Cheapo?!

[ACM138]

Hi everyone!

I'm new to the forum and of course a big Lemmings fan.

I'm sorry, I understand this is a stupid question, but please, can you tell me what "Cheapo" is?

Is that a clone or a new Lemmings game?

Thank you in advance.

[Andi]

Hi and welcome to the forums!

Cheapo is a very identical clone from lemmings. It uses the same graphics but is although very customizable. Becauses it's almost the same as the original lemmings it became illegal. But nowadays no one is anymore interested in this fact. Not even Sony. You can get it from several sites such as the one from DragonsLover.

[namida]

http://www.teamhellspawn.com/lemmings/ is where I usually go to download.

Although the first time I got it, I got it directly from the creator(Peter Spada).

[ACM138]

Thank you!  

It was formerly known as Copycat (Lemmings), right?
 ::

[namida]

Nope. Cheapo is the sequel to Copycat Lemmings.

[namida]

Also. Cheapo is not illegal. Copycat Lemmings is. Psygnosis and others never found out about Cheapo, so they didn't make it illegal. They did do so about Copycat Lemmings, though.

It's confusing how the names are similar.
First: Copycat Lemmings
Second: Cheapo Copycat Lemmings Game

[DragonsLover]

The strange thing is that Lemmings is an abandonware, so it is legal to make clones of it. But, of course, Lemmings shouldn't be in the title of the clone. That's all!

No?

[ACM138]

The strange thing is that Lemmings is an abandonware, so it is legal to make clones of it. But, of course, Lemmings shouldn't be in the title of the clone. That's all!
No?

AFAIK the "abandonware" term is actually non-sense. It's just like those disclaimer you find downloading Mame roms which ask you to delete them after 24 hours if you don't own the dumped PCB.

If the copyright owner still retains it, it's still illegal to own an abandonware title or a game rom, even if nobody sells it and you can't legally buy it. Sounds a bit stupid, doesn't it? :x

On the other hand, making clones isn't illegal in any way, otherwise we could say MS Word is illegal because it's a clone of the ancient Lotus Abiword.  

To avoid any legal issue, I think it should be enough:
1. (of course) not to steal the code,
2. make graphics look different and
3. (as you stated) name the clone completely different.

Anyway, I tried Cheapo and I think it's an amazing piece of software. But first of all I should finish all the levels of the official games...  

[finlay]

I've seen Windows Lemmings and Lemmings Paintball on sale in places like Game.