FFG pulls the plug on Android: Netrunner

[kommissarParticipant 617xp 0]

Fantasy Flight Games have announced they are ending the Android: Netrunner LCG after a 6 year run. FFG have said their licensing term with Wizards of the Coast for the game is coming to an end.

From October 22nd 2018, FFG will not be offering any Android: Netrunner products for sale, including all accessories that were produced, such as playmats and sleeves. The final release will be the Reign and Reverie deluxe expansion.

While Netrunner may be ending, FFG have promised that the Android universe will continue to be explored, and the developers have said they hope that while the game may be out of print, people will still think it is worth playing.

[motioninpoetryParticipant 1704xp 0]

sad news 🙁 I stopped playing competitively a couple years back, but I still enjoy making themed story line decks for casual play with friends, like Valencia investigating brain damage claims against HB, so sad to hear I won’t be able to get any more expansions or data packs 🙁

… I’d bet a tenner WOTC are secretly planning a reboot, and pulled the license unexpectedly, after seeing it’s successes levels …

either way, I expect to see new Android games come out anyway like New Angeles, which was pretty good, although I mainly got it for the Netrunner minis 😛 … custom tokens, anyone ?? 😛

[totsuzenheniParticipant 5651xp 0]

I’m hoping for an Android: WebWalker or somesuch from FFG.

On an aside, it’s precisely this kind of sudden licence withdrawal that makes me reticent to buy into any licenced games. I’ve made an exception of WFRP 4th edition because it’s an RPG and i’m likely to houserule and gut it anyway. I’m very tempted by Modiphius’ Fallout game, but i couldn’t care less that it’s ‘Fallout’ branded and i would have much preferred it if they had created their own setting and been free from a licence overlord.

[motioninpoetryParticipant 1704xp 0]

yeah, I think it’s more to do with them licensing IP’s from other companies who already make tabletop games, and that’s causing these sudden license issues unfortunately 🙁

when it’s a license that transfers it from another medium to a tabletop game, it seems to be less problematic to retain the license from what I’ve observed 🙂 for instance they’ve been publishing Game Of Thrones games for over 16 years without issue 🙂 well before it became this popular as a franchise 🙂

luckily they still own all the Android settings and characters, so they can still explore games that involve running the net, it’s only the mechanics of Netrunner they licensed from WOTC 🙂 so there’s still hope they can make something similar 🙂

[totsuzenheniParticipant 5651xp 0]

@Motion In Poetry – Do you know if the mechanics actually belong to WotC, or can belong to WotC? If not then i can’t see anything much stopping FFG from creating their own game, other than the work to do it. As i recall the current lead developer Michael Boggs was designing his own not too dissimilar card game before he signed up with FFG, and i’m guessing they have quite a few cards that were waiting in the wings, so there might be quite a lot of new material and mechanics just sitting there.

[motioninpoetryParticipant 1704xp 0]

yeah, the main mechanics were basically unchanged since the original game from 1996, so a direct copy would be … legally problematic 😛 as they had to pay for the license to use those mechanics before …

what FFG did, was layer those mechanics over the existing ideas in their own Android franchise of games, so 99% of the theme is owned by FFG, outside of terms like Icebreaker, so it wouldn’t be too difficult to make a new game about hacking, as WOTC didn’t invent hacking 😛 they would just have to use something with different mechanics 🙂 the question of if they could do it as a LCG is another question entirely though …

here’s some pics of the original to show what it looked like

programs, icebreakers :

https://cf.geekdo-images.com/large/img/0ivf1wCtaYFSrn1_F_m_O1zcVKA=/fit-in/1024×1024/filters:no_upscale()/pic192099.jpg

ice :

https://cf.geekdo-images.com/large/img/w8WitztRqHo6P-UEcP5bP69-lB4=/fit-in/1024×1024/filters:no_upscale()/pic171267.jpg

agendas :

https://cf.geekdo-images.com/large/img/n_lRX9nQrUjX-J8HseoQZp9C9tE=/fit-in/1024×1024/filters:no_upscale()/pic171269.jpg

[totsuzenheniParticipant 5651xp 0]

I was under the impression that mechanics couldn’t be copyrighted. Some of the mechanics could do with some tweaking. Would tweaking be enough? Whatever the case i will be watching to see what moves FFG and WotC make.

Incidentally, someone commented on a youtube video that Lukas Litzsinger is now with WotC. I did a quick bit of searching and saw that Lukas joined WotC about 8 months ago.

[motioninpoetryParticipant 1704xp 0]

for the most part yes, but it’s much like the way no other company can call turning a card sideways “tap”, because WOTC owns the concept of “tapping” cards, but many other games feature turning cards sideways as “exhausting” them, because no one owns the concept of something being exhausted 😛

WOTC owns the concept of “running” and “breaking ICE” using “Icebreakers”, but they don’t own the concept of a program with subroutines, because they do in real life 😛 so if FFG want to do a new running game, they would have to call it a hacking game, but defenses can’t be called “ICE”, and programs can’t be called “Icebreakers”, so they have to not only rework the game, but rework the story and setting that has developed further using these concepts (like Next Design), maybe by creating newer types of server defenses, and new programs, that may work in a similar way, but can’t be the same thing for legal reasons, and if FFG paid substantial amounts of money to use the concept of these mechanics, and then continued to use them without paying that money, Hasbro could potentially sue them … so it’s a bit more complicated than it may at first seem unfortunately … it would have to be different enough for them to avoid potential lawsuits from the biggest toy company in the world … (X , X)

… and as you say, if that secret project Lukas is working on for WOTC uses the same mechanics … oh dear

[nakchak 5539xp 1]

@motioninpoetry and i would bet if it came to it WotC would struggle to retain ownership of any of the terms you mention, seeing as william gibson popularised their usage in neuromancer, and have been used in real world hacking since forever never mind the multitude of software which predate the card game by many years.

[totsuzenheniParticipant 5651xp 0]

I’ve seen the term ‘ICE’ and ‘Barrier’ used in the Babylon 5 TV series.

[totsuzenheniParticipant 5651xp 0]

Some thoughts from someone saying they are a European and UK patent attorney: https://forum.stimhack.com/t/no-more-netrunner/9909/51 .

[motioninpoetryParticipant 1704xp 1]

it’s possible … although again, it may be a lot more difficult to enforce than we realise, if you go down the IP rabbit hole it gets complicated … conspiracy hat time 😛 …

the original Netrunner card game was based off the Cyberpunk 2020 pen and paper RPG from 1988, which was also licensed and based of William Gibsons stories and also the Mirrorshades short story book, which comprises a dozen other authors works, the legal rights to Gibsons stories are very complicated, and almost nobody has public knowledge of who exactly owns the rights, but we do know Hasbro owns Cyberpunk 2020, and has the rights to make games based in that universe and Gibsons stories … and they don’t have to pay for that license for some reason … Hasbro also of course owns WOTC, and WOTC licensed the rights to the Netrunner mechanics and various terms to FFG to make Android: Netrunner, but they did not give FFG the license to use the Cyberpunk 2020 franchise IP,  fast forward a bit, Lukas then joins WOTC 8 months ago to work on a secret card game… at the same time Hasbro signs a first look deal for their film division Allspark Entertainment with Paramount to make movies based off their IP portfolio, one of the first deals they shop around is the Cluedo movie, Paramount passes, and it quickly arrives at 20th Century Fox, produced by Ryan Reynolds, about 2 weeks after Fox signed a deal to make a Neuromancer trilogy directed by Deadpool director Tim Miller … did I mention Fox also owns the rights to make Magic The Gathering movies ?? 😛 … P.S. now Fox and their entire movie rights portfolio is currently being brought by Disney 😛 … long story short WOTC possibly pulled the rights from FFG because they are about to launch a Neuromancer / Cyberpunk 2020 card game backed by the full might of the Disney corporation 😛

[motioninpoetryParticipant 1704xp 0]

… new Cyberpunk 2077 game, eh ?? … hmmmm, suspicious 😛

[motioninpoetryParticipant 1704xp 0]

Netrunner is one of the 3 classes you can play in the new Cyberpunk 2077 game … got a feeling I was right …

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