Where to get legal copy of Keen 6?

GolfHacker · Post by **GolfHacker** » Sat Feb 09, 2008 23:00

Anyone know where I can purchase a legal copy of Keen6?

IMA3HDDMNKY · Post by **IMA3HDDMNKY** » Sat Feb 09, 2008 23:08

Unfortunately, nowhere. The game has been discontinued by it's publisher and for some unknown reason, id's not selling it on their website either. Check eBay.

Post by **KeenRush** » Sat Feb 09, 2008 23:30

Yep, that's right... One other option could be iD Anthology which includes CGA version of Keen 6, but it might not be that good choice... And I don't even know if they still sell those.

GolfHacker · Post by **GolfHacker** » Sun Feb 10, 2008 3:10

Bummer. Thanks, anyway.

SupFanat · Post by **SupFanat** » Mon Jun 02, 2008 15:08

Unfortunately, nowhere. The game has been discontinued by it's publisher and for some unknown reason, id's not selling it on their website either. Check eBay.

Unknown reason???
I think that the reason is obvious - the game Commander Keen 6 has no more commercial value.

Commander Spleen · Post by **Commander Spleen** » Tue Jun 03, 2008 7:09

Flame war ensues.

MortimerInBlack · Post by **MortimerInBlack** » Fri Jun 06, 2008 16:48

What is the company that supposedly owns it now? They could just do what 3drealms does--make it available on their website for download (after pay). There are many games 3drealms lets u buy there--do u think any of them still have commercial value?

This company with Keen 6 either is lazy or doesnt realize they legally own it.

VikingBoyBilly · Post by **VikingBoyBilly** » Fri Jun 06, 2008 18:46

I think it's sofdisc or something. Not sure if it still exists.

StupidBunny · Post by **StupidBunny** » Sat Jun 07, 2008 6:16

I kinda get the impression that Keen 6 is in a sort of legal limbo; nobody really owns it, nobody was given the right to distribute it for free, and nobody has the right to sell it either. In times like this, I think that...illegal things become justified. Because nobody loses anything that way. If id doesn't want to sell it or own it or anything anymore, then as far as I'm concerned it means they don't care what people do in terms of distributing it.

This is just my tired ranting though.

Commander Spleen · Post by **Commander Spleen** » Sat Jun 07, 2008 10:00

Amensicle.

q 90 · Post by **q 90** » Sat Aug 09, 2008 0:26

What is the company that supposedly owns it now?

Sorry for resurrecting an old topic, but I've been trying to figure this out. It was originally owned by FormGen, which became Good Times Software, which was then renamed to GT Interactive, which was then bought out by Infogrames Entertainment SA (who absorbed all of GT's franchises according to this 1999 company report) and became Infogrames, Inc. (an IESA subsidiary), which was THEN (similarly with all of IESA's other acquisitions) renamed to Atari, Inc.

Now if one looks at the present-day incarnations of the three example franchises mentioned within the PDF - Driv3r and Unreal 3 - they are published by Atari. So it appears as though Atari is who technically "owns" distribution rights to Keen 6. And since we don't know how much iD makes off of Keen these days (such as the package on Steam), iD may just have no desire to purchase the rights to Aliens Ate My Babysitter.

Galaxieretter · Post by **Galaxieretter** » Thu Aug 14, 2008 17:26

Infogrames owns UNREAL TOURNAMENT?! Isn't that... an Epic Games... game? I'm so confused when it comes to this sort of thing. One company makes one game but another company gets credit for it and stuff...

I never liked Infrogrames because most of the games with their label suck. I did like Alone in the Dark. That game was crazy when it came out.

But why on earth would ID not own the rights to Aliens Ate my Babysitter? Why wouldn't they own it to begin with back when it came out? As in, why did "FormGen" own it in the first place? And wouldn't the original contract have run out by this time?

I dunno these legal things drive me nuts.

q 90 · Post by **q 90** » Thu Aug 14, 2008 21:39

Unreal Tournament was DEVELOPED by Epic Games, but published by GT Interactive (now Infogrames/Atari). FormGen owned distribution rights to Aliens (as opposed to Apogee for the rest of the games). Obviously there was some weird distribution deal set with FormGen different from the ones set with Apogee.

Edit: I finally got my head around some things. Atari definitely holds distribution rights, though they're obviously not doing anything with it. FormGen was the official distributor up until 1996 when they were bought out by GT Interactive; Apogee was able to resell the game, but with it being discontinued they ran out of games in 1997. The reason it mysteriously appeared on the iD Anthology was because the Anthology was published by GT - therefore they were legally able to place Keen 6 on it, something iD wouldn't be able to do with any other publishing company. So if GTI owned Keen 6, that means Atari/Infogrames owns it now.

GoldenRishi · Post by **GoldenRishi** » Fri Aug 15, 2008 15:53

I'm not going to say you should do something illegal, but if you want K6, then you're going to have to do something illegal.

VikingBoyBilly · Post by **VikingBoyBilly** » Fri Aug 15, 2008 22:39

Galaxieretter wrote: But why on earth would ID not own the rights to Aliens Ate my Babysitter? Why wouldn't they own it to begin with back when it came out? As in, why did "FormGen" own it in the first place? And wouldn't the original contract have run out by this time?

I dunno these legal things drive me nuts.

I think it's like how ID owns Heretic and Hexen even though Raven developed them, but Raven owns Hexen II and Heretic II independently. ID made Keen 6 and it was licenced and sold by Formgen, while ID still owns the rights to all other Keen games (Keen dreams doesnt count cuz, well, it's freeware now). [/pretending to know what I'm talking about]

Yeah, it's some brain-meltingly weird stuff

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Where to get legal copy of Keen 6?

Where to get legal copy of Keen 6?

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