Edit: You can track my progress here.
I have been talking to the people at the treasury and the possibility of obtaining the rights to the Hardwar game and releasing it under the GPL is getting stronger.
Having the Hardwar code under the GPL would be a big boost for free software game development..
- There are several technologies such as the AI and economy simulation which could be used in other games or help inspire others to write better systems.
- It would mean we could port the game to run natively on Linux and the Mac
- It would mean we could fix existing problems the plague the game.
I had attempted to get the treasury to release the code as open source themselves..
You have asked the Crown to make the software freely available, however, I should point out that the Treasury Solicitor is obliged to obtain full open market value for all assets that we deal with, subject to a minimum sale price of £500 plus VAT. In addition to the sale price you would be required to cover the Treasury Solicitor’s costs plus VAT and disbursements. In order to obtain full open market value I would ask the HMSO to provide a valuation.
Therefore the next step would be to:
- Get a UK lawyer that specialises in copyright law
- Get money to purchase the rights.
Since I have neither I am asking anyone that is interesting in seeing Hardwar as free software to help me liberate this fine piece of work.