Lawyers for families of those killed in the mass shooting say they are moving “full-steam ahead” after the company did not allow for full access to its internal documents.

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Newtown, Conn., where 26 people, including 20 first graders, were killed in 2012 by a gunman armed with a Remington Bushmaster rifle. Credit...Ángel Franco/The New York Times

From the outset, legal experts said the case faced long odds, running headfirst into barriers that are built into federal law and protect gun companies from most litigation.

The case, brought by the families of those killed in the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Connecticut, seeks to hold responsible the companies that made and sold the weapon used in the attack, in part by unearthing documents they hoped would reveal the gun industry’s inner workings.

The families acknowledged the hurdles they faced, but saw the lawsuit as a gamble worth taking.

Now, after winding through the courts for nearly seven years, the suit has yielded an offer: Remington, which made the AR-15-style Bushmaster that was used in the 2012 attack, has proposed settling with the families for $33 million as a trial date looms.

The company’s offer underscores the viability of the novel strategy the families have adopted to pierce the legal shield that guards gun makers, offering a potential road map to the survivors and relatives of victims involved in other mass shootings.

The Sandy Hook plaintiffs are considering the offer, which includes $3.66 million apiece for each of the nine families who are pursuing the suit. But a lawyer for the families, Joshua D. Koskoff, added that his clients were still moving “full-steam ahead” toward trial.

The families have long said that they want a jury to see the company’s behind-the-scenes communications, including, possibly, those in which they outline plans for marketing the weapon — a central component of the suit.

“One glaring inadequacy about the offer, among many,” Mr. Koskoff said, “is that it doesn’t contain a provision for full access to all documents.” Any agreement would have to include that access, he added.

Lawyers for Remington, which is in bankruptcy, declined to comment on the offer. The company has previously argued that the claims raised by the families fall squarely within the protections provided by federal law, which the gun industry’s supporters described as a critical defense against predatory or politically driven lawsuits.

Remington’s lawyers have said the families are trying to obtain internal company documents without any justification to do so. In one recent court filing, the lawyers said the families’ suit did not contain any evidence that the gunman “even saw Remington’s advertisements — much less was inspired by them to commit mass murder.”

The case is being watched closely as the United States continues to be gripped by the anguish stirred by recurring mass shootings and the political rancor surrounding the ownership and use of guns. And the interest has only intensified through the many legal twists and turns the case has endured, surviving far longer than other litigation brought after a mass shooting.

The families argue that Remington marketed the assault rifle in a way that was meant to appeal to troubled young men like the 20-year-old who stormed into the elementary school in Newtown, Conn., killing 20 first graders and six adults in a spray of gunfire that saw 154 rounds fired off in under five minutes.

The suit seizes on an exception built into federal law that allows for litigation over sales and marketing practices that violate state or federal laws. The families contend that Remington’s practices violated a Connecticut consumer law that prohibited businesses from marketing or promoting their products in a way that encouraged illegal behavior.

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The families’ lawyers have described how the Bushmaster was portrayed as a weapon of war with slogans and product placement in video games that invoked combat violence. The marketing of the rifle also employed hypermasculine themes, including an advertisement with a photograph of the weapon that said, “Consider your man card reissued.”

“Since this case was filed in 2014, the families’ focus has been on preventing the next Sandy Hook,” Mr. Koskoff said. “An important part of that goal has been showing banks and insurers that companies that sell assault weapons to civilians are fraught with financial risk.”