[casual_games] RE: It's about time!

[Brian Robbins]

While I'm not a lawyer either, my understanding of IP law is very
similar to Neil's. The biggest issue as far as I see it, in this
particular case is that the developer is creating a confusion in the
marketplace between the original Geometry Wars, and their title Grid
Wars.

As several people have mentioned, this gets into a very tricky legal
grey area. ie, Are the images exactly identical, or do they have
subtle variation? The point that I think we can all see is that the
games are extremely similar. That coupled with the very similar name,
clearly creates a confusion in the marketplace about which is the
original game.

This is something that does appear to me to be a violation of
copyright simply because it is obvious that they tried to copy the
game and title as closely as possible, such that they could benefit
off of the success of the original.

In this instance, I don't think we're even talking about the issue of
clones, and debating whether they are good or bad for the industry
(something that will be debates for centuries to come).

One thing that many people don't realize is that when it comes to
copyrights you are obligated to defend them. If you don't protect your
copyright, you run the risk of having it become public domain. In this
case Bizarre Creations may be going after this game more to protect
their future options for Geometry Wars, than they are to protect their
XBLA sales.

-- 
Brian Robbins
Director of Games, Game Trust
http://www.gametrust.com/
Chair, IGDA Casual Games SIG
http://www.igda.org/casual/