hello all, I have a business question: a game company went out of business in 2001, and to my knowledge, no one owns the rights to a game that they made and released. how would I go about finding out if the rights to this game are owned by any one entity?

Which company and which game? I can say with about 99% certainty that some one (whether an individual or company) does in fact own those rights. Just because the company no longer exists doesn't mean that the copyright to the IP is null.

BattleTanx from 3DO

Hm. I have no idea how to dig up the information. A very informal research (aka Wikipedia) says that 3DO's IP was sold off to other companies like Ubisoft, Microsoft, and others. Take that as you will. The only thing you could really do is find out who was in charge of 3DO at the time of the bankruptcy, contact them, and ask where the rights to BattleTanx went. I'm sure someone bought it, but it will be hard to figure out exactly who.

May I inquire, why do you want to know if the rights are owned? For something simple like a tank game, you could easily just create a new game that uses tanks and be all set regardless of who owns the rights.

I really like the story, I felt it was very unexplored.
The tanks were really cool and original.

overall I felt the game was never given its due and could use a make over. Also it would be good practice to make before I and my group gears up for a more original game on the back burner.

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Original post by Nynx a game company went out of business in 2001, and to my knowledge, no one owns the rights to a game that they made and released. how would I go about finding out if the rights to this game are owned by any one entity?

You can assume that they are. I suppose there's some weird way for a copyright to actually end up owned by nobody (other than being explicitly released to the public domain), but the standard ways in which businesses close and disappear always leave someone with the remaining assets, including intellectual property. This was certainly true of 3DO, the recipient was certainly a major corporation, and they certainly don't want to give them to you.

ill bet they'll just sit on the rights because they dont want to make a game OR let someone else

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Original post by Nynx ill bet they'll just sit on the rights because they dont want to make a game OR let someone else

Yes, exactly. Your only course of action now is to come up with your own game concept.

heh, that'll be easy

The bankruptcy of 3DO is still ongoing. Corporate bankruptcies take a very long time to resolve -- there is a lot of money at stake and a lot of lawyers are involved.

I believe Trip Hawkins bought the rights to many older games, which might include Battletanx. If not, you might still be able to buy the rights through the bankruptcy court. If nobody ends up buying them, they will probably be given to one of the creditors.