Steel_Wind
Legend
This topic has been discussed on Board Game Geek and on the Wizkids message boards yesterday and today, but has not as yet been the subject of comment on ENWorld.
While not directly RPG related, it certainly is game and industry related and should be of interest to ENWorlders, generally.
The substance of WotC's press release is as follows:
The patent itself is available for viewing here: http://v3.espacenet.com/textclam?DB=EPODOC&IDX=US2004084842&F=0&QPN=US2004084842
What this all means and the prior art that existed before the patent, (which is one of the things that determines if an idea / process is sufficiently novel to be patentable) is a matter which has yet to be clarified. The USPTO deems it worthy for a patent - but the US PTO relies principally upon other interested parties with a financial stake to challenge patents and litigate the matter before the courts. That is the inherent nature of the patent system.
Clearly, the party whose interests are jeopardized is Topps and its subsidiary Wizkids, who have had some success with the Pirates of the Spanish Main Constructible strategy game. Just as importantly, Wizkids was slated to release a new CSG, the Star Wars Pocket Model CSG next month in June - at more or less the same time as WotC is due to roll out the Transformers CSG by the end of next week.
Given that the Star Wars Pocket Model game competes not only with an existing Star Wars ship miniatures game from WotC, but will also compete against the Transfromers CSG, the odds of a steaming bowl of IP litigation being served by reason of all of this seems more likely than not.
I actually buy and play the Pirates of the Spanish Main CSG with my son and have enjoyed modding the rules and otherwise using these naval miniatures in other games - so this is more than a little aggravating to me.
I have some difficulty accepting that a CSG has been originated by WotC, given the fact the history of games from Steve Jackson, (Pirate Lego Wars) the homebrew Lego Wars from the early 90s - and even back even to Rock Em Sock Em robots, suggests that this does not appear to be all that original a concept.
I'll go further and say that the claimed computer applications of this patent are a pile of hooey and the prior art is so large that the extension of the patent to that area seems a big stretch.
As in most things, the only opinion that matters is ultimately that of the Circuit Court of Appeals'.
We'll see.
While not directly RPG related, it certainly is game and industry related and should be of interest to ENWorlders, generally.
The substance of WotC's press release is as follows:
The patent itself is available for viewing here: http://v3.espacenet.com/textclam?DB=EPODOC&IDX=US2004084842&F=0&QPN=US2004084842
What this all means and the prior art that existed before the patent, (which is one of the things that determines if an idea / process is sufficiently novel to be patentable) is a matter which has yet to be clarified. The USPTO deems it worthy for a patent - but the US PTO relies principally upon other interested parties with a financial stake to challenge patents and litigate the matter before the courts. That is the inherent nature of the patent system.
Clearly, the party whose interests are jeopardized is Topps and its subsidiary Wizkids, who have had some success with the Pirates of the Spanish Main Constructible strategy game. Just as importantly, Wizkids was slated to release a new CSG, the Star Wars Pocket Model CSG next month in June - at more or less the same time as WotC is due to roll out the Transformers CSG by the end of next week.
Given that the Star Wars Pocket Model game competes not only with an existing Star Wars ship miniatures game from WotC, but will also compete against the Transfromers CSG, the odds of a steaming bowl of IP litigation being served by reason of all of this seems more likely than not.
I actually buy and play the Pirates of the Spanish Main CSG with my son and have enjoyed modding the rules and otherwise using these naval miniatures in other games - so this is more than a little aggravating to me.
I have some difficulty accepting that a CSG has been originated by WotC, given the fact the history of games from Steve Jackson, (Pirate Lego Wars) the homebrew Lego Wars from the early 90s - and even back even to Rock Em Sock Em robots, suggests that this does not appear to be all that original a concept.
I'll go further and say that the claimed computer applications of this patent are a pile of hooey and the prior art is so large that the extension of the patent to that area seems a big stretch.
As in most things, the only opinion that matters is ultimately that of the Circuit Court of Appeals'.
We'll see.
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