As A Vulture Circling Carcasses On The Roadside

I just learned that the company that made my favorite computer games a decade and a half ago, Sierra Entertainment, had been acquired and dismembered out of existance a year ago. I'm wondering about the intellectual property aspect of this event.

For years I've wanted to somehow reverse-engineer the robot designs/scenery/effects from Earthsiege and CyberGladiators and Thexder For Win95 for newer games. I was told by those allegedly in the know that what I was contemplating was doing things "the long way around" and that I was better off creating lookalike designs of my own. Dunno how true that would be.

I wonder about the rights reversion in the case of games software. If games software is Industrial Art, all the games I'm interested in may have already lapsed to Public Domain anyway.

I want more solid information--and more ideas.