In the Apogee discount thread I learned that Jazz Jackrabbit 2 was available there, and so I downloaded it and have been having fun. But I'm assuming the site is legally questionable (and recall others on here discussing this), so I was wondering if anybody else wanted to weigh in on their opinion of the site. (I'm guessing they have FAQ and Legal pages; I was just looking for your personal opinions.)

Unless they have permission from the rights holder, they're probably violating copyring law. But I don't really care. Maybe they're keeping some older titles alive until dd like gog picks them up?

Well I just found System Shock on there, so ... I dunno...

http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/24684/System+Shock.html

I guess at least people have the option to play it, vs. missing out on history or having to pay eBay prices. :P

EDIT: Oh, and I guess they do have a buy button for games made available once again; Magic Carpet actually links to GoG's page. http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/27731/Magic+Carpet.html

Abandonware is not legally questionable; it's unquestionably illegal to deal in. The more important question, though, is whether anybody cares enough to prosecute.

Unlike trademarks, the concept of "abandoning" a copyright has no standing. Unless the copyright holder explicitly releases the work to the public domain, it remains under copyright. If the original copyright holder is demised, some successor holds the copyright. No copyright that obtained from 1978 on, which includes most games, has lapsed.

There have been sporadic attempts to shut down abandonware sites. AFAIK, though, nobody has gone after mere users of abandonware.

I am a long time member (not moderator, not admin or anything else, just a simple member) there. Once in a while when a game is available on GOG, I take time to notify the moderator/admin there. But I must admit I have been slacking a lot lately and do not notify them much. But what I am trying to say is that they DO remove games that are available on GOG.

Abandonia did receive a warning from ESA (can't remember the year, probably was around 2005 or something), and all games from ESA members were removed back then.

Everything else I want to add more or less is already mentioned by orcishgamer and strixo above. So yeah, abandonware is not legal, but Abandonia is one of the good site, IMHO.

I think that companies who care about sites like GOG should be cracking down on classics that are actually selling and leave the rest of the games that have no backing by any company alone in that website . It is a great site to find some very old lost gems but every time someone who downloads a game that sells in sites like GOG does not give support to great franchises in any way besides non-profitable numbers.

It is a double edge thing for classic games because the worst situation that could happen is a game being pulled from there and never to reappear again.

I'm all for abandonia. They're the only means to get many old, out-of-print games, and they do what they do out of the unavailability of their games -- They allow you to report if the game is on sale and take it down in that case.

They're not pirates, they're just keeping an archive of old games that are at risk of being lost forever due to publishing issues. Before GoG it was the place to go for retro gaming.

And before anyone jumps in and says you can get the games used, to the industry it has the very same effect as pirating them, with the addition of having you pay a lot of cash (for older releases in a good/mint state).

I like Abandonia. They take games down when they become available again and actually link to the place that sells them. It's unquestionably illegal but I don't see it as being highly immoral or anything.

Places like Abandonia are what allowed me to play Last Half of Darkness again (a shareware adventure game in the style of Shadowgate and Deja Vu with MSPaint-style graphics). Not a great game, but certainly a huge nostalgia trip.

I'm a fan, personally, especially with the way they'll take down games you can legally buy again. Hell, I had copies of Blood and Master of Magic from there, until GOG got them. I personally delete 'Abandonware' copies from my hard drive when they come up for sale, which was partly what brought me here.

I'd like to add that I actually learn about GOG from Abandonia :-)

It's not illegal in the US, it's at most a tort, and people don't get prosecuted, they get sued.

It's an incredibly important detail and getting it wrong is either ignorance or bias. Neither of which are really appropriate in these sorts of threads.

The same what I think about warez-bb.org.

While Abandonia is certainly committing copyright infringement by offering the various old games for download, I think they're also providing a very useful and important function by keeping cultural works readily available in the face of the copyright holders of those works no longer providing them. Abandonia also seems to be quite good about removing games as soon as those games start being official sold again or if the copyright holder to one of the games contacts them (this may simply be out of self-preservation, but it's still good that they do it). In short, I think they help mitigate some of the negative effects that result from just how broken current copyright laws are.

I like their site. It was one of the first classic games sites that I visited. Before GOG, there were few good sites that offered classics games. Good site for classic gamers.