Each week Mark Methenitis contributes Law of the Game on Joystiq ("LGJ"), a column on legal issues as they relate to video games:

New developments in the Madden franchise's ongoing legal troubles have provided a unique opportunity to talk about the so-called "right of publicity" that has become an issue with retired NFL players. As reported by GamePolitics, there are allegedly documents showing that EA altered aspects of Madden to keep from having to pay the NFL Player's Association (NFLPA), which kept the NFLPA from having to pay all of the former NFL players that appear in the game. The lawsuit is by the players toward the NFLPA to recover royalties for the use of their likenesses. The idea that EA would have to pay the NFLPA and the NFLPA would have to pay the players for the use of retired players likenesses rests in the "right of publicity."

The right of publicity is rooted in the concept of privacy, and has evolved in part from the ideas of libel, slander, and "passing off," which is often associated with a trademark-like protection. The basic concept is that you alone have the right to profit from the use of your likeness, which may include your name, physical appearance, voice, personality or other defining characteristics. So, if Nintendo wanted to make "Super Mark-io Brothers" with me as the main character, then they would have to pay me royalties. But it gets a lot deeper than that.

Each week Mark Methenitis contributes Law of the Game on Joystiq, a column on legal issues as they relate to video games:

There's been a torrent of discussion about a series of mysterious Activision anti-piracy actions as of late. Given the rumors and secrecy, I thought I should give my thoughts on the matter. For the record, this is just speculation. I don't have an inside source at Activision that is feeding me information, nor have I spoken with any of the alleged pirates. Hopefully, my analysis of the activity will give a little clarity to those of you trying to piece together this puzzle.

Here's what we know: Activision had suits against six people, all of which seem to have settled out of court. The cases had something to do with piracy but did not involve file sharing. The rest of the goings on were largely a mystery, other than one of the defendants alleging that he was encouraged not to seek counsel. So, that means there are far more questions than answers, but I think I have a pretty good theory to resolve most of these outstanding questions.

We should have seen this one coming, especially after witnessing the shockingly efficient way in which our custom-made race of space-faring lawyer sharks enslaved the Spore galaxy. Boy, those guys were quick, turning over verdicts and shutting every brief case with aplomb.

The plaintiffs of a new class action lawsuit against Spore's publisher, EA, could have found some use for our toothy objectors, as they've alleged that the game violates consumer law by including and installing SecuROM, the digital rights management software responsible for many an outraged gamer. The complaint, which seeks damages for trespass, interference and unfair competition, as well as disgorgement of unjust profits, claims that SecuROM is "secretly installed to the command and control center of the computer (Ring 0, or the Kernel), and surreptitiously operated, overseeing function and operation on the computer, preventing the computer from operating under certain circumstances and/or disrupting hardware operations."

We're not sure how EA will respond to the complaint, but we can offer the company some advice, based on the weaknesses we surmised from our aquatic lawyers. Attack with really big space ships.

[Via Gamespot]

The International Trade Commission has agreed to look into claims, made by Hillcrest Laboratories, that Nintendo infringed on several of the company's patents with the Wii. According to Reuters, the ITC has the power to block products from entering the United States if Hillcrest's claims are found to have merit.

Nintendo stated it will "vigorously defend this action," which it is sure to do with its buckets chasms full of cash. Nintendo's success has certainly been, in the words of a great 20th century poet, a case of "mo' money, mo' problems." Nintendo recently lost one patent case, and there are always more popping up.

Sony Computer Entertainment America and game designer David Jaffe are being sued for alleged copyright infringement over God of War. GamePolitics has Sony's statement on the matter, as well as the complaint, which will be heard in US District Court in California. The crux of the case is that Jonathan Bissoon-Dath, who wrote a screenplay called Olympiad, and Jennifer Barette-Herzog, who designed a map for the former's work, believe God of War was based on their work submitted to Sony Pictures in 2002.

The plaintiffs cite numerous similarities between the two works (like, both stories have bridges going over bottomless chasms), while Sony maintains that Greek mythology is in the public domain and the alleged similarities are "inaccurate, incomplete, abstracted and/or misleading."

Good news, Tecmo employees! No no, please don't get up. That bed under your desk really looks quite comfortable and snuggly. Now, if you'll just minimize that window filled with Ninja Gaiden II: Burnt Sienna code ... there, that's it. You'll be pleased to note that Tecmo has reached a settlement with Hiroaki Ozawa and Tatsuki Tsunoda of Team Ninja, who recently filed a lawsuit against the Dead or Alive publisher in response to an alleged overtime pay dispute.

According to Gamasutra, the pair claimed that employees (like you!) were not paid according to documented overtime hours, going as far as to say that the company created false documents to cover up the salary shenanigans. With this lawsuit wrapped up, it still leaves one to go with departed Team Ninja boss, Tomonobu Itagaki.

Alright, back to work! And go brush your teeth, seriously.

Another lawsuit has been filed against Nintendo for alleged patent infringement in the Wii remote, according to Bloomberg. Maryland-based Hillcrest Labs filed the suit in Greenbelt, Maryland, and has also filed a complaint with the U.S. International Trade Commission seeking to block imports of the Wii console and remote. Hillcrest's technology, dubbed Freespace, is reportedly used by Logitech International and Universal Electronics.

There have been numerous lawsuits and patent claims on Nintendo's Wii and DS interface technology. We're wondering if any of these companies who are suing Nintendo for patent infringement will ever sue each other for the same violations. We won't be seeing the lawsuit go to court anytime soon, however, as it's been put on hold while the ITC investigates. According to Bloomberg, that could take about 15 months.

ResponDesign, an Oregon-based company that published Yourself!Fitness a couple years back for various consoles, is suing Ubisoft over a game the French company was supposed to publish earlier this year. Ubisoft, which licensed assets from ResponDesign, was expected to publish My Fitness Coach to coincide with the release of Wii Fit, ResponDesign feels it has lost millions of dollars in royalties due to the game's delay.

There's a lot of numbers in the suit, with many zeros behind them, but the point is that ResponDesign believes it's owed at least $26 million for breach of license agreement and continued damages from Ubisoft's inability to "diligently pursue development of the game." Ubisoft has yet to respond to the lawsuit.

You'd think most football players would be overjoyed to be named to the Madden's "All Browns Team." Not hall-of-fame running back Jim Brown, though. Bloomberg reports that Brown filed suit against Electronic Arts and Sony yesterday in a New York court, alleging that he "never signed away any rights that would allow his likeness to be used.''

What makes Brown different from the hundreds of other current players represented in the game? According to the lawsuit, Brown alleges that when he played in the '50s and '60s, "the NFL had league wide policy that players shall have no lawyers or agents when negotiating compensation." Even if he had had a lawyer, Brown argues, "video games were not invented yet and no union to obtain rights from [them] existed.'

It's a decent argument, but we'd like to think that some forward-looking '60s lawyer could have foreseen the invention of video games and included them in his contract negotiations. After all, today's sports contracts routinely contain clauses for holosim royalties (No, not really).

[Via GameDaily]

Nintendo has filed a lawsuit in Japan against five retailers for "importing and selling equipment that enables illegal game programs to be played on [the Nintendo DS]" -- presumably flash carts such as R4. According to Reuters, Nintendo is joined by 54 other Japanese developers.

While the lawsuit is intended to thwart piracy, an unfortunate side effect is a hit to the homebrew community. If you were ever planning to pick up a flash cart for the DS, you might want to go ahead and grab one while you can.

Former head of Tecmo's Team Ninja and leather aficionado, Tomonobu Itagaki, is proving himself to be quite the legal eagle hawk whatever bird a ninja might keep as a pet in his ongoing lawsuit against his old employer. In addition to upping his claim for damages from 148 million yen ($1.3 million) to 164m yen ($1.6m) for bonuses and salary not paid, the Dead or Alive creator delivered a blow to accusations by Tecmo president Yoshimi Yasuda that he was never promised bonuses in the first place.

The evidence: an audio recording of Yasuda specifically stating that a legal document known as a ringi, which outlined the contested bonus plan, had in fact been approved by Tecmo's board of directors. Take that! If that didn't sting, Itagaki said (in what we're guessing was a stern voice): "I am prepared to reveal this evidence as the need arises for the sake of greater justice." Hear that? Greater justice. Everything the guy does is intense.

Nintendo could see its GameCube, Wavebird and Wii Classic Controller banned from retail shelves. Bloomberg reports that Nintendo has lost its attempt to overturn a $21 million patent-infringement verdict brought against the company by patent trolls patent holders Anascape Ltd. of Tyler, Texas. The house of Mario has a stay on the ban by putting the judgment amount in escrow until its case goes to the US Court of Appeals in the Federal Circuit.

The Texas jury found the Wiimote and Nunchuk controllers did not violate Anascape's patent; previously, Sony paid off Anascape back in 2004 and Microsoft settled on May 1, just before the Nintendo trial began. Anascape argued for the ban because it wants to enter the market and Nintendo has "clogged the channel." Yeah, we're very much looking forward to seeing if the third-party Anascape controller ever gets released.

When it comes to controller design, there truly is nothing new under the sun. You don't have to tell that to Nintendo -- the company has been sued (with varying success) over existing patents allegedly relating to the Wii Remote, the Gamecube controller and, uh, the Wii Remote again. Now, GamePolitics is reporting Nintendo is facing another lawsuit over the DS touchscreen.

In his complaint, John R. Martin alleges that the Nintendo DS infringes on his 2003-filed patent for a "Method for Operating an Electronic Machine Using a Pointing Device," (pictured above) which describes, among other things, a touchscreen input system. Nintendo, for its part, formally responded to the charges (PDF link) by saying it does not infringe on the patents, that Martin's ideas are unpatentable, and that the company is protected by something called the "doctrine of prosecution history estoppel." So there!

We're not patent lawyers, but Martin's patent doesn't seem to offer much improvement over the 1993 touchscreen patents he himself references. Still, he'll have his day in court, and we'll be sure to let you know what happens once that day is done.

Each week Mark Methenitis contributes Law of the Game on Joystiq, a column on legal issues as they relate to video games:

Summer is typically a "low season" for game releases, except for one particular annual tradition: new football games. As of late, those games have been all from EA, most notably the Madden and NCAA franchises. Last week it was made public that two gamers brought suit to disrupt EA's stranglehold over the football game market. Since the pleadings are online, I thought I would take the opportunity to offer some commentary on the issues presented. Of course, these are just my thoughts on the matter, not a prediction as to what result a trial may bring. EA's actual response may vary.

Professional sports are no strangers to antitrust and other anti-competition based legal actions. More or less every major professional sports league has faced these suits in the past, and some of them even hold specific anti-trust exemptions. For example, the Sports Broadcasting Act of 1961 is a specific anti-trust exemption for the NFL to be able to negotiate the broadcast rights for all teams. While none of the leagues have a true monopoly over the sports they represent, the barriers to entry are fairly great and most leagues are ultimately unable to compete (need I remind you of the XFL?). From the perspective of the NFL or MLB, exclusive licenses are likely viewed the way TV rights are, and I'm somewhat surprised that exclusivity has only become an issue in recent years.

Losing one of your company's most recognizable figureheads, especially one whose name is so closely associated with most of your best-selling properties, is bound to put a damper on things around the office. However, that last statement assumes that there are still people in the office -- 1UP recently printed a rumor that as many as three dozen Team Ninja higher-ups could be leaving the company following Tomonobu Itagaki's resignation, and will sue Tecmo to gain unpaid bonuses for the games they've completed (much like the class-action suit Itagaki planned to file against the company following his departure).

1UP's source for the rumor was the ever-present "word on the street", though that's likely just rumorese for "we have an inside source". Whoever it may be, we doubt it's the same hopeful Tecmo higher-up who recently assured the public that Team Ninja was going to be just fine, as losing your poster boy, a heartbreaking amount of stock market value, and supposedly, a healthy portion of your workforce in such a short period of time would surely make any game developer feel anything but.