I haven't read the whole article yet but I figured it'd be worth sharing before I forget to share it. :P

http://www.pcgamer.com/lost-in-limbo-on-the-hunt-for-pc-gamings-abandoned-classics/

The situations of these games are discussed:

- No One Lives Forever
- Full Throttle
- X-Wing, TIE Fighter CD-ROMs (Seth Davis gives us hope)
- Curse of Monkey Island, Escape from Monkey Island
- Black and White 1, 2
- SWAT 4 (really makes it seem like Activision just doesn't care :P)
- System Shock

Add Wizardry 1-5 to that list aswell.

For a second there, I thought this was about Limbo of the Lost :-D

Who owns the IP of that one now...

Uhm, everyone? Noone? As far as I know, it was pulled off the market specifically because it had stolen a metric fuckton of assets from a wide array of other IPs. That is one game that is definitely never getting an official re-release.

No mention of any of the Star Trek PC games caught in a thick web of red tape.

no worries, it was just my failed attempt of humor again.

They aren't really. It's pretty clear who owns which. Problem is, them being licensed games they have very little chance of being rereleased. If what the article says is true, then colour me confused as to EA's unwillingness to release the games.

Meh article. As far as I can tell the remaining Monkey Island games and Full Throttle are probably in the same situation as any other LucasArts classics and are likely to pop up on GOG later this year. Talking about legal limbo is kinda ridiculous at this point. As for the X-Wing / TIE Fighter Collector's CD-ROMs: the Disney dude responsible for the cooperation with GOG did tweet that they were working on the Collector's CD-ROM editions. The article's author clearly wasn't aware of this.

Oh, true...but they might as well be given the effort of getting them released digitally.

Facts muddled or not, it's nice to see a bigger game publication talking about these things. Maybe it brings some attention to the right eyes and we then get some movement on at least a few of the 'lost' gems.

The effort costs money. Significantly more money than merely getting a typical old game released, as Activision or other companies would have to sign a new licensing deal with Star Trek's owner and the Star Trek license isn't necessarily cheap. Even assuming Activision (for example) would find such a deal worthy of their money/time, this would still exclude other companies from releasing their older Star Trek games at the same time. And, of course, the license would eventually expire once again and Activision would have to pull the games from release. Unfortunately, this is the sad fate of games based on licensed properties, that are not owned by the license-holders themselves (like Indiana Jones/Star Wars).

Maybe the writer was unaware of some extra snags (compatibility issues?), or maybe EA is pulling an Activision and currently just not that interested in re-releasing them.

There are some obscure Microsoft games that should be added to the list as well. Does anyone remember or [url=http://www.gog.com/wishlist/games/urban_assault]Urban Assault?