that sort of attention and when.

[DNSKILL5]

Yes, Beyond Wolfenstein did suffer a similar fate. As far as I can tell, it’s the only Wolf 3D mod to ever receive a C&D. My best guess is that since Id bought the rights to Wolfenstein’s branding back in 1992, that included “Beyond Wolfenstein” which could have very well been a working title for RTCW or they felt it was too similar. I also think that mod reused full version maps without alterations in some parts of the mod.

[Wadmodder Shalton]

2 minutes ago, DNSKILL5 said:

Yes, Beyond Wolfenstein did suffer a similar fate. As far as I can tell, it’s the only Wolf 3D mod to ever receive a C&D. My best guess is that since Id bought the rights to Wolfenstein’s branding back in 1992, that included “Beyond Wolfenstein” which could have very well been a working title for RTCW or they felt it was too similar. I also think that mod reused full version maps without alterations in some parts of the mod.

I wonder if there is a surviving copy of Beyond Wolfenstein anywhere on the internet.

[DNSKILL5]

Just now, Wadmodder Shalton said:

I wonder if there is a surviving copy of Beyond Wolfenstein anywhere on the internet.

There definitely is but it is usually just spread between community members in private. 

[Zerofuchs]

48 minutes ago, Wadmodder Shalton said:

I wonder if there is a surviving copy of Beyond Wolfenstein anywhere on the internet.

There's a DOS game archive project called ExoDOS which is fairly comprehensive... includes a pretty extensive gathering of titles and major mods. Might find it squeezed in there.

Edit: This the right Beyond Wolfenstein? With Duke's shotgun?

Edited May 30 by Zerofuchs
Added image

[Lila Feuer]

Suit moment. Nobody would care nowadays, especially for such old games. Wow I forgot all about Beyond Wolfenstein.

Edited May 30 by Lila Feuer

[Wadmodder Shalton]

2 hours ago, ETTiNGRiNDER said:

I do believe there were some Doom mods back in the day (specifically a Beavis & Butt-Head one?) that got hammered down similarly, but I'm vague on those details, maybe someone can fill me in. 

I bet one could find an old post on the Doom Usenet newsgroup archives about those mods somewhere.

5 hours ago, Spooner5020 said:

Apparently this wasn’t the only Quake mod at the time that got Foxed. There was also a Simpsons Quake mod that went through the same thing. So what was different about Alien Quake that that mod had to be shut down?

I wonder if one can find an old post on the Quake Usenet newsgroup archives about the Simpsons Quake mod.

[Jello]

Just a thought, I wonder if it didn't have something to do with the "X-Men: Ravages of Apocalypse" TC for Quake that saw a retail release in '97. It's quite possible that Fox saw something of a lucrative market in making licensed Quake mods, so they wanted to shut down the Aliens mod because they thought they could make money off the IP. Or they just wanted to shut it down because they're dicks and they didn't want people releasing free products based on their IP's. It's been a long time since I've heard the phrase "FOXED", so that brought back memories. Is the common parlance now "NINTENDO'D"?

[Spooner5020]

1 hour ago, Wadmodder Shalton said:

I bet one could find an old post on the Doom Usenet newsgroup archives about those mods somewhere.

I wonder if one can find an old post on the Quake Usenet newsgroup archives about the Simpsons Quake mod.

You can find the Simpsons Quake mod pretty easily. I don’t have a link, but I’m pretty sure I have it. It’s literally just some graphic changes and sound changes with Barney as the Ogre, Santa’s Little Helper as the dog, nailing replacement, Mr. burns replaces Zombies and some other changes. It’s nothing special.

Edited May 31 by Spooner5020

[Spooner5020]

So I read somewhere where supposedly Fox may have been upset by the Quake mod because people were saying it was better than the Alien Trilogy game at the time.  If that is true, then Fox didn’t have much of a spine back then.

[Spooner5020]

4 hours ago, ETTiNGRiNDER said:

Take none of what I say here as definitive, as I wasn't involved nor do I have direct word from any people who were, but my understanding of the situation has always been that Aliens Quake (and other Quake mods that suffered a similar fate) was somewhat of a "wrong place, wrong time" type of deal where A) while early Doom modding was kind of a "gamer thing" that wasn't that well known outside of the scene, Quake was sort of in the spotlight and there was real concern among companies that user mods would compete with official products, and B) there was, in fact, such a product either recently released or in the works (that probably being Alien Trilogy?) so the legal teams were extra twitchy about it.  If they were aware of the Doom mod at that time, they probably ignored it as old news and old tech, not worth stomping on when it had already been in circulation for a few years at that point.

 

I do believe there were some Doom mods back in the day (specifically a Beavis & Butt-Head one?) that got hammered down similarly, but I'm vague on those details, maybe someone can fill me in.  I think it was a similar case with the notorious "Beyond Wolfenstein" mod of Wolf3D as well that happened to be on time to attract ire right around when Return to Castle Wolfenstein was coming out.

 

Theoretically, any TC based on a corporate franchise could suffer a similar takedown, but in most cases companies either aren't aware or have weighed the possible negative backlash as not worth what they'd gain out of it.  It sometimes seems rather arbitrary what attracts that sort of attention and when.

The Beavis and Butthead mod for doom I’m pretty sure I have. It was called BB4Doom or something like that. I know it was removed from the archives and I think the reason they went so hard was cause they used sound clips from the show and they weren’t allowed to. There may have been more to it, but Simpsons Doom did same thing and nothing happened there so I don’t know.

[Lila Feuer]

It's also possible they didn't want the Alien Quake mod to compete with the-then Alien Resurrection film as it was also having a game developed alongside that would end up in development hell until its release in 2000.

[Kinsie]

12 hours ago, DNSKILL5 said:

Yes, Beyond Wolfenstein did suffer a similar fate. As far as I can tell, it’s the only Wolf 3D mod to ever receive a C&D. My best guess is that since Id bought the rights to Wolfenstein’s branding back in 1992, that included “Beyond Wolfenstein” which could have very well been a working title for RTCW or they felt it was too similar. I also think that mod reused full version maps without alterations in some parts of the mod.

It was a standalone game that didn't require Wolfenstein 3D to run, loaded with most of Id's assets. That's pretty commonplace now in the Wolf4SDL era and they don't seem to give a shit because there are much bigger fish to fry, but back they it wasn't and they very much did.

 

Just because Id is pretty lax about our bullshit nowadays doesn't mean they've always been, or they always will be!

 

12 hours ago, Wadmodder Shalton said:

I wonder if there is a surviving copy of Beyond Wolfenstein anywhere on the internet.

It's not difficult to find, and indeed a well-known modder did a port of it to Wolf4SDL back in 2018.

[Lila Feuer]

23 hours ago, Kinsie said:

It was a standalone game that didn't require Wolfenstein 3D to run, loaded with most of Id's assets.

The absolute laundry list of standalone TCs that rely on hacked executables is staggering, you can essentially download entire new Wolf3D games and not even own the originals, so I'm going to assume there was straight up unmodified maps in Beyond Wolfenstein or else it's a freak isolation case. Registered level sets required the graphics and/or sounds supplied as they would only offer you the new maps, but these honestly pale in comparison to the standalone stuff. It isn't news however that id or at least Carmack was not super pleased with how dirty modding the game was and why their next game (the one this website's named after) is a lot more modular and total conversions still required the IWAD to operate.

[Marmiteman02]

Mapping for Wolfenstein 3D is like playing around in Paint.