Opinions are not those of Oxford University. Address any queries to the author of these pages, Damien Burke.

AUTHORS THAT ALLOW DISTRIBUTION

  • JOHN F. CAIN
    No direct proof available. However, the current price list (May/June 95) from B.G. Services lists the following: 

    Mind Games Z80 emulator versions of Booty, Chaos, Nebula, Lasersquad, Rebelstar,
and Rebelstar II. Al by permission of the authors with ...................£5.00

    As Booty was written by John F. Cain, I presume he allows distribution of all of his titles, which are:

    Booty
    Exodus
    Pulsoid

  • DESIGN-DESIGN
    No proof available apart from the fact that a collection of their games can be had from ftp.nvg.unit.no, and the maintainer of the Spectrum area at NVG (until recently) only put up stuff that had been released by the authors.

    Design-Design titles are:

    2112 AD
    Dark Star
    Halls Of The Things
    Halls Of The Things '85
    Invasion Of The Body Snatchers
    Kat Trap
    On The Run
    Rommel's Revenge

  • GARGOYLE GAMES/FASTER THAN LIGHT
    From the Spectrum FAQ: 

         Roy Carter is a registered user of Z80 and has given spoken
     permission to distribute the Gargoyle games.

    No other proof available. Presumably Brian Gaff of B.G. Services is the one to contact if you want written proof from Roy.

    Gargoyle titles are:

    Ad Astra
    Dun Darach
    Heavy On The Magick
    Marsport
    Sweevo's World
    Sweevo's Whirled (expanded 128K version of Sweevo's World)
    Tir Na Nog

    Faster Than Light titles are:

    Lightforce
    Shockway Rider
    Hydrofool

  • JULIAN GOLLOP
    From a text file written by Ian Coates giving instructions for Laser Squad: 

         COPYRIGHT

Julian Gollop has kindly agreed to this game being made Public Domain. Anyone
is freely allowed to duplicate and distribute this game for use in Spectrum
emulators. It is requested that the identification of Julian Gollop as the
author of this software is not removed and the code not altered. E-mail me
(OKTUP@MONO.CITY.AC.UK) for further details.

    If you take a look at the entry for John F. Cain you will see that also listed in the collection of 'Mind Games' for sale are Julian's other titles, so he has presumably allowed distribution of all of them.

    Julian's titles are:

    Chaos - The Battle Of Wizards
    Rebelstar
    Rebelstar II
    Laser Squad

  • MIKRO-GEN
    No proof available apart from the fact that a collection of their games can be had from ftp.nvg.unit.no, and the maintainer of the Spectrum area at NVG (until recently) only put up stuff that had been released by the authors.
  • JEFF MINTER (THE YAK)
    Here's Jeff's response to my request for distribution permission: 
    From llamaman@ix.netcom.com Thu Jun 29 07:24:35 1995
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 23:23:15 -0700
From: llamaman@ix.netcom.com (YaK)
Subject: Re: Old games
To: D.M.Burke-CSSE94@cs.bham.ac.uk
Content-Length: 1102
X-Lines: 36
X-Display-Position: 0

>Hi

- baaaa!

>    Presuming you are the actual Jeff Minter that we all worshipped in the
>80's by buying your games, I've got a request to make...

- you presume right :)

>    I maintain a web page with a fair bit of old computer coverage, including
>a section where people can make requests for old games and I'll put them up
>on the page for them to get. I can't do this unless I have the copyright
>holder's permission; so would you give permission for free distribution of
>any of your old games on the Sinclair Spectrum? Two I have are Traxx and
>Voidrunner. You don't have to release the copyright, just permission to
>distribute freely is OK; several other people such as Amstrad, Gargoyle
>Games, Design Design and Jon Ritman have all done this and are universally
>adored for being such nice chaps.

- no problem, go for it, I don't think we're selling a lot of speccy games 
these days!

>    Looking forward to hearing from you... keep on Yakking :-)

- always!

>    BTW, Llamatron on the Atari ST was a real blast; I broke my space bar
>I played it so much!

- hehe

Regards,

\
(:-)
/
  • DON PRIESTLEY
    From a post on comp.sys.sinclair: 
    Subject: Don Priestley
From: Brian Gaff 

An open letter from Don Priestley. Please do not ring him up and annoy him!



Tel 00 353 46 43907                                             Balrath
                                                                Oldcastle
                                                                County Meath
                                                                EIRE

Dear Brian,

        Thanks for sending the registered z80. I was beginning to think
        that someone somewhere had shuffled off to meet the Great
        Programmer in the sky. Everything, including the soldering,
        works OK and I now have some of my old stuff on hard disk.

        Concerning the programs I have written, I take full
        responsibility in giving you permission to use them with your
        z80 program. I have included a number of them on the disk, along
        with a comments file. Could you do me a favour and let me have a
        copy of Gregory Loses his Clock. I must have given mine away to
        someone. I am also missing an epic called "Up For Grabs" if it
        comes your way.

        I look forward to hearing from you


        Don Priestley

    The programs written by Don are:

    Dictator
    Gregory Loses His Clock
    Jumbly
    Maziacs
    Meteroids
    Popeye
    Spawn
    Tanx
    Trapdoor
    Trapdoor II
    Up For Grabs

  • JON RITMAN
    Jon Ritman is a reader of the comp.sys.sinclair newsgroup and has allowed all his 8-bit titles to be distributed freely. No proof available yet.

    The programs written by Jon are:

    Batman
    Bear Bovver
    Combat Zone
    Cosmic Debris
    Dimension Destructors
    Head Over Heels
    Matchday
    Matchday II

  • VORTEX
    Mark Haigh-Hutchinson of Vortex software has released the Vortex Emulation Package which contains most of the Vortex games released for each 8-bit platform. Here's an excerpt from one of the accompanying text files in that package: 

    Although we are releasing all our 8-bit titles as FREEWARE, the following
caveats apply:-

1) All software can be freely distributed as long as this file accompanies
   the software.
2) VORTEX SOFTWARE retains the copyrights as to the use of all characters,
   names, graphics, source code, and other related materials found in this
   package or otherwise distributed.
3) VORTEX SOFTWARE reserves the right to remove the titles from the public
   domain at any time without warning.
4) No allowance has been made or even implied for use of any of the properties
   on any other computing system. See point 2) above.

    You can verify this information by emailing Mark on MHH@LUCASARTS.COM or by snailmail:

    VORTEX SOFTWARE
    Mark Haigh-Hutchinson
    1725 Marion Avenue, K-10
    Novato
    CA 94945
    U.S.A.

    Games included in release v1.0 of the Vortex emulation package were:

    Alien Highway
    Android One (and intro)
    Android Two
    Cyclone
    Deflektor
    Highway Encounter
    Hostile All Terrain Encounter
    Revolution
    Tornado Low Level

  • JOHN WATSON
    John posted this message to comp.sys.sinclair (I've edited the post slightly): 

    Article: 16059 of comp.sys.sinclair
From: John Watson 
Newsgroups: comp.sys.sinclair
Subject: copyrights, pirate software etc
Date: Tue, 05 Dec 1995 01:41:11 +0000
Message-ID: <750225609wnr@wats.demon.co.uk>

After a little bit of lurking and taking some advice (thanks John)
I've decided to join in here. I was a Speccy game programmer.
Shameful admission I know but I think I'm now senile enough to
stand up to the ridicule.  :-))

Pro Golf & Pro Golf 2 : Atlantis publications
(Definately NOT the greatest games in the world but somebody has
 to start it somewhere)
As the writer and copyright holder of the above two games I hereby
give permission for emulator compatable copies of said games to
be freely uploaded and downloaded to archives such as NVG and the
new Demon site. Anyone silly enough (includes me) to still want
to play these games may do so.

I expressly DENY permission for these same files to be included
on any media to be sold for profit without written permission
from myself and/or Atlantis software (If they still exist).

I don't see why someone should make money from all my hard work
without some of said money coming in my direction.

    After seeing that, I emailed him for confirmation, and here's his response: 

    From john@wats.demon.co.uk Fri Dec  8 17:44 GMT 1995
Date: Fri, 08 Dec 1995 17:24:00 +0000
From: John Watson 
Organization: None
To: D.M.Burke-CSSE94@cs.bham.ac.uk
Subject: Re: copyrights, pirate software etc
X-Mailer: Newswin Alpha 0.9.1
Lines: 47
X-Smtp-Posting-Host: wats.demon.co.uk [Fri, 8 Dec 95 17:33:22 GMT]
X-Smtp-Posting-Host: post.demon.co.uk [Fri, 8 Dec 95 17:33:54 GMT]
Content-Type: text
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Hi.

Don't know if this is what you want or not but below is a slightly
edited version of the post on Usenet. The original post was really
just to make a point about " dead programmers " and " non-existant
copyright holders ". At this late date I certainly don't expect to
make any money from the games.

Until a month or so ago, when I first got the internet connection,
I didn't even know there was such an interest in old Spectrum
games.

I haven't looked at any of the available sites as yet, so I don't
know how anyone else has phrased permissions but I think I have
covered everything I want to say. If your own site includes a freely
available archive please feel free to add the name in the bit about
NVG and Demon.

Thanks for the post and the interest.

John.





Pro Golf & Pro Golf 2 : Atlantis publications

As the writer and copyright holder of the above two games I hereby
give permission for emulator compatable copies of said games to
be uploaded to, and downloaded from, freely available archives
such as NVG and the new Demon site.

I expressly DENY permission for these same files to be included
on any media to be sold for profit without written permission
from myself and/or Atlantis software (If they still exist).

Initial contact via E-Mail to  john@wats.demon.co.uk

John Watson    8th Dec 1995


-- 
=-=  john@wats.demon.co.uk =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
"She would if she could and she should, but nobody will."  J.Prine
=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Made In Scotland =-=
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