It's a real shame...shame isn't even the word. At the least you can say that you tried, i guess it was just a dream, no matter how close you came.

I just wanted to say thank you for everything, for keeping me coming back to these boards every day to check for every single update and for learning a hell of a lot since i joined back in whenever lol.

Well done, i wish you all happy and prosperous futures.
Antony.

This is so sad...
If I was rich, I would donate money to you guys! I don't know how that would help, but I still would.
So what's going to happen to the MEMod section of the forums now? And all the stuff that has MEMod on it (like moddb)

EDIT: Goodbye everyone...Now that MEMod's gone..I leave to.

I just wanted to thank the community for their support and continued interest in the mod. What should've been a fantastic project lead by a team of dedicated people is dead.

I can barely believe that this is the case, as I always had complete faith that MeMod would reach completion.

The MeMod team will move onto new pastures, in my opinion. This group of modders are too experienced and talented to simply go their seperate ways.

Thank you.

Ember.

Yeah, it has been a complete blow for all of us.

This is a very sad day.

I cannot think of anything to say right now. A complete pity.

Oh, man, I don't even know what to say. . . Must be a nightmare. Nightmare. . .
I always thought that this game (not MOD) would immensely better than any other Middle Earth game, because (Not only are ya'll guys geniuses) its a non profit, pure Tolkien. . . Am I making sense?

Damn Lawyers ruin everything, I wonder if there is anything at all we can do? (Grasping at straws, I know) I don't know, start calling whatever company would sue Suz and threaten to never buy there products again or something. . .) Puerile, but geez, I can't get over this.


Is there anyway the uncompleted version could be brought out as a modders tool? Maybe the world? Minus nameplaces or something? I don't want to see your work go to waste.



Don't give up, there is always hope.


If there is no way. . . You are the greatest modders of all time, in my book. I wish there was something I could do.

wow, I can't imagine what a shock this is for those of you who spent so much time and effort on this amazing project. good luck in whatever you move on to, I'll miss these forums.

Just a thought though for the future: I hope that someone will gather all materials and files on this mod and store them saftely. You never know what will happen in the long run.

I can't imagine how professional game developers feel losing their project after working on a project 10 hours a day for years. This is about the blow Memod takes on us, for even though it was a project to be completed in the spare time of the team, we spent thousands of hours apiece in whatever department we were associated.

Well, we must continue. I'm not making an official announcement, but I personally want to start another project perhaps being developed for TES 4. Perhaps a mod sometime in medieval history, or in a made up world.

If I can ever manage to put up a website ill show my concept art done for the mod, for there were hundreds.

April Fools, right....??




...Right?


I have just a few comments - please ignore them if you find them offensive [I don't know how you would].

While there are certainly many negatives that come of this, such as the possible disbanding of the greatest mod team ever, we have to look up - it's better than staying down.

Now, a few questions/suggestions:

Are you going to release the realism scripts you have made?
Are you going to release the pixel shaded grass?
Maybe I should just ask: Can't you release all of the "technical" [for lack of a better word] scripts, such as sleeping, temperature, house-building, etc... since they don't have to do with ME?

There may be hope yet, however unlikely:
You could change the mod into one of your own - a completely original intellectual property. A lot of work would be required, but I, along with many others, and probably yourselves, do not think that your hours of hard work should go to waste. Keep Wookiee's scripts. Keep the weapon models. Make an entire new world. Better yet, you could make your own game......


Just a thought.


For those of you who say you are leaving now that the MEMod is dead - don't.


-Benjamin E. Holt

err um **cough**set up bit torrent link on the official elders scrolls forums mod section under a different name. and mention you were hacked recently **cough**

Its a shame all that work will go to waste

Now this is really, really sad...... *turns on a really sad song*


I can imagine how much the deavs have try to find ANY way to continue the mod......


I mean YEARS of work day and Night is just flushed away and can never be bought back.

I´ve been sticking to this mod for over a year now and i have only had a terrific time all the time.

I´m only 14 years old but the sadness is so much i can´t even write. Those glorious time when a new screenshots came :/ , something new things that were not in Morrowind(like the arrows) and so on....

The only thing i wanted is to see is that the MEMod is finished, not so i can play it, just so i can see that all the time that has been put into the mod isn´t just a completely waisted.

My deepest thanks to all the devs & team members...

EDIT: Im NEVER going to stop peeking on the forums

I think the entire team deserves a round of applause - after working so hard on this project it seems a shame for memod to end this way...... so much effort has gone into this mod, and it all hasn't been for nothing either. i can only hope that some of the scripts that dont have anything to do with ME can be released.
Good luck to all of the team, for whatever you decide to do next.

SSpro (it's a soccer game) devs didn't take the approval from FIFA to use real player names. However they used similar names and the game was released without any law issue (and became huge success).

If your team was going to use similar method what would happen?
I mean if the Shire had different name it stops belong to Tolkien world, so Tolkien Enterprice can do nothing for this. You can make a continent similar to Middle-Earth (which will actually BE Middle-Earth) without using any relative name. After all, you make your very own TC without any relation with Tolkien Enterprise.
I don't think this is illegal. If it is, then all the TCs are illegal.

After all, they are rules, there is always a way to trick them, without being illegal.

The Tolkien world itself is copyrighted. We can't just go through and change names. If we were to release it, we'd still be sued.

As I said before, this is it, it's all over. There is no hope of us continuing it.

As for releasing some of MEMod's contents, scripts, etc. It is possible, however, we haven't come to a decision yet.

Steve, you mean you want us to travel around Upper-Earth while solving quests for the people of Grondar and Zohan?

I have a suggestion, although not a great one:
Rather than releasing ALL of ME, why not just release landmass mods that will be plopped down next to Vvardenfell?

I know, it's far from what any wanted, but Middle-earth is so dear to me(and apparently EVERYONE here) that if we can't have the hole thing, why not the best parts?

~V

I will not, in any sense, be willing to massacre tolkien's literature to create mock-middle-earth with differnt names and places, to circument copyright.

to do so would defeat the very ethos of the Middle-Earth Mod.

I am at such a loss of words I guess it hasn't really hit me yet, MEMod is gone.

er... I was gonna post the same thing as slaiv but I cannot even imagine 1. how depressing it is to see your "life's work" crumble away in your hands and 2. people saying, oh well can we have the content? even if that was not their intention or feeling. But also I know that you won't be putting the wookies script files and the "gondor armor" texture armors in the recycle bin, along with everything else. Even though I am being a hippicrit and a very rude one, I think that the armor/weapons could be realeased under different names if they said gondor or something on them and also the scripts that we have been looking foreward too, grass whatever else... maybe you thould stay together and continue the mod in a way and not making a total conversion but adding pixel shaded grass to the world, placing whatever NPC's you may have had in the mod into morrowind, along with scripts and items and everything else.

I don't won't to be selfish and that is by all means not my intent, but by realeasing your hard work minus Middle Earth it could almost be worth it, or continuing the mod by making changes to morrowind. Please just don't quit, The MeMod staff has seen tough times, and you can get through this too, even if it means not the original plan... you still have an awsome mod with you, don't just pack it up, show your talent, and don't give up... in a way it could still be a tribute to Tolkien, if not for your fans, for yourselves. I hate to see a shattered dream forgotten.

-Michael

this really cant be happening...

this really, really, really cant be happening.. *cries*

if im feeling this sad, and i actually havent done anything for the memod,
i cant even begin to imagine what the devs, teamsters and others are feeling..

Come on, give the MeMod devs a break at least now that there is no longer a MeMod... Do you think that if there were a way to save the mod they wouldn't do it? Do you think that they have declared the mod officially "canceled" before thinking of every possibility they had? All I hope is that the MeMod team will remain together, and that in the future they'll start working on a new project. And, yes, they will probably be able to salvage some of the work they have done for the MeMod, but that's for them to judge.

Hope Everything that has been done will be released? if there´s some copyright issues just change the names or something. use the material you have done in some other mod? Medieval related sounds really good. Do not let the precious material rot in your hardwares.

isn´t any way you can sell MEMod to EA or something?

I think the devs would rather not have anyone have MeMod than let EA get their hands on it, they'd only completly destroy the vision the team had for it.

(None of the devs have said any of this) This is my oppinion i dont actually know if this is what they think. So i'm sorry if i'm wrong.

I cant believe this happened...

We are all sad for the hard work we have put into this mod so of us for years.

R.I.P MEMod...

I wonder if a petition or something would work...
We would get a lot of signatures, but what do they care about someone's dreams ?
All they care about is money... I know Tolkien would let us use his world

This should be in the private forums but, what the hell, where all equal now...

A petition wouldnt work, they decided to close it down themselves they weren't threatened.

I cant believe you are just going to waste all that work 3 #%^@ing years.
You seriously haev no other choice besides compiling it all and bit torrenting it or something. Just to think 3 years of futile work. Give what you have done to the community. It will no longer be your burden but whpever chooses to secretly take it up

**** the machine!!! Why does people have to be so bound these days? I mean, why spoil people dreams and hard work, just because of some damn copyright laws, when they don't even take money for the **** and credit everything to Tolkien? Send those damn people that invented these laws down to Iraq and let them experience the torture we (and specially the Devs) are put through now!!!

what the vulk ...what has the world come to when you can't even give shit away. i feel so bad for the team...i dont' know what i'd do if i was an MEMod dev right now...i'd most likely be putting holes in my walls.

what the hell happens to all the work? all the models? you can't just throw them out

Hm, just heard the news, really bad, my sincerest condolences.

I don't want to blame anyone, there would be no use in it and also Suz wished for it, so I will respect that.

But you could, as suggested by others, use your technical "things" (I'm not good with modding, programming and all those stuff, but you know what I mean) for something different, like another mod or release it for other modders to use. It would be a real shame if all your work would have been in vain.

By the way, have I mentioned that I created my own world and am writing a novel about it at the moment (almost finished, the test-reader phase is on now)? If you wish, you may use my inventions it to create another mod. I haven't released anything (still searching for a company) so there are no rights on it.

If you want the material, just say so. It would be an honor for me, if you used it and I really have no objections towards you using my world to create your mod.

i say we write all the magazines that MeMod has been mentioned in and get them on our side... because the only thing that money grubbing corporations fear is the press....

...Everyone who has put their hard work into this mod has my most sincere gratitude. I just found out and I wish there was anything I can do. I think what MEMod had really taught you in addition to your moding skills is persistance. You all have worked so hard on this project and they just shut you down. You have thanks for doing what youve done, and I hope that you achieve great things in the future. (That hopefully wont get shut down)

Rock on

Ahhhh... if only I had ANY skills at modding... I am leaving for Bordeaux in two weeks, and I will stay there 9 months, but when I come back, I want to learn modding.

I have a dream.

In my opinion, the Morrowind Engine - or the Oblivion one, who knows - would be excellent for a realistic, purist, historical mod which takes place in a late Roman / early Medieval setting. Tamriel itself - fantasy races excluded - is a corruption of that world: the Imperials are the Romans, the Bretons are the celtic people, the Nords are the German people, the Redguard are the arabic/african people.

One would have no problems whatsoever with copyrights, with that mod... unless the ghost of an ancient Roman emperor comes back from the underworld to sue him... But I am afraid this project would be a little TOO big

however... the possibilities are endless. Don't let the end of the Me-Mod discourage you. I am not in the team, nor - with my skills - I think I shall ever be, but my suggestion is that you take a long, deep breath, take some time off, and then, if you feel like it, start a completely new project, using most of the realism script, weapons, and even the non-Tolkien related quests and NPCs for a new mod... or a new game.

But in the meantime... again, congratulations to everyone who has worked in this mod, and thank you. Should you EVER decide to turn professional and start making and selling games... you already have a faithful fan and buyer!

I don't think we will be giving the material we already have away to anyone else for them to complete the mod. Our work is too precious to us to just let *anyone* take it over. Also, I think there is still talk going on about what may be done with what we already have available. It might make its way into someting else. No one wants to see our work be for naught.

I'm curious *who* has told you "no" to this. You have said it is not the stance of T.E., so who were to talking to that has told you that you cannot proceed with a free plug-in. Were you being contacted by someone that led to this conflict?

All I have read is that Daerk had a lawyer who told him it was legal years ago (since it was non-profit). Were you able to contact Daerk? Have any of you spoken with lawyers that you hired/trust, or were you merely informed by lawyers on "the other side" (whoever they are)? [It could be in someone's interest to threaten you with litigation when they actually do not have a strong case. Frankly, the MEMOD makes other Psuedo-Tolkienesque game look like crap, and I can see how the MEMOD is a threat to them.] I'm worried that some opposing lawyer may be lying to you.

If you have not hired your own lawyer. I say that we all send money to Suz or whomever to pay for a consultation on this. Even if it's just a 1-3 hour charge, this could save the project. Somewhere in the range of $100-400? That's just a donation of $10 from 40 of us. I'm in if this could help.

But, (as is more likely the case) every avenue has been travelled, I hope you guys do not to discard your work. Even aside from the Middle-Earthishness of the mod, all the concepts of Realism are perfect. I have been in near-perfect harmony with all the ideas that were discussed here since I joined, and want everything that you made this far. The scripts, the textures, etc. are a treasure for those who want Realistic-Fantasy.

Thanks for all the work.

Daniel

Is there NO way that MEMod can be saved??

holy frickin shit that sucks. i'm so sorry, every one of you. I know that all of you worked your asses off for years to try to bring this game to its conclusion...it must hurt you even more than it hurts me to see this brought to a close.


oh, and pardon my french.

I know you worked very hard to accomplish this. I also know that you wouldn't quit unless you had examined all possibilites of keeping this mod alive. Still, we shouldn't despair - something may yet come up......

I don't know what to say... This came as a total shock! At first I thought this would have to be a very bad joke. Then as I realised it was not, I felt intense anger and frustration. Though I was never involved in the development, just a follower, I feel that a part of me just died! MEMod was a dream of mine! And probably all of yours, too. I just hope that you could send someone to crush a few knee-caps and get this mess sorted out! You have all my sympathy, for it is indeed a sad day. I will probably check in here out of habit, hoping to one day see you back in action.

The death of a mod, the death of a thousand dreams...
I will never forget the sparks you lit in my tired, ever-watching eyes

Thank you and farewell

Tor Anders

The most we can do is ask politely for the rights from whoever holds them, and try to convince them....

Very unlikely, but there's not much else to do...

I have drafted a letter, in my small hopes of helping this mod to succeed:


Intended for the Tolkien Enterprises Licencing Division:

As you may or may not know, the production of the Middle Earth mod for Morrowind has halted production.

If you have not heard of this modification, please visit http://mwsource.net/forum/index.php?act=SC&c=9 and read up on this mod, particularly in the "Daerk On" thread under "General MEMod Discussion."

After reading the information available in the above link, you can get a sense of just how much of their soul the developers have put into this project. This description of just one person's work on the MEMod, given days before its closing, can also give you an idea of just how much they have worked:

"I'm going to give an indication of why memod's not dead.

it's called the contents of my hard-drive. or more accurately, the "Memod" folder.

And this is just my own part of the work, not to include the rest of the other member's efforts to produce it - that is seperate.


Contents. 6 sub-folders.

"Others"
"Middle Earth Mod For Morrowind"
"Middle-Earth Concepts"
"Middle-Earth Promotional Samples"
"Texture Library"
"Reference Library"


"others" contains translations and original anglo-saxon copies of Beowulf, the Fight at Finnsbug, and a huge wadge of linguistic work, including copies of half the academic lectures tolkien gave. the 55 files total 3.8mb.

"texture Library" contains 933 files, ranging from Photoshop Masters to DDS texturemaps. it comes to a total of 857Mb.

"reference Library" contains 339 files: 260 of those are photographs and the rest are scans which I have taken for the memod. they range from weaponary and armour to a full year's worth of environmental reference, to allow texture maps for "summer" "spring" "autumn" and "Winter", and for every imaginable category. there are "leather" "portraiture" "food" "stone" "wood" and even a "chainmails" folder in there. the folder alone comes to 1.76gb.

"promotional Samples" includes articles written for Magazines that never published the articles, screenshots, renders, maps, and wallpapers. one high-res map file alone comes to 138mb. The Entire Folder consists of 139 files totalling 1.41Gb.

"Middle-Earth Concepts" has folders titled "creatures" "esgaroth" "maps" "arnor" "gondor" "primary source" "tolkien original drawings" and a string of other folders that give away the timeline. Many of the folders contain sub-folders. The entire folder comes to 341 files, and a total of 742mb of images.

And then there's the biggy. "Middle-earth mod for morrowind" the one with models, Icons, "Household items" "design docs" "creatures" "Audio" "Buildings" and "weapons". there are a total of One Thousand, Six Hundred, and Forty-six files in there, that total up to 1.68Gb of data.


that, in total is around 6.44 Gigabytes of data, 3,453 files, of work for the MeMod.
six and a half gig. three and a half Thousand files.

Every day, I spend perhaps 3-4 hours working on memod. At one stage I used to just draw. then I started trying to manage a team. When D left, I took over the lead for this mod. I try to be dealing with the needs and requests of the entire team - if KFM wants a peice of design, I'm the one who's not getting it to him... when atti needs a drawing of an object to model, its'my falure to give it to him. there's a lot I fail on. Workingon this full time, I'd struggle. Instead, I don't get a penny for the memod work, and I should be working as a freelancer producing stuff for clients. I've had nights that I've failed to end up in bed with partners, because I've had to produce work for memod. I've written, frankly, an unknown amount for memod - now so much one hundred thousand words, it's more likely a million - we've probably written more than many authors, discussing and designing this mod. I've learnt software I never dreamed I could use to create this mod, and I continue to learn. I've probably spent more money than I want to think about. Lenses and film must have set me back five hundred pounds. Software, I'm not even going to try to count. I've bought four copies of Morrowind, because of CD's either wearing out or being broken in one case. I've had nightmares about the MeMod.


And that's just me. then there's the huge volume of work produced by Theta - both as a designer, and in organising the mod - without her, we'd be no-where. Then there's the insane amounf of art that KFM has produced, often struggling because I've not got the time as the lead to be able to give feedback. There's times I'd gleefully murder him, and give praise to dark god as I burn his body sometimes... but I'd give him a hug for being a suffering sod, just as often. there's DP and Kahenraz's work, and Ember's ideas, Rynos, who started off wanting to do art - and a frankly dire artist, only to have evolved into a bloody effective PR and researcher who's doing a fantastic job of helping get the mod running in some sort of order, with theta's skills and guidance. And there's a hundred other artists, modellers, designers, and assistants, from Devs to teamsters that I can't even list, in some cases - atti, howlingoak, greywolf, and countless others. Each one has been of priceless value. And I can't give half of them quarter of the feedback they deserve."



It is these devoted Tolkienites' dream to create and present the perfect tribute to Tolkien and his wondrous publishings. Day in and day out have they worked to accomplish this dream, that only a team with such a good relationship and devotion to Tolkien could produce what they have promised.

The decision to halt production on the mod effectively crushed these dreams.

Suzerain, the lead developer of the Middle Earth Mod, stated the following on 18 September, 2004:

"Dear Players.

Following contact and negotiations, first in letters with the solicitors to the holdings of Tolkien Estate, and today, in international telephone calls to the holders of the electronic media rights to the works of Tolkien, a decision on the Middle-Earth Mod has been made.

As a result of the contacts and discussions, it has been concluded that, barring a near miraculous turnaround in legal stance, MeMod does not have the right to the use of the copyright content of Middle-Earth for any Electronic Media production, profit-making or non-profit.
Nor, it would appear, has it held any such rights over the last two and a half years, despite our belief in such an agreement. This comes as just as much of a shock to the current Dev and Team members as it does to you.

This situation therefore means that Memod is no longer a viable project, irrespective of it’s nature as a non-profit tribute. In light of this breach of copyright law with the holders of the rights, we would be unable to release the MeMod without threat of legal repercussion on all members, and it is therefore our only practical option to call a halt to the project at this stage.

In light of this closure, I would like to publicly thank the following members, for their work and effort for the Middle Earth Mod, over the years.

Ancalagon
Atti
Casuir
Communist James
Daerk
Dark0ne
Dark Lord Sauron
DeLite
Diplomat
Diseased Punk
Earendil18
Earrindo
Ember
Ent Went Moot,
Eru
General Timothy C
Geonox
Ghorgareth
Gogeka
Greywolf
Howlingoak
Illvarin
Iluventi
Immortal Snafu
JamaicanMeCrazy
Jesugandalf
Kahenraz
Kethruch
Kfmccall
Kyp
LadyMidnight
Lethmorra
Lord of the Boards
Lord of the Cheese
Lordoverkill
Lyte
Mighty Mule
Morgoth
Mr Badger
Nailo
Phr33ksho
Porcupine 1
Ring
Sarrowa
Seremegil
Sereph
Shizzy
S MacNelly
Smuli
Sone One
Stewart
Surian
Rynos
Theta Orionis
Tolkienniste33
TypeIII
Wardem
Wookiee


There have been many others. Each deserves their mention, and I wish I could, but in the course of two and a half years of work on this mod, as an artist, as lead artist, and as the lead designer for the entire mod, I’m afraid there are more than I can remember.

Thankyou. Each and every one of you, for the effort you gave, that got this project so far, to be halted. We’ve overcome letdowns, design changes, leadership issues, technical problems we thought would be impossible to overcome, and a hundred other problems. Sadly, this is the one problem we cannot get through.

Likewise, I’d like to thank everyone who applied to join the MeMod team over the years.

In a later post, I may well outline what MeMod’s timeline and story were to be. But that’s not for today. Today is to say goodbye to a dream we struggled for years to produce, stillborn.




Suzerain."


Many of us have been following this modification since it's inception years ago. Others have joined up more recently. There are currently 397235 registered users on the Morrowind Source forums, which host the MEMod forums. As you most likely can tell, this came as quite a shock to us. Read our reactions here: http://mwsource.net/forum/index.php?showto...topic=10645&hl=

So what, you are probably wondering, am I writing to you for? Simple: I am asking if there is any way to obtain the rights required to make this dream possible? This organisation of developer skill and talent is doing this for absolutely nothing - no profit whatsoever. Yet they still worked for countless days to realise their hopes. This is because of their love of Tolkien's worlds and works. These people are not greedy in any way at all. They are completely selfless. If I could help them in any other way than asking you for help, I would.

To restate the question: is there any way to save this modification? To prevent thousands of hours of work going to naught? What are the licences required for this mod to be able to continue production? And, finally, if you do not hold the rights, who does?

Please, help 40,000 people in their time of darkness, need, and sorrow - please help the development team for the Middle Earth Modification for Morrowind in realising their dreams, and creating possibly the greatest tribute ever made to J.R.R. Tolkien.

Sincerely, Benjamin Holt

no.
Thanks for the feeling but, as I've repeatedly stated, this is a desicion to avoid dragging such issues into disputes.

I beleive that such requests will merely cause additional hassles that will hinder any hope of having the mod progress at a future date.


While I appreciate the sentiment, the content is not what we want.

Suzerain

So as long as you don't release the mod, you can't be prosecuted, right?

I'd certainly not prefer the design contents of my HD being advertised to them, however.

Hi, i beleive there are ways around this. First change the title and the npcs name, just make it something else that appens to look like middle earth. If it has no direct relation to middle earth beside the looks, its going much harder for them to prevent you from releasing it. Change some of the quest contex and dialogue. Name the creatures differently also. Middle earth is not the only fantasy world with small humans and dwarves. And at worse, scatter the landscape regions with Faith and redo the edges.

There is ways to save your work.