Who owns the rights to Kyle Hyde?

[The_Dude1212]

Bought myself an imported copy of The Last Window last year, finally finished it a few days ago. Now, I do remember hearing about Cing going under, which is rather unfortunate. What I want to know is, did all their IP go down with them, or did Nintendo or anyone else pick them up? I recently read about the rumour about Level-5 picking up the Kyle Hyde saga, but that was last posted about in October 2011, and has since been deemed false.

tl;dr Is there any real hope of seeing another entry in the life of Kyle Hyde? I love me these noire stories. That and I'm also curious about the rest of the cast and where they ended up.

[gtt]

unknown, I don't think anyone bought their properties.

[PaperLink64]

Nintendo owns the Hotel Dusk and Another Code IPs.

Kyle Hyde also has a trophy in Super Smash Bros. Brawl proving this.

[mock turtle]

Nintendo owns the Hotel Dusk and Another Code IPs.

Kyle Hyde also has a trophy in Super Smash Bros. Brawl proving this.

Nintendo almost certainly owns the IPs, but that doesn't necessarily prove anything. Sonic and Snake aren't owned by Nintendo after all.

Anyway, assuming Cing owned the rights when they were active, they certainly don't now (obviously, because they don't exist any more). Since they filed for bankruptcy, they would have had to sell off their assets, including their IPs, and I can't imagine that Nintendo wouldn't have bought them. Of course, that's IF they owned the rights to begin with. Aside from some cell phone games from the early 2000s that were only released in Japan, it doesn't look like they were ever legally in control of what they made, since they were all produced by someone else. Glass Rose was for Capcom, the Another Code/Trace Memory and Hotel Dusk/Last Window games were for Nintendo, Again was for Tecmo, and Little King's Story was for Marvelous. Since all of those were collaborations with and financed by the respective companies, they would own the IPs, not Cing. Probably.

I'm suddenly very depressed after talking about this...

[The_Dude1212]

unknown, I don't think anyone bought their properties.

Nintendo owns the Hotel Dusk and Another Code IPs.

Kyle Hyde also has a trophy in Super Smash Bros. Brawl proving this.

Really? I'm gonna have to go through my trophy collection in Brawl now, cause I don't recall seeing anything related to Kyle Hyde, or at least nothing I've unlocked yet.

EDIT: Figured out why. Need to clear All-Star mode with every character. Prolly should get around to that, lord knows I still have a bunch of stuff to unlock on SSBB, haha.

Nintendo almost certainly owns the IPs, but that doesn't necessarily prove anything. Sonic and Snake aren't owned by Nintendo after all.

Anyway, assuming Cing owned the rights when they were active, they certainly don't now (obviously, because they don't exist any more). Since they filed for bankruptcy, they would have had to sell off their assets, including their IPs, and I can't imagine that Nintendo wouldn't have bought them. Of course, that's IF they owned the rights to begin with. Aside from some cell phone games from the early 2000s that were only released in Japan, it doesn't look like they were ever legally in control of what they made, since they were all produced by someone else. Glass Rose was for Capcom, the Another Code/Trace Memory and Hotel Dusk/Last Window games were for Nintendo, Again was for Tecmo, and Little King's Story was for Marvelous. Since all of those were collaborations with and financed by the respective companies, they would own the IPs, not Cing. Probably.

I'm suddenly very depressed after talking about this...

Well, I just sent an e-mail to Nintendo asking them the status on who owns the rights to them. I think the biggest thing would be though that if it did get a sequel, it would likely be on 3DS, and would either be the first game to not have 3D effects to continue the tradition of holding the 3DS like a book, or break said tradition to maintain 3D effects. It'd be a shame to not have both, but between the two I'd rather hold the 3DS like a book.

And I know that depressing feel. I did my second run of 999 right after, but limited mobility, a shorter game and gruesome details of the deaths made me just yearn for more of Kyle Hyde. I sincerely hope that there is at the very least a small but positive chance that we could see that threequel and more, assuming the writers who worked on the first two can be rounded up to work on it again if they're willing.

[PaperLink64]

Nintendo owns the Hotel Dusk and Another Code IPs.

Kyle Hyde also has a trophy in Super Smash Bros. Brawl proving this.

Nintendo almost certainly owns the IPs, but that doesn't necessarily prove anything. Sonic and Snake aren't owned by Nintendo after all.

Anyway, assuming Cing owned the rights when they were active, they certainly don't now (obviously, because they don't exist any more). Since they filed for bankruptcy, they would have had to sell off their assets, including their IPs, and I can't imagine that Nintendo wouldn't have bought them. Of course, that's IF they owned the rights to begin with. Aside from some cell phone games from the early 2000s that were only released in Japan, it doesn't look like they were ever legally in control of what they made, since they were all produced by someone else. Glass Rose was for Capcom, the Another Code/Trace Memory and Hotel Dusk/Last Window games were for Nintendo, Again was for Tecmo, and Little King's Story was for Marvelous. Since all of those were collaborations with and financed by the respective companies, they would own the IPs, not Cing. Probably.

I'm suddenly very depressed after talking about this...

A better clarification would be that Hotel Dusk and Another Code/Trace Memory are listed under Nintendo's release history in the Chronicle, since that focuses on Nintendo's games aside from the few licensed games on it.

[Serpent_Seed]

Where is Nintendo's Release history?

[Iridium077]

Bought myself an imported copy of The Last Window last year, finally finished it a few days ago. Now, I do remember hearing about Cing going under, which is rather unfortunate. What I want to know is, did all their IP go down with them, or did Nintendo or anyone else pick them up? I recently read about the rumour about Level-5 picking up the Kyle Hyde saga, but that was last posted about in October 2011, and has since been deemed false.

tl;dr Is there any real hope of seeing another entry in the life of Kyle Hyde? I love me these noire stories. That and I'm also curious about the rest of the cast and where they ended up.

Ah, Level-5 having the property? Ha. They'd make a couple comparatively good games, and not localize any of them.

But Nintendo still owns the series.

[Jingleboy]

I would go with Nintendo owning the series, as they published it in the EU AFTER Cing went backrupt.

[The_Dude1212]

This is Nintendo's reply:

"Hello,

All I can tell you is that we currently have no plans to release another game in that series. We do not comment on our business dealings with other companies.

Is it possible that another game could be released? Certainly, provided a developer or publisher gets the rights to do so.

Sincerely,

Nintendo of America Inc.
David Marshall"

So, I guess you could say this is something they own but won't work on; something that they would rather rent or lend out to another company.

Well, if Level-5 is anything to go by with Professor Layton, I would love to see them carry on Kyle Hyde's legacy.

[the_nintendo_screw]

Why didn't The Last Window come out in America? Did Hotel Dusk really not do well?

It's such a shame, I really wanted to play the game.

[PaperLink64]

Why didn't The Last Window come out in America? Did Hotel Dusk really not do well?

It's such a shame, I really wanted to play the game.

Could say the same for Another Code R. But at least they do have English translations, so importing European copies is the best way to enjoy them at this point.

[Fluffernutter]

Well I really enjoyed Room 215, but all these years later I'm still debating whether to import The Last Window. Can anyone who's played it tell me if I'm missing out on something great if I don't pick it up?

And Kyle Hyde is the man. That is all.

[wiiarebrothers]

Well I really enjoyed Room 215, but all these years later I'm still debating whether to import The Last Window. Can anyone who's played it tell me if I'm missing out on something great if I don't pick it up?

And Kyle Hyde is the man. That is all.

I played it. I'm from Europe. It is really great.The story is more about Kyle, and his past. There are also a few connections to Hotel Dusk in the story.

When I played it, it was terrible. I do'nt usually play games for very long periods (I don't have much time), yet for Last Window, I was hooked to my DSi for 4 hours every evening after school. It was creepy o_o

Ah, and Rachel is also in this game <3

[Fluffernutter]

@wiiarebrothers Thanks for the info!

[mock turtle]

Why didn't The Last Window come out in America? Did Hotel Dusk really not do well?

It's such a shame, I really wanted to play the game.

Could say the same for Another Code R. But at least they do have English translations, so importing European copies is the best way to enjoy them at this point.

Unfortunately, that still leaves Another Code fans out in the cold without modding one's Wii. It sucks, especially since Trace Memory is one of my all-time favorite DS games. Maybe once the Wii is dead and gone I'll import it and mod the damn thing, I don't know.

[HammerGalladeBro]

I don't know if this means anything now, but the credits of Hotel Dusk say:
"All rights, including the Copyrights of Game, Scenario, Music and Program, reserved by Nintendo and CING."

So, even if they don't fully own it, it's clear they have some control over the IP, as it was shown in Brawl, since there are some stickers of Trace Memory and Hotel Dusk, as well as a trophy for both, Ashley Robins and Kyle Hyde.

[amir_zwara]

Well I really enjoyed Room 215, but all these years later I'm still debating whether to import The Last Window. Can anyone who's played it tell me if I'm missing out on something great if I don't pick it up?

And Kyle Hyde is the man. That is all.

It's the only game I've imported. It was well worth it.
...
Whatever the case may be, I'm sure Nintendo has the ability to make another Hotel Dusk game happen if they decided to do so. They are not the type of company to let great exclusive ips slip away from their control too often.
I personally would love another follow up, they could even do it as a smaller downloadable game and I'd be happy.