Marvel lawsuit against City of Heroes is examined by Law.com

by Ben Zackheim { Dec 16th 2004 at 12:05PM }

If you want to get into the nitty gritty of the latest Marvel lawsuit, you should check this piece out. Instead of actually making a good MMO, Marvel has decided to use the courts to put their stake in the ground with online gaming. They've filed suit over City of Heroes, claiming that characters can be created that too closely resemble their own creations. We think they're going the wrong direction here, much the same way they did when they threatened many fan sites. One of the scariest scenarios that the writer presents is this…

"...If the court accepts Marvel's notion that playing Wolverine or the Incredible Hulk online is unlawful, you can expect a chill to spread through all the MMO universes. Rights holders will begin insisting that MMO operators police their games for unauthorized elements — robots that look too much like C3PO, uniforms that look too much like Captain Kirk's, haircuts that mimic Bart Simpson's, in-game face paint that evokes KISS, or blonde vampire slayers named Buffy."

Believe it.