Sega Sues EA.

[X-Fan]

Video game publisher Sega of America on Thursday sued a division of Fox Entertainment and industry leader Electronic Arts Inc., saying a game based on Fox's well-known "Simpsons" characters infringes a Sega patent.

The suit, filed in San Francisco federal court, named as defendants Fox Filmed Entertainment, a unit of Fox Entertainment Group Inc. (FOX); Fox Interactive, Fox's former games unit that is now controlled by the video game arm of Vivendi Universal; the game's developer Radical Games Ltd.; and Electronic Arts.

Sega of America, a division of Japan's Sega Corp., claims the 2001 video game "Simpsons Road Rage," developed by Radical and Fox Interactive and published by EA, was designed to "deliberately copy and imitate" the Sega game "Crazy Taxi," according to court documents.

Sega holds a U.S. patent, known as the '138 patent, on "Crazy Taxi," in which players take the role of a taxi driver who has to accomplish outrageous driving stunts to pick up passengers and quickly deliver them to their destinations.

Sega cited reviews by video game publications of "Simpsons Road Rage" that said the game was very similar to "Crazy Taxi," including one that characterized "Road Rage" as a "shameless incident of design burglary."

The suit asks the court to stop the sale or import of "Simpsons Road Rage," which has sold more than 1 million copies to date, as well as for damages for lost profits and a recall of any copies of the game available at retail.

source

[DocHoliday78]

Well i dont understand the big deal. That is how things work in life. Someone takes an old idea and spices it up a bit to release a new product. This benefits us the consumers and i dont think sega is gonna win this one.

[X-Fan]

i think what u said is true but still i like the fact that my favorite sports games company sued the company that i totally despise.

[DocHoliday78]

Originally posted by X-Fan
i think what u said is true but still i like the fact that my favorite sports games company sued the company that i totally despise.

Of course, **** EA, ESPN football rapes Madden. Word life

[Hero]

i will have to agree with sega on this one.

[Hard Boiled Cop]

You know what, I hate both sega and EA. EA just sucks and Sega is saying that they're not going to put Outrun 2 on the xbox. So really I don't really care who sues who.

[Variation-XBA]

Stupid reason to sue, but since its against EA... DOWN WITH EA!

[Flood]

i think sega's reasoning for it to be pulled of the shelf is wrong, it shouldnt be allowed to be sold cause its SUCH A HORRIBLE GAME!

[MikeMan91389]

haha... thats like sueing all the football game companies because they copy how the QB hikes the ball

[CarGuy]

In other news: Pepsi sues Coca-Cola....

[StudioAlex]

Road Rage is a blatant rip off, and a horrible one at that. I don't think Sega will win, but I'm surprised they waited so long to initiate the lawsuit. Maybe rockstar will follow suit if Sega prevails. In a perfect world, Fox would've approached Hitmaker to develop Road Rage. We would've had a kickass game that was funny to boot.

[Penfold]

Whats next? Maybe Sega will sue Rockstar because in the GTA 3 and VC, you can do taxi missions. Sega will lose in court, IMHO.

[Yankeez]

though the simpsons game is coo they did kinda copy crazytaxi and i guess we get revenge since we already hate EA somewhat...

[mattgame]

Sega sounds like they are pulling a Benzino........,

[StudioAlex]

I just remembered there is precedence for this. Capcom successfully sued another company for ripping off Street Fighter. Can't remember who it was, though.

Whoops, just googled it. Apparently Capcom was unsuccesful in suing Data East over Fighter's History. I could've sworn they won that one.

'Data East learned a lesson as well. In 1993 it released Fighter's History, hoping to capitalize on the red-hot versus fighting game trend sparked by Capcom's seminal 1991 release, Street Fighter II. The game must have seemed a bit too similar, though, because in 1994 Capcom -- you guessed it -- slapped a copyright infringement suit on Data East. It reasoned that "potential video-game players will be confused about the source of Fighter's History [games], ... and will believe that they are CAPCOM Street Fighter games." Capcom's counsel must have been feeling saucy that day because it even tried to lay claim to "the distinctive appearance of the Street Fighter II cabinet, including, but not limited to, the physical layout of the two eight-position joysticks and six-button control panels. ..." '

[Kronicle]

Next thing you'll here is Pacman suing Kirby for stealing his ideas...

[Trento52]

i don't think that crazy taxi is doing as good as it use to be but they won't win. This sounds kinda stupid but i want ea to lose something because i wasted 70 bucks on a crap ass game of theres.

[FuNkY mOnK]

I'll have to start buying a boat load of simpson road rage and sell them on ebay as last time collectables.$Cha-Ching$

[xbox genius]

lol haha thats funny, go sega, EA you suck.

but i still think its kinda stupid.... people copying people... blah blah blah, sue here , sue there. America is just a place of people sueing each other.... sheesh thats one of the bad characteristics i'm not proud of as an american

[DocHoliday78]

Flood thats a nice way of putting it.