Macaroni and cheese. Siskel and Ebert. Nintendo and litigation. Some things just go together. From the late 80s on, they have racked up quite a record of lawsuits. Here, we present a list of Nintendo's lawsuits over the years.
1983
MCA Vs. Nintendo
Case: Nintendo is sued by MCA (the motion picture company) for allegedly copyright infringement, over the title of Nintendo's then-new hit game, "Donkey Kong", claiming that the name was too similar to MCA's "King Kong".
Outcome:The case was dismissed, with the judge citing that the term "kong" was generic and that MCA had no claim to it.
1987-1991(?)
Nintendo Vs. Blockbuster Entertainment
Case: Nintendo sues the Blockbuster video rental chain for photocopying NES manuals. These photocopies of the manuals were then rented out with the NES games, obviously so the original manuals were not at risk of being lost or damaged when they were rented.
Outcome: Nintendo legally forces them to stop photocopying the manuals. I assume Blockbuster then included original copies of instruction manuals with game rentals. Can you say... "lame"?
1988
Nintendo Vs. Camerica Ltd.
Case: Nintendo claims Camerica, in making a wireless NES Advantage clone, violates their patents.
Outcome: unknown
1989
Nintendo Vs. Camerica Ltd.
Case: Nintendo claims Camerica violated their patents in creating the Game Genie for the NES.
Outcome: Game Genie release is delayed for 2 years in the US (the Game Genie was successfully released in Canada a year before the US).
1989
Nintendo Vs. Tengen
Case: Nintendo sues Tengen over patent violations, because Tengen, in order to bypass the licensee lock-out chip, they simply copied the 10NES program which is in the US CIC lockout chip. They gained the info needed when they were a Nintendo licensee, and using this fact to trick the US Patent Office into allowing them to access the needed data. Outcome: Nintendo was unable to stop Tengen, and dropped the suit or something, for reasons I am not sure of.
1989
Nintendo Vs. Tengen
Case: Nintendo sues Tengen in the now famous case concerning who had the legal right to sell Tetris. Nintendo proved they had gotten the license from the original Russian creator, and that Tengen licensed it from a European company who didn't have the right to issue licenses, because they didn't own the game; they just licensed it themselves.
Outcome: All copies of Tengen Tetris are pulled from store shelves, creating an instant collector's item.
1990
Nintendo Vs. Color Dreams
Case: Nintendo sues Color Dreams for producing NES games without an official license.
Outcome: Unsure, but Nintendo failed in their suit, and Color Dreams continued to produce unlicensed games. Nintendo probably failed, because unlike Tengen, Color Dreams did not copy their 10NES program, which is inside each lockout chip, to get around the lockout, and therefore did not violate any of Nintendo's copyrights or patents.
1991
New York State Vs. Nintendo
Case:Then-New York State Attorney General (I can't remember his name) sues Nintendo, claiming they have an illegal monopoly on the video game market.
Outcome: Nintendo agrees to give each Nintendo consumer a $5.00 certificate good on any licensed NES game; if you subscribed to Nintendo Power, or sent in a product registration card for your NES or game to Nintendo, you probably got one.
1994
Alpex Computer Corp. Vs. Nintendo
Case: Nintendo is sued by Alpex, claiming the NES infringed on their patents. (This may have been for the newer style NES, I don't know for sure). Nintendo's tactics for this case really shine, like a firebug's ass. They demanded a jury to hear the case, then when the jury ruled against them they demanded a mistrial, on the grounds that allowing a jury to settle a patent dispute was unconstitutional! My source is the actual transcripts that are unfortunately no longer available on the web where I read them. Maybe somebody else has posted it elsewhere? (Thanks to zerothis@northcoast.com for this info)
Outcome: Nintendo paid Alpex $208 million in damages
1995
Nintendo Vs. Samsung Electronics
Case: Nintendo alleges Samsung helped spread various components containing Nintendo software to third party companies, which produced illegal counterfeit cartridges. In other words, they gave Nintendo's games to pirate outfits to produce pirated games, including one owned by the Chinese government; not a surprise, considering they are one of the world's leading pirate cart producers.
Outcome:Eventually Nintendo and Samsung settled their differences, siting that while Samsung provided the components, they were not directly responsible for the piracy, and they announced they would work together to stop piracy.
1997
Nintendo Vs. Games City
Case: Nintendo sued Games City for selling Game Doctor (SNES backup device) and Doctor V64 (N64 backup device), as well as CDs of pirated Nintendo software. In June, Nintendo got an injunction against Games City from selling and advertising those controversial items.
Outcome: On October 25th 1997 Games City agreed to pay Nintendo $100,000 and to stop selling any devices or software that violate Nintendo copyrights and patents.
1997
Nintendo Vs. Prima Publishing
Case: Nintendo sued Prima Publishing for allegedly copying a screenshot map of the N64 game "Goldeneye" from Nintendo's own official player's guide of the game and using it in Prima's own unofficial guide. According to a former employee of Prima, the map was very convincingly a copy of Nintendo's own map. There had been some level of tension between Nintendo and Prima since the beginning of the SNES era, over copyright and trademark issues, this was, reportedly, the boiling point which resulted in Nintendo taking Prima to court.
Outcome: The judge dismissed the case, stating the map was "public knowledge" and Nintendo had no case against them (?). But here is the real shocker, Prima and Nintendo resolved their differences shortly after, and Prima is now authorized to make official player's guides, such as their recent Pokemon player's guide!
1999 (New!)
Nintendo Vs. Bung Enterprises Ltd.
Case: Nintendo sued Bung Enterprises, of Hong Kong, alleging that their backup devices for the Game Boy, SNES and N64 violated Nintendo's copyright.
Outcome: Nintendo got an injunction against Bung, and they cannot sell nor advertise any of their Nintendo game copier/backup devices in the US
Sources for some of the lawsuits: tsr's NES archive, NES World, EGM2 #9, Zerothis
2000 (New!)
Ali Geller Vs. Nintendo
Case: Famous spoon bending psychic Ali Geller sues Nintendo of Japan, of America and of Europe. He alleges that the psychic, utensil armed bad guy Pokemon character Kadabra, is his image and likeness, and filed claim for a whopping $100 million!. Perhaps this guy needs to get a life, or at least a real job?
Outcome: Unknown, this is a very recent suit. I suspect it will be thrown out tho
Source:
- Code: Select all
http://web.archive.org/web/20021005010047/http://www.gamersgraveyard.com/repository/oddities/nintendosuits.html
