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A Paris criminal court recently ruled in favor of Divineo, a company that sells DS flash carts. In a statement, Nintendo said that it was "extremely disappointed with the decision by Paris Criminal Court to find Max Louarn, his company, Divineo, and other co-defendants not guilty in the criminal case involving the sale and distribution of game copying devices," and that the company "welcomes the prosecutor's decision to appeal the judgment. As a victim Nintendo will join his appeal."

In the statement, Nintendo noted that Divineo still owes the company damages from a ruling made in Nintendo's favor in Hong Kong last year. Last month, a Spanish criminal case was dismissed against a company selling DS flash carts, with the judge in that case ruling that the carts are not illegal since they can be used for many non-infringing purposes.

Mark Methenitis contributes Law of the Game on Joystiq ("LGJ"), a column on legal issues as they relate to video games:
I would imagine anyone reading this column has seen the coverage of the UK government's plan to create a "Pirate Finder General" and other new anti-piracy activities. The Pirate Finder General would have exceptionally broad powers to find and punish pirates with little supervision in an almost Judge Dredd-esque "I am the law!" kind of way. Of course, the whole matter is couched as a necessary measure to protect rights holders, ignoring what impact the ability to permanently revoke use of the internet might have on the average household. To me, this is just another sign of the times in the constantly tumultuous intellectual property ecosystem. While the situation could certainly turn out poorly for our friends in the UK, could something like this ever happen in the United States? The answer might not be as clear cut as you think.

We have been over intellectual property topics of all shapes and sizes in the history of LGJ, and the one universal truth is that intellectual property rights exist for one reason: to balance the rights needed by IP producers to be able to profit from their work with the rights needed by IP consumers to be able to enjoy those works. The concept of intellectual property has never been about granting unlimited power to rights holders, nor unrestricted access to consumers. However, since the advent of the Internet, we have been in the middle of a digital arms race between pirates and various parts of the entertainment industry, which we have seen to have substantial resources and connections given some of the legal changes like the UK law cited above or the infamous Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement. Both sides have, at times, taken unsustainable or unrealistic positions, be that utopian unrestricted access to all intellectual property or draconian restrictions to simple use, like the position that ripping a CD you purchased to your iPod is copyright infringement.

Judge D. Gregorio Alvarez Alvarez of Salamanca, Spain, dismissed a complaint brought by Nintendo against Grupo Movilquick, which sells the DSTT flash cart in Spain. The judge ruled that though the device does circumvent Nintendo's DRM, and can be used for piracy, it can also be used to extend the functionality of the DS in other, legal ways -- such as, according to Google's translation of the judge's statement, "backing up original games or other various functions such as managing photos, music or performance of (free software)."

The judge notes that Nintendo might still have grounds for a civil lawsuit if it can be proven that the DSTT infringes on a Nintendo industrial design patent. But his ruling is a far cry from the usual "flash carts are piracy machines" rhetoric that (understandably) angry companies like Nintendo perpetuate. [Via GamePolitics]

In response to a possible class action lawsuit resulting from a recent round of Xbox Live bans, Microsoft has now asserted the legality of its position. A spokesperson has told the Financial Post that piracy is a violation of the company's terms of use and that Microsoft is "well within its legal rights" to ban users from its Xbox Live.

It was reported earlier this month that the law firm AlbingtonIP is "investigating" the possibility of a class action lawsuit against Microsoft over the bans. The firm argues that timing of the bans -- shortly after the release of Halo 3: ODST and just prior to the launch of Modern Warfare 2 -- was designed to get as much money from Xbox Live subscriptions as possible. In other words, the firm believes that Microsoft personally waited for a time when many people -- modders in this case -- would be purchasing Live subscriptions for popular games -- money that probably wouldn't be refunded after a ban.

Joystiq's Law of the Game columnist, Mark Methenitis, classified the suit as a likely "cash grab," explaining that anyone savvy enough to mod an Xbox would know to stay well away from Xbox Live. We might add that major releases, like ODST and Modern Warfare 2, are the biggest targets for piracy, and likely correspond with rises in illegal downloads. And that just might have something to do with the timing of the bans in question.

[Via Kotaku]

We don't live in Brazil, but from what we hear, it's not one of the most gamer-friendly places out there. Piracy runs rampant and whenever any kind of controversial game releases, citizens usually find their government won't let 'em play it. But, hey, things are kinda looking up!

Reader Renato wrote in to us saying the PS2 has finally officially released in Brazil and that consumers can get it from the Sony Style store now ... for the low, low price of 799 BRL (about 461 USD). That's right, Brazilians no longer need secure safe passage for emigrating consoles or pay ridiculous sums of money to third-party distributors and can instead pay ridiculous sums of money directly to Sony for a locally-supported PS2! Isn't that awesome?

[Thanks, Renato]

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Congratulations to Serge808 on being the first to comment. You've been emailed a free Battlefield: Bad Company 2 beta code. All beta codes have been awarded. Click here, for more information on this giveaway. Official rules apply.

Troubling news for pirates worried about their fearsome image today: In a recent survey of TIGA members, a majority of developers say that while piracy is a problem, it's not necessarily a fatal one to their business. While 90 percent of those polled think the issue is getting worse, only 60 percent call it a low threat with a mere 10 percent saying it represents a significant danger to their survival.

What are the other 90 percent worried about? Well, getting caught between Mega Shark and Giant Octopus, naturally.

We all know the timeless adage: "If you can't beat them, then think of cleverer ways to entice them, then break down their spirits, showing them the error of their ways, which will ultimately lead to you beating them." Developer RedLynx employed this strategy when trying to make a foothold in the piracy-riddled PC gaming market when it released its motorbike platformer, Trials, last year. However, the method of this "release" were unconventional, to say the least: The studio actually beat PC pirates to the punch, and uploaded its own game to a number of popular torrent sites.

The version the developer distributed was missing one key feature, however: Leaderboard support. According to RedLynx CEO Tero Virtala, who spoke on the bizarre distribution model at the Develop Liverpool conference, "leaderboards are the soul of the game." He hoped that pirates would fall in love with the leaderboard-less version of the game, then purchase the full version so they could compete with their law-abiding friends.

Virtala admitted that he has no way of knowing how successful that strategy was, but we applaud the studio's unbridled chutzpah nonetheless.

While it might be tempting to go straight to Craigslist with those Modern Warfare 2 Xbox 360 bundles you stole, it turns out that Activision notices exciting, high-profile offers just like your potential customers might. VentureBeat reports that when Activision noticed a listing for one of the bundles last Thursday, the company hired a private investigation firm, IPCyberCrime.com, to track down the seller.

When IPCyberCrime found the person behind the sale, the investigator discovered that he was an employee at a retailer, who, with friends, had stolen the bundles to sell on Craigslist. The sellers were turned over to the store's loss prevention department.

That bust led to one of the prospective buyers, named Christian Del Amo, who was raising money on a forum to buy the bundle (allegedly) for the purpose of copying the game and selling the copies, along with other pirated games, on hard drives. IPCyberCrime turned that case over to the Miami-Dade Police Department, who arrested Del Amo.

Obviously, this demonstrates one reason (aside from the whole morality thing) why you shouldn't try to make a business of selling pirated games. Activision has enough money to hire a private investigator, and is not afraid to use it.

We hope your recent forays into piracy merely involve you donning a hook and eyepatch for a debaucherous costume party, or else you likely received a message from Microsoft like the headline of this post. The company recently dispatched a wave of bans to owners of modded Xbox 360s who've been playing pirated copies of games. A Microsoft spokesperson confirmed to IGN that "we have taken action against a small percentage of consoles that have been modified to play pirated game discs."

The spokesperson went on to explain that this batch of console bans wasn't conducted on any particular time frame, and that the company was merely following up on its standing policy against piracy. In other words, Microsoft isn't trying to ruin your Halloween weekend -- it just, you know, worked out that way.

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Only a day after iPhone developer Smells Like Donkey complained of an 80 percent piracy rate of its game Tap Fu, another developer has made an even more alarming claim. According to Fishlabs, its latest release, Rally Master Pro 3D, achieved an astonishing 95 percent piracy rate in its first day of release. Fishlabs' Michael Schade told Mobile Entertainment News that the 95 percent piracy rate corresponds to "many thousands." When discussing whether the recently implemented in-app purchasing feature would help curb piracy, Schade was skeptical, saying, "I doubt that." He added, "We will see in the future how well in-app purchases fight piracy."

Apple's iPhone/iPod Touch is a lot like Sony's PSP in many ways: they both play games, movies and music -- and now both can struggle with the effects of piracy. According to iPhone developer Smells Like Donkey, about 80 percent of all downloads of Tap-Fu were illegally downloaded.

The developer notes that learning how to pirate games off the iPhone is surprisingly easy, thanks to "a kernel patch that bypasses Apple's DRM system" that "would take an average person 5 minutes in Google to find." Additionally, the developer discovered that an average of zero percent of pirates end up purchasing a legitimate copy of Tap-Fu -- it seems marking the game down to $1.99 didn't discourage anyone from taking a free ride.

"It is kind of depressing," the developer admits. However, other iPhone developers are encouraged to take a proactive approach in lieu of Apple's slow response to the piracy situation. "Detecting a pirated app is quite simple to do," the developer notes. "Probably the first thing we'll try is popping up a message reminding people that they really should buy the game if they like it and conveniently provide links to do so." An alternate plan to generate revenue? DLC. "This forces the pirates to change their strategy significantly and it might be a while before it becomes feasible to attack this system."

[Via Develop]

Q-Games president Dylan Cuthbert has suggested that rampant piracy of his studio's optimized PSP port, PixelJunk Monsters Deluxe (PJMD), has deterred its plans for further PSP development. "I don't think we'll port anything else to the PSP, we have to see how PJMD does as there's a *lot* of piracy," Cuthbert tweeted over the weekend. Perhaps constrained by character limitations or simply caught up in another Uncharted 2 sesh, Cuthbert did not cite piracy estimates -- nor sales figures, for that matter. He did, however, confirm a demo is in the works; "but I don't think it makes any difference to piracy," Cuthbert lamented.

Cuthbert added in a follow-up tweet, "because Monsters is such a good fit it is being pirated I think," and then he responded to a suggestion to incorporate anti-piracy measures into the game code with: "unfortunately the pirates could just hack those kinds of things out." While the PSP Go has yet to be fully unlocked by would-be pirates and download-only PSN titles seem to be well protected from piracy, PJMD is available on UMD (in Japan and the greater Asia region), which has no doubt lead to the distribution of pirated versions of the game.

While it's somewhat naive of Q-Games to not have anticipated a piracy issue, it's no less disheartening. The PSP has long suffered from a lack of consistent third-party support because of a history of sales losses due to piracy. Q-Games is just the latest developer hesitant to commit further resources to supporting the PSP platform, and without the release of an impossibility firm firmware, it won't be the last.

Update: Cuthbert reemphasizes that PJMD sales will be the key determining factor that drives Q-Games' future in PSP development. Cuthbert's studio has not definitely dropped PSP development, but ostensibly low sales over the first three weeks of PJMD availability have Q-Games in some doubt about pursuing further PSP projects. Of course, a sales spike could certainly change that attitude.

[Via Examiner; thanks, Marcus N.]

Faced with The Truth that – regardless of what sorts of anti-piracy technology it folds into its DS platform – pirates will invariably hack the dual-screened handheld, Nintendo has buddied up with Capcom and 53 other video game publishers in Japan to file suit against four resellers of the popular R4 flash cartridge.

Earlier this year, a Tokyo court banned the sale of the devices; however, Capcom now says that "legal action has had no meaningful effect in the intervening period" and that sellers would "ignore" its warnings. Enter: a new lawsuit, which Capcom hopes leads to a ruling that acknowledges "our company and other software manufactures have sustained [extreme] damages from proliferation of illegal instruments." Seems pretty cut and dry to us, but we'll let the courts decide.

Police officers often employ the aid of criminal informants, a kind of double agent that works behind enemy lines to get all of the dirt on the lowlifes breaking the rules. That's the new strategy for Nintendo and the 54 other companies that have again jointly filed suit in a Tokyo District Court to thwart the sale of devices used by pirates, such as the R4.

Despite winning the initial filing, Japanese retailers still sell the R4 and other flash carts, so Nintendo and (presumably) the same 54 companies have again filed suit. This latest filing aims for damages from those reselling the devices. See, Nintendo and the participating companies sent a letter to these resellers back in February requesting that they cease selling the device, but these resellers failed to comply.

Back to the snitching: Nintendo has opened a consumer website to report offenders and retailers hocking the devices. There, folks can fill out a web form with the appropriate information and submit it direct to Nintendo for follow-up. In exchange from Big N, you ask? You don't really expect freebies for doing the right thing, do you? Also, there's nothing.

[Via Andriasang]

Well, this is just hysterical. Posting on the Batman: Arkham Asylum PC forums, user "Cheshirec_the_cat" complained that Batman's glide wasn't working in a certain section of the game, leading to his death by poisonous gas. Before long, Eidos moderator Keir informed him that he had actually stumbled on an intentional glitch in the game that only affects those who pirated their copy. "It's not a bug in the game's code, it's a bug in your moral code," quipped Keir.

Sure, more unscrupulous members of the gaming community will discover a workaround eventually, but let's just savor the moment, shall we?

[Via MaxConsole]