About Codemasters' marketing tactics, Unrespected legend? OFP2/OFP:DR vs OFP:CWC Options

[kaneda]

BOHEMIA INTERACTIVE MADE THE FOLLOWING PRESS RELEASE TODAY:

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

THE NAME GAME: CODEMASTERS’ MARKETING OF NEW “OPERATION FLASHPOINT” CREATES CONFUSION, PROVOKES PROTEST

Is the upcoming Codemasters game really “the much anticipated return of the genre-defining military conflict simulator” Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis?

Is it really “the official sequel to the multi-award winning Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis”?

Bohemia Interactive says: “No! What matters is the game, not the name.”



Prague, Czech Republic, February 26, 2009 - In a letter from its attorneys to the English company The Codemasters Software Company Ltd, Bohemia Interactive Studio s.r.o., the leading Czech-based independent games developer, is protesting Codemasters’ marketing tactics which tout Codemasters’ upcoming game Operation Flashpoint: Dragon Rising as the “return of” or “official sequel to” the genre-defining game Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis.

The award-winning Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis was created by Bohemia Interactive in 1997-2001. Bohemia Interactive licensed its creation to Codemasters to publish and distribute. Although Codemasters owns the “Operation Flashpoint” trade mark and plans to release its new game under that title, Bohemia Interactive has always owned 100% of the original OFP game. Bohemia also provided gaming community complete set of editing tools and on-going support that turned the original OFP into one of the most modded PC games ever. Codemasters owns only the name – and Bohemia Interactive wants fans to understand that Codemasters’ new game is not from the same development team that brought them the classic original.

“In the license agreement, Bohemia Interactive expressly reserved the exclusive right to develop sequels to the original OFP game,” says Leora Herrmann of Kluger, Peretz, Kaplan & Berlin, PL in Miami, attorneys for Bohemia Interactive. “Codemasters also acknowledged that Bohemia owns all the intellectual property in the game – except the words ‘Operation Flashpoint’,” adds Herrmann.

“Since Codemasters has no right to use the Bohemia Interactive game engine or any other component of the Bohemia-developed game, how can it rightfully claim to produce a ‘sequel’?” asks Bohemia Interactive CEO Marek Spanel.

Because Codemasters owns the trade mark “Operation Flashpoint,” Bohemia Interactive cannot use the name for its own sequels. Instead, ArmA, released in 2007 and already adopted by the modding community, is powered by the second generation of the Bohemia game engine. Bohemia Interactive is currently working on its latest revolutionary re-creation of modern military conflict – ArmA II, due out later this year– which will be powered by the third generation of its engine and is based on the same original design concepts and artistic style of Bohemia Interactive’s legendary releases OFP: Cold War Crisis and OFP: Resistance.

In fact, the ground-breaking game engine that Bohemia Interactive launched initially in OFP: Cold War Crisis has spawned not only ArmA and the upcoming state-of-the-art ArmA II, but in its most sophisticated incarnation to date also powers Bohemia Interactive’s VBS combat training simulators used by armed forces around the world, including the recently announced Game After Ambush training program for the US Army.

“We can’t stop Codemasters from releasing a game using the words ‘Operation Flashpoint,’” acknowledged Spanel. “But it is not right to promote this game as the ‘official sequel to the multi-award winning Operation Flashpoint: Cold War Crisis’ or the ‘return’ of Bohemia Interactive’s ‘genre-defining military conflict simulator.’ The awards were given for the game created by Bohemia Interactive - not to a name.”

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Soure


What Do You Think?

[STALKERGB]

I think on this i am with Bohemia, at the end of the day the engine used in OFP1 is owned by BIS and in no part is used on OFP2, so in my mind that makes them different games.

For me a sequal really needs the original development team and the original engine (albeit updated) for it to properly be a sequal (i know lots of sequals have been done without one or the other [sometimes without both]) but seeing as the original devs and engine are in use (by BIS) Codemasters can't call OFP2 the true sequal.

Most of the people who are playing ARMA and OFP do know this to be the case but there are most certainly those who don't so i really think it is unfair for Codemasters to lead people to believe OFP2 to be the real sequal.

[JdB]

(i know lots of sequals have been done without one or the other [sometimes without both])

That is why most sequals are vastly inferior to the original, the name remains, but the love for keeping the product 100% true to the original is gone. More often than not to make a quick buck.

This kind of marketing is normal these days, capitalism.

[kaneda]

"This kind of marketing is normal these days, capitalism"

No. Thats not. Operation Flashpoint(1) is only one - from BIS. Codemasters create OFP2, not OFP!!! Why Codemasters do that? Nobody else did... Arma = sequel.

Both games looks good ,but its not fair.

[Hostilian]

ArmA was meant to be the sequel to OFP. Though on the forums when it came out, it was branded "OFP 1.5" - which is in my mind a lame excuse for for the terrible shortcomings of this poor game.

BIS let me down (and as I recall from the forums at the time, many others) with their ArmA release so cant bring myself to buy the so called successor to OFP (even though it is in reality their SECOND attempt to get it right).

H

[adi]

ArmA was meant to be the sequel to OFP. Though on the forums when it came out, it was branded "OFP 1.5" - which is in my mind a lame excuse for for the terrible shortcomings of this poor game.

BIS let me down (and as I recall from the forums at the time, many others) with their ArmA release so cant bring myself to buy the so called successor to OFP (even though it is in reality their SECOND attempt to get it right).

H

Don't want to sound all rude or anything. But BiS are making their games on a very old and updated engine (poseidon aka Real Virtuality) From what i remember when BiS was still making OFP 2 it was being build on a new engine. But after the split Bis made arma with a updated version of OFP's engine while Codies were making a new engine from the ground up. There are differences between the two engines but there are also similarities.

[wipman]

Hi, i don't that the OFP2: DR have much in common with the OFP, i think that BIS did very well the OFP with their own engine and that Codemasters was
only the publishers, say that the OFP was made by Codemasters is like go to buy a Dodge Charger RT to a car's shop and say that was the car's shop
who made the car instead Chrisler, Dodge or Plymouth. In the shop they can add some features or extras to the car, but that's all.
I don't think that the OFP2: DR be a sequel to the OFP but a new game, for me... the Armed Assault is the sequel to the OFP, you only have to open the
missions editor to check it out. Let's C ya

[Pulverizer]

They signed a legal contract and lost the name many, many years ago so they should just get the f*ck over it already and concentrate more in getting their shit together than making pointless and childish press releases. Crybabies.

[edjcox]

Would have never bought this game had I know this beforehand. Now my hopes are dashed to ever see this anywhere's near the original OFP series and the the interactives therin...

Bah!!!!

[wipman]

Hi, seems that between the CM marketing plans is the "idea" of release a expansion pack before even have released a demo yet; here it's the video:

- OFP: DR Skirmish Pack.

Let's c ya

[fx8]

This game is dead. This is so stupid. How can they lie like that? Even Intel lies. This is not a sequel.
Arma 2 engine isn't outdated. It's called Real Virtuality 3 and looks better than this "award winning" ego engine.

[melmartinez01]

More often than not to make a quick buck.