Hello,
I am a big Kings Quest Fan. I played the first 3 Episodes of Silver Lining and I am very happy with the Game.
This is truly Kings Quest 9 the Game Sierra never did.
But I do not understand why you release this Game for free. You put so much work in the Game and get nothing at all. Why do you not put the Episodes on GOG (Good old Games) there every Episode is priced 5.99 $.
For the people who didn't know GOG is a download Service, there you can buy old Game for a few bucks with no DRM.
This would be good for you as a Developer but also would show Activision, that Fangames can be commercial Sucess.
Regards
Since Activision owns the King's Quest series, it wouldn't be legal for us to make money by selling King's Quest games without their permission. The agreement we have with them for this game is that we would finish and distribute it totally for free.
Also, TSL was made out of love for the game and appreciation for the fans. There was never any intention of profiting from it. However, Phoenix Online has some commercial projects in the works. :D
This game is amazing. One thing that adds to the uniqueness of this game is the fact that Activision is no longer allowing King's Quest fan games to be made, after this current generation, which includes Kingdom of Sorrow. At least, that's what I read from another group. TellTale's 'Reboot' of King's Quest will be Activision's manner of making money from the series, so they don't want to give out any more fan licenses.
Actually as I understand it, the official ninth game in the series through Activison is being produced by Telltale sometime in the future. It won't be free.
TSL is a fan game, made by the fans, for the fans (although not every fan agrees with POS take on the series). So it is a work of fan fiction.
While it was initially called King's Quest IX on early versions of the website, that was dropped later on, as part of the agreement for the fan license.
We can thank fangames like TSL, IA's KQ3, and AGDI's trilogy, for pushing Activision to bring the official series back to life!
I actually think that it is a good thing that the game is free. This way, the TSL Team can accurately guage who has a serious work ethic and who does not. It is better to have a group of people that you already know and trust to get the job done as your core team rather than just hire on a bunch of strangers from the blue. Of course, it is ok to give new people a chance, but you see where I am going with this. POS will already have a good idea about who they can trust to get things done and that is a very nice duck to have lined up when you start dealing with real money and the company puts its reputation on the line. Each of POS' employees responsibility is to the company since their actions reflect on the company as a whole and even the public's perception of it. There is indeed a "Silver Lining" to every dark cloud out there.
Besides, I don't work for free.... I blackmailed the company directors into giving me brownies, cookies, funnel cakes, and other goodies on pain of revealing sensitive secrets.