[casual_games] RE: It's about time!

[Kirby, Neil A (Neil)]

OK, so I'm not a lawyer and Tom is, but I think I still recall basic IP stuff.

What we are really talking about is copyright infringement, no?  

So, a "pixel perfect" copy is clearly infringement.  Even coming close is enough to get you into "need a lawyer and courtroom" territory.  Art, text, and actual code are protected by copyright.  And thank goodness for that, or most of us would never get paid.

But correct me if I'm wrong, basic gameplay isn't copyrightable, is it?  Basic gameplay is a process description, and that can only be patented.  I seriously doubt that is the case here, so let's just say that for all intents and purposes it doesn't apply.

DOOM and Duke Nukem 3D had IDENTICAL gameplay and practically identical internal world representations (2.5 dimensions).  They had very different art, code, and text.  Similar claims can be made for Quake 3/Unreal death match modes.

Basic gameplay is NOT protected unless it's patented.

The actual instantiation of any game IS protected by copyright.

[Trademarked elements are protected by those trademarks. The John Deere Company will sue you and win if you use their color of green on your own brand of lawn gear, and they will sue you and win if you use their color of green with a yellow accent stripe on almost everything else.]

So cloners who clean room their own code and use their own *different* artwork are free to do what they do even if it feels to us like a rip-off.  A game where an electrician is dodging bowling balls might be different enough from a game where a plumber is dodging barrels to be legal, but all of would call it "lame."

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Neil Kirby              +1.614.367.5524        Hope is not a strategy
Lucent Technologies     nak at lucent.com         Prayer is not a process
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