In The Groove to "respect" Dance Dance Revolution

by Alexander Sliwinski { Oct 19th 2006 at 4:20PM }

Konami, publisher of Dance Dance Revolution, has settled a lawsuit with In The Groove's developer Roxor. With mighty samba moves and Euro Beat legal techniques, Konami now owns the intellectual property rights to In The Groove -- guess the games were a little too similar.

The best part of the agreement is that Roxor must agree to "respect Konami's intellectual property rights." Can you feel that pimp-slap Roxor?

Roxor may have been the developer of In The Groove, but Red Octane was the publisher. Red Octane is also the publisher of Harmonix's Guitar Hero, which shares similarities to Konami's GuitarFreak. RedOctane, owned by the Activision, may not have put up too much of a fight to lose In The Groove, but you know the nails are coming out if Konami's legal team goes after the infinitely more successful Guitar Hero. RedOctane may become better known for their legal issues than their games soon.

Tags: ANT Commandos, DDR, Guitar Hero, In the Groove, Red Octane

Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

Petrie @ Oct 19th 2006 4:28PM

Shouldn't be any issued. ITG was nothing more than DDR with a few extra modes and options. Guitar Hero is a completely different interface with a controller that is also totally different, even having more buttons. Guitar Hero is more like Pump it Up was to DDR, a similar concept but implemented quite differently.

s256 @ Oct 19th 2006 4:30PM

Actually, Alexander was moreso talking about Konami's Japan-only Guitar Freaks, which originally came out in 1999.

s256 @ Oct 19th 2006 4:33PM

Wait.. I see what you mean.

I guess it was a little less clear than my head right now.. :p

But you're right, it's fairly different. Konami probably can't touch Guitar Hero. It would probably be different if they had actually gotten GF out over here, ever.

NATO_Duke @ Oct 19th 2006 4:41PM

"...respect Konami's intellectual property rights" is the normal way to state that you cannot steal someone's IP in the future. Otherwise you would just settle the claim for damages in the past and leave the door open for future use.

sphetr2 @ Oct 19th 2006 5:00PM

"Can you feel that pimp-slap Roxor?"

ROFL. Best part of the article.

Fedule @ Oct 21st 2006 8:31PM

See - this will probably help In The Groove more than hurt it. If Konami have any sense, they'll allow Roxor to continue to develop In The Groove, but slap the Konami logo on it. ITG + Konami Songs = win.

Jay @ Oct 19th 2006 8:59PM

Well, if ever there was an article THIS BIASED, I have no problems right now with being a total fanboy. How many of you have ever played ITG? The only reason it even existed was because Konami was so obsessed about appealing to 12 year old girls, that they were completly ignoring the hardcore players. More advanced players DON'T PLAY HOME VERSIONS because the arcade has better equpiment. There was a 4 year hiatus between the release of DDR Extreme and DDR SuperNOVA. Something needed to fill it in. ITG isn't filled with lousy covers of licensed songs, the stepcharts are well-written, and the machine syncs properly. ITS NOT JUST A RIPOFF

BTW, how many of you are always complaining about EA and company stomping the life out of independent developers.

Corey @ Oct 20th 2006 4:10AM

Jay, your comment sounds great from the perspective of a fan but it totally ignores whether or not Roxor infringed on Konami's intellectual property with DDR. If Konami in court could prove that ITG used essentially the same presentation, look, and themes from DDR to a point where the games were too similiar then Konami could sue...it isn't a matter of whether ITG is good or not but whether Roxor work was built too much on what Konami did.

You mention EA but that is simply a red herring since it has NOTHING to do with the topic so your next comment might want to leave that little part out.

zombiejesus @ Oct 20th 2006 8:25AM

Really though I don't get how you can't have two of almost the same kind of dancing games in the market together. I mean look at fighting games Virtual Fighter and Tekken look excatly the same yet you dont see them going to court over the sameness. Also take racing games and so on. Competition is competition if your loosing money make a better game stop using your competition as the reason why noone wants to play your shitty game.

MrTroy @ Oct 20th 2006 11:57AM

I've never even heard of In The Groove. But if that above screen shot is from In The Groove, then there is no argument. They ripped... You CAN have different dance games in the arcade from different companies. I don't think Bust-a-Move(Groove) is anything like DDR. And I hate Pump It Up. The "Dancing" genre has sooo much room to be exploited- I mean explored, that there's plenty left to do.

That's like saying puzzle games all copied off of tetris so there's no reason to do any more.