dakinle

Reading this article makes me recall the whole Konami versus Roxor Games lawsuit over DDR and ITG. I am a lawyer (for real) and the outcome of that lawsuit always saddened me because I think Roxor had an excellent chance to prevail against a number of Konami's claims.

There really isn't much difference between what Roxor had with ITG and the examples cited in the Kill Screen article. In fact ITG had its own coded engine (based off stepmania) and used completely brand new songs and stepcharts, as well as innovative ideas with regard to their step modifiers. Let me be clear, I am not anti-DDR, nor anti-Konami. Konami did what it felt necessary as a corporation to protect its own property, but that doesn't mean its property was truly ever in danger from ITG or that Roxor was liable to Konami.

Unfortunately we will never know what the outcome would have been because of the settlement that avoided a trial (the anticipated cost of which, I am sure, played into Roxor's decision to settle). Additionally, emails and communications between Roxor employees and officers discussing "copying" DDR and/or "ripping them off" are irrelevant. That is NOT the legal standard for whether something is copyright or patent infringement.

The strongest case Konami had probably was the ability of arcade owners to retrofit Konami arcade cabinets to house ITG kits. However, if the arcade had purchased those cabinets, then it seems that the owners should have been free to modify them in any way they saw fit (although, again, if Konami had a strong side to its case, then this claim was it). ITG was advancing the dance game formula and doing it at a time when Konami was letting their own product stagnate.

In my opinion, though, this really was a case of the big guy shutting down the little guy simply because he had the money and power to do it, not necessarily because he was in the right. *sigh* Oh well, off to play Dance Central...

smells like a real fir christmas tree

Well most certainly not at my desk at work... really not there,,, promise,,,

Hey nice to meet you

Obviously my real life job of Dragon hunting - the fantasy world equivalent is just so much less painful.

You have my Katamari

I used to, but then the same songs got boring and the DLC was just too expensive.

@ZildjianKX Except bizarrely with Mass Effect 2 which came out in January 2010 and still has not had a Game of the Year/Ultimate Edition - despite having won many GOTY awards and having a lot of added content consisting of missions and miscellaneous weapon/armor permutations.

@An Unnamed Mob Your analogy fails. That is an argument that is applicable to pirating games, not to the sale and purchase of used or secondhand games. In the United States, copyright laws and the Uniform Commercial Code guarantee the right of original sale, and also guarantee the right of second/used sales by the purchaser who becomes the owner of the purchased goods. That is why you have markets for used goods like records and CDs, books, cars, houses, anything and everything sold at a garage sale....

Just because there are practical barriers to engage in secondhand sales of digital content does not mean that your right to resell that content is any less. This story is clearly aimed at used sales, not piracy.

TLDR: The law is clear: Piracy is theft. Secondhand/used sales are not.

I am confused (or Richard Mitchell is) - Resident Evil 5 didn't come out at the same time as ODST - it was months earlier in March 2009. All these other games mentioned came out in September 2009.