Let’s talk about some ancient history to lay a solid framework of how things developed and to provide proper context for current events.
In 1983, Jordan Weisman saw a series of plastic model giant robots at a toy fair. At that time Jordan was co-owner of a game company called FASA Corporation, which was producing games based on various TV and movie properties, as well as publishing game aids for other successful game properties. These robots (soon to be known as “mecha” to American audiences) came from a variety of Japanese animated series, but Jordan instantly knew that giant robots would shortly be very big in the United States. He subsequently licensed those giant robot images from that model
toy manufacturer, to use the images in a game. FASA published the box set game BattleDroids in 1984, with the name changed to BattleTech upon publication of a second-edition box set in 1985. While those first licensed images formed the bedrock visuals for the initial game, BattleTech quickly began creating original images. In 1986, FASA published Technical Readout:
3025, which included twenty-four licensed images, along with sixty-four original illustrations...
With the convergence of these factors—and with a MechWarrior 2 computer game already in development (which would become a top seller soon after its 1995 debut and which remains on most “top 10 best games of all time” lists)—work began on an animated series in 1993, with thirteen episodes airing in 1994. During that time, FASA Corporation approached Playmates US to produce an accompanying toy line, but they expressed no interest. FASA then approached Tyco, which released a line of BattleTech toys simultaneously with the animated series.
At this point, FASA became aware of a new toy under development by Playmates US that they felt was based directly on an original image created by FASA. Copyright/Trademark law demands that the copyright holder vigorously pursue any apparent violations (or risk losing the copyright/trademark), and so FASA sued Playmates US over this alleged copyright infringement.
After a long, protracted court battle, FASA both won and lost its court case. An interesting, relatively unknown bit of copyright/trademark law says that anyone can slap a trademark on a name or product when they publish it. However, the trademark doesn’t really mean anything until the holder is dragged into court and the judge makes a final ruling one way or another; in other words, most copyright/trademarks are about intimidating companies
from making such infringements. FASA won in one respect: the judge unequivocally stated that FASA owned much of the imagery of the BattleTech universe, in particular the ’Mech image that had caused the case in the first place. Unfortunately, the judge felt that because FASA dealt in the gaming market and the Playmates US toy fell into a different market, FASA failed to prove that Playmates US infringed directly on FASA’s business. Therefore, FASA received no monetary settlement.
In the midst of that case, FASA realized that the original images licensed for the publication of BattleDroids in 1984—images still very much a part of the game universe—left the company open to legal action from other companies currently using those same images. Understandably now legal-shy—having lost years and millions to the lawsuit—FASA decided to remove those images from
any in-print products, and to discontinue the use of those images in the future. While the images were discontinued, their names, their game
statistics and so on—everything but their images—were wholly owned by FASA Corporation. This left FASA with two options. The first involved redrawing all the images to make them unique enough not to cause any legal problems. However, one of the biggest draws of the BattleTech universe (outside of giant robots blowing stuff up on alien worlds, fighting for far future star empires) is its continuity: it represents twenty plus years of artists and writers weaving together a living, breathing, dynamic universe, with each
sourcebook and story building on the events of the past. FASA believed that tossing aside visual continuity would do far more harm than good, and so chose the second option: to simply discontinue the use of the problem images.
This decision allowed players to keep using the game statistics and names of those designs in their own games and at conventions, but the images in question would no longer be featured in published products. (Among the BattleTech community, these images would become known as the “Unseen.”)
-- Randall N. Bills
-- Managing Director
