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The bad news:
Not only trenchwars has this message - its also on 17th Parrallel (http://www.17thparallel.com/) and Extreme Games (http://www.extreme-games.net/) which means its a pretty elaborate hoax.
Theres also a (very badly written) petition at http://www.petitiononline.com/freeSS/petition.html (the word "rescissed" doesn't exist in the english language, so this petition is basically meaningless).
The good news (such as it is):
1) The site looks like a hoax.
2) The site source code looks like its been ripped off the DOJ homepage, and botched to work, by someone in a hurry
3) I don't think EA would mention plans for an upcoming game such as subspace 2 in a legal document, without pre-announcing it elsewhere
4) The domain name subspacetwo.com isn't owned by EA (or doesn't appear to be), its registered with a small hosting company in New York (where Dock lives) and the hosting company is registered to Dock
5) While Brilliant Digital Entertainment (BDE) did buy up VIE UK (the people who owned the rights to the original subspace) they apparently sold the entire VIE division to Titus in France. I can't find out if either of these purchases included the rights to subspace.
6) I've found no evidence that BDE have sold any part of their business to Electronic Arts (its not listed in their press releases, and its not easily findable on google)
7) Electronic Arts don't list Subspace as one of the brands they own (I checket, its a long long list!)
8) Electronic Arts don't appear to have ever bought a division of BDE or Titus or VIE (I've checked all their press releases as far back as records go, which is the middle of 99 - BDE bought VIE at some point in 98)
9) Titus Interactive of France bought VIE in 2000/2001 (according to their website) and haven't mentioned selling it since.
Ok, so none of the above are conclusive - deals can be made without announcements, rights are sometimes not transfered when people buy a company, etc. All the information I can find is circumstantial at best.
This leaves me with a few musings.
Firstly, its not April 1st...
Secondly, supposing EA DID own the rights to subspace, the only reason for releasing a game called Subspace 2 (rather than anything else) would be to cash in on the existing brand and user base of Subspace. If that were the case, a big company that is as smart as EA wouldn't antagonise Subspace's existing users by shutting down their sites, especially if Subspace 2 wasn't ready to immediately tempt them away. Of course, EA could be really really stupid...
Thirdly, Continuum is a totally reverse engineered version of the original subspace client, and the servers have been extensively rewritten as well. However, the LOOK of the game (and probably the protocols it uses to talk to the servers) ARE copyrighted to the original owners (or whoever bought the rights off them) so could in fact be the basis of a legal battle.
Fourthly, PriitK and the dev team are quite capable of re-writing continuum so that it doesn't use Subspace protocols, and doesn't look too like the original Subspace, which would get around the copyright problems. Since most of the dev team are not US based, EA might find it hard work stopping them.
The above aren't very collected, sorry Where does this leave things? Well, I'm not convinced either way. I can't find any evidence to back up the web page, and it looks pretty shoddy and hoax-like. However, it IS on 17thP and ex-games as well, which is a worry. I'm still half and half.
My next course of action is to email Titus, BDE and EA (can't be bothered with the DOJ, they wouldn't talk anyway) to find out who owns the rights to Subspace.
Ty Mister Fluffy.
Very Enigmatic aint it?
The bad news:
Not only trenchwars has this message - its also on 17th Parrallel (http://www.17thparallel.com/) and Extreme Games (http://www.extreme-games.net/) which means its a pretty elaborate hoax.
Theres also a (very badly written) petition at http://www.petitiononline.com/freeSS/petition.html (the word "rescissed" doesn't exist in the english language, so this petition is basically meaningless).
The good news (such as it is):
1) The site looks like a hoax.
2) The site source code looks like its been ripped off the DOJ homepage, and botched to work, by someone in a hurry
3) I don't think EA would mention plans for an upcoming game such as subspace 2 in a legal document, without pre-announcing it elsewhere
4) The domain name subspacetwo.com isn't owned by EA (or doesn't appear to be), its registered with a small hosting company in New York (where Dock lives) and the hosting company is registered to Dock
5) While Brilliant Digital Entertainment (BDE) did buy up VIE UK (the people who owned the rights to the original subspace) they apparently sold the entire VIE division to Titus in France. I can't find out if either of these purchases included the rights to subspace.
6) I've found no evidence that BDE have sold any part of their business to Electronic Arts (its not listed in their press releases, and its not easily findable on google)
7) Electronic Arts don't list Subspace as one of the brands they own (I checket, its a long long list!)
8) Electronic Arts don't appear to have ever bought a division of BDE or Titus or VIE (I've checked all their press releases as far back as records go, which is the middle of 99 - BDE bought VIE at some point in 98)
9) Titus Interactive of France bought VIE in 2000/2001 (according to their website) and haven't mentioned selling it since.
Ok, so none of the above are conclusive - deals can be made without announcements, rights are sometimes not transfered when people buy a company, etc. All the information I can find is circumstantial at best.
This leaves me with a few musings.
Firstly, its not April 1st...
Secondly, supposing EA DID own the rights to subspace, the only reason for releasing a game called Subspace 2 (rather than anything else) would be to cash in on the existing brand and user base of Subspace. If that were the case, a big company that is as smart as EA wouldn't antagonise Subspace's existing users by shutting down their sites, especially if Subspace 2 wasn't ready to immediately tempt them away. Of course, EA could be really really stupid...
Thirdly, Continuum is a totally reverse engineered version of the original subspace client, and the servers have been extensively rewritten as well. However, the LOOK of the game (and probably the protocols it uses to talk to the servers) ARE copyrighted to the original owners (or whoever bought the rights off them) so could in fact be the basis of a legal battle.
Fourthly, PriitK and the dev team are quite capable of re-writing continuum so that it doesn't use Subspace protocols, and doesn't look too like the original Subspace, which would get around the copyright problems. Since most of the dev team are not US based, EA might find it hard work stopping them.
The above aren't very collected, sorry Where does this leave things? Well, I'm not convinced either way. I can't find any evidence to back up the web page, and it looks pretty shoddy and hoax-like. However, it IS on 17thP and ex-games as well, which is a worry. I'm still half and half.
My next course of action is to email Titus, BDE and EA (can't be bothered with the DOJ, they wouldn't talk anyway) to find out who owns the rights to Subspace.
Ty Mister Fluffy.
Very Enigmatic aint it?
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