Category: IP

News: Interplay vs Bethesda (Part 2)

We previously blogged about Interplay’s lawsuit against Bethesda regarding the Fallout series of games.  Now read on for another update in the ongoing litigation…

To recap, Interplay sold the Fallout IP to Bethesda in 2007 having retained certain rights, including the rights to develop a Fallout MMO.  Bethesda has now commenced this (US) lawsuit arguing that Interplay is in breach of that agreement and has infringed Bethesdra’s trademark rights in the Fallout series.  In particular, it seems that Bethesda is angry that Interplay sold the Fallout 1 and 2 games and expansions as a ‘Fallout trilogy’ at around the same time that Bethesda released Fallout 3.

The position now seems to be (courtesy of Game Politics) that Interplay has counterclaimed for Bethesda’s repudiatory breach of their agreement, apparently to the extent of claiming that the Fallout IP has reverted to Interplay and Bethesda now sub-licences the IP from Interplay (a complete reversal of the current position). 

It’s worth taking all of this with a heavy dose of salt since (as far as we are aware) the relevant court documents have not yet been published on the net and therefore there is no way of being sure of the accuracy of any of this (unless one of Interplay or Bethesda make a press statement on this anytime soon).

That said, defending an action against you for breach of an agreement by counterclaiming yourself for breach of the same agreement is a standard litigation tactic, which it seems clear Interplay has decided to adopt in this case.  Of course, the devil is in the detail: in order to substantiate a claim for breach of contract Interplay’s lawyers will need to set out in detail how the contract operated and exactly which provisions of that contract have been breached by Bethesda. 

Of course, the main question from all this is what will eventually happen to the Fallout IP.  If Game Politic’s report is accurate, then Interplay is not just arguing for damages for breach of contract, but a version of the Fallout IP back to it in some way – which is by no means impossible in theory, but it will be interesting to see how they play that argument out.  Keep watching this space…

News: Interplay vs Bethesda

Bethesda has commenced Court proceedings in the USA against Interplay over the Fallout series of games (story first covered by Gamasutra). 

The facts seems to be: Interplay sold the Fallout IP to Bethesda in 2007, as part of which they agreed that Interplay would retain certain license rights, including the right to develop a Fallout MMO.  Bethesda now alleges that Interplay is in breach of that agreement and has infringed Bethesdra’s trademark rights in the Fallout series.

So, a straightforward piece of commercial and IP litigation then, which is likely to be of interest to the industry, given Bethesda’s current (and Interplay’s historic) importance as publishers, but also of interest to gamers at large for the impact it may have on Fallout itself.  In particular, if this case continues there will eventually have to be disclosure about what exactly Interplay has been doing (or should have been doing) with the Fallout MMO.

In the meantime, a spirited discussion is fully underway at Gamasutra.  One really very interesting point which has already emerged from that discussion is the potential PR impact of all this – does this claim risk Bethesda alienating its customerbase, even if legally the Court eventually rules in its favour?  This is of course always an issue when a high-profile company decides whether to bring high-profile litigation and no doubt Bethesda will have carefully weighed up its option before deciding to act.  Either way, we will be keeping an eye on this one…