No Doubt says in a statement that the band “agreed to place avatars containing their name and likeness performing three No Doubt songs” but that Band Hero allows their use in more than 60 other songs, all without the group’s knowledge or approval.

Furthermore, individual band members can be “isolated into solo performances of these cover songs and placed randomly in countless variations”.

According to No Doubt’s claim, that goes against the contract it signed with Activision granting its likeness in Band Hero. It also contends that Activision refused to change the band’s appearance beyond the agreed songs, saying that catering to No Doubt’s request would be “too expensive”.

The publisher of Band Hero raised the ire of Kurt Cobain’s widow Courtney Love — as well as former Nirvana members Dave Grohl and Krist Novoselic — for the singer’s inclusion in Guitar Hero 5. In that game, the late Cobain could be used in non-Nirvana songs, performing any instrument, resulting in hastily Twittered fury from Love.

No Doubt is seeking an injunction and damages in the suit. We’ve contacted Activision to get their side of the story and will update with comment, should they provide any.

John Kennedy filed his complaint against Sony Computer Entertainment America on October 3 in, where else, federal court for the Northern District of California. That would be San Francisco.

The suit’s complaint mentions two things: one, “that as a general rule, Sony ‘encourages’ PS3 owners to install the latest version of system software, Sony required users to install the Firmware 3.0 update”, and two: a Sony forum featured enough complaints about the Firmware causing console failures that Sony responded with a firmware FAQ.

At this point we put on our hushed baritone court-reporter fine-print voice: Class members demand declaratory relief, compensation and restitution for breach of implied warranty, negligence and unjust enrichment.

Firmware Update Borks PS3, Man Sues SCEA [Game Politics]

The company, Paltalk Holdings Inc., has successfully settled claims against Microsoft, alleging it infringed the same patents in Halo. The technology in question concerns how multiple players in different locations still see the same events—explosions, monsters, etc.—in real time.

Paltalk bought the patents in 2002, and allege that Turbine and other companies are infringing them. The suit’s been filed in federal court for the Eastern District of Texas, which is known as a plaintiff-friendly venue for such litigation. Microsoft’s settlement, back in March, certainly makes it harder to deny the validity of Paltalk’s claim.

In addition to Turbine, Sony (Everquest) and Blizzard (World of Warcraft), NCSoft (Guild Wars) and Jagex (Runescape) are also named as defendants.

Westwood-Based Video Game Maker Named in Patent Infringement Suit [The Boston Globe]

The publisher has faced nearly a half-dozen other lawsuits dating back to 2005 over everything from alleged fiduciary mishandling to refusing to sell the company to Electronic Arts, to the company’s purported connection to the triple homicide of Alabama police officers in 2005.

Here’s a break down and where all of the cases stand:

Strickland et al. Personal Injury Action
On June 7, 2003, Devin Moore grabbed a gun while being processed by the Fayette, Alabama police department, and shot two police officers and a dispatcher to death.

When he was captured about four hours later he told police that “life is a video game, everybody has to die sometime”.

He was convicted in 2005 and sentenced to death by lethal injection. In February 2005 attorneys for the three victims filed a suit against Take-Two, Sony Computer Entertainment America Inc., Sony Corporation of America, Wal-Mart, GameStop and Devin Moore, alleging under Alabama’s manufacturers’ liability and wrongful death statutes, that Grand Theft Auto resulted in “copycat violence” that caused the deaths of the three. The suit seeks damages against all of the defendants in excess of $US600,000.

On July 29, 2009, the court granted summary judgement to Take-Two. One of the plaintiffs filed an appeal on August 10, 2009 which has not be ruled on yet.

Consumer Class Action and City of Los Angeles Litigation-Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas
In July 2005, Take-Two received four complaints for class actions, which were consolidated in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York (the “SDNY Court”).

In the complaints, the plaintiffs say they bought copies of Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and accuse Take-Two of engaging in consumer deception and false advertising because publisher failed to disclose that San Andreas had hidden sex scenes in it.

In January 2006, the City Attorney for the City of Los Angeles filed a complaint in the Superior Court of California, alleging violations of California law for the same reasons. That was later consolidated with the consumer class action.

In December 2007, the court preliminarily approved a settlement of the consumer class action, but in July 2008 the court refused to certify the proposed settlement class. The plaintiffs filed an appeal April 15, 2009. The appeal is now pending.

St. Clair Derivative Action
In January 2006, the St. Clair Shores General Employees Retirement System filed a class and derivative action complaint in the court against Take-Two and some of their former officers and current and former directors.

The suit alleged that the defendants breached their fiduciary duty by selling their stock while in possession of certain material non-public information and that the company failed to disclose material facts in their 2003, 2004 and 2005 proxy statements. The plaintiff seeks the return of all profits from the alleged insider trading conducted by the individual defendants who sold Take-Two stock, unspecified compensatory damages with interest and its costs in the action.

In 2008, the court dismissed all claims, but didn’t rule out monetary damages, instead inviting briefs from the defendants. In October 2008, the defendants sought to have the remaining claims against them dismissed. The briefing on that was wrapped up in January 2009, but no decision has been made.

Securities Class Action-Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and Option Backdating
In February and March 2006, four class action complaints were filed against Take-Two and former and current officers and directors over the hidden content in Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and the backdating of stock options.

In April 2008, the court dismissed, with leave to amend, all claims as to all defendants relating to Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas and certain claims against Take-Two’s former CEO, CFO and certain director defendants relating to the backdating of stock options.

In September 2008, the lead plaintiff filed a third amended consolidated complaint seeking to reinstate these claims. On August 31, 2009, Take-Two entered into a memorandum of understanding with the lead plaintiffs to comprehensively settle all claims asserted by them against them, Rockstar Games and all of the current and former officers and directors named in the actions.

Under the terms of the proposed settlement, Take-Two will pay $US20,115,000 into a settlement fund for the benefit of class members, $US15,200,000 of which will be paid by their insurance carriers and the balance of $US4,915,000 was previously accrued for in their financial statements over several quarters ended April 30, 2009.

In addition to the payment to the settlement fund, Take-Two also agreed to supplement the substantial changes that the publisher has already implemented in their corporate governance policies and practices. The proposed settlement is subject to the completion of final documentation and preliminary and final approval by the court.

Derivative Action-Option Backdating
In July and August 2006, shareholders Richard Lasky and Raeda Karadsheh filed actions against Take-Two over the company’s historical stock option granting practices, alleging violations of federal and state law, including breaches of fiduciary duties, abuse of control, gross mismanagement, waste of corporate assets, and unjust enrichment.

On April 21, 2009, the court dismissed all claims against all named defendants except Ryan A. Brant, James David, Larry Muller, and Kelly G. Sumner, and assigning those remaining claims to the company as the sole party plaintiff.

On June 15, 2009, the former shareholder plaintiffs applied for the entry of final judgement in order to permit the immediate appeal of the court’s April 21, 2009 order dismissing certain defendants and terminating the former shareholder plaintiffs from consolidated action. The shareholder plaintiffs’ request for the entry of judgment is pending before the Court.

Stockholder Actions
In March 2008, Patrick Solomon, a stockholder, filed a purported class action complaint against Take-Two and certain of their officers and directors alleging that they breached their fiduciary duties by, among other things, allegedly refusing to explore premium offers by Electronic Arts Inc.to buy the company.

After certain voluntary actions were taken by the Company, the plaintiff agreed to withdraw his motion for preliminary injunctive relief, but on December 19, 2008, the plaintiff filed a supplement to his complaint repeating his allegations.

On April 3, 2009, Take-Two entered into a settlement in principle of the plaintiff’s complaint and both supplements, subject to approval by the Delaware Court. The Court approved the settlement on June 18, 2009.

The settlement provided, among other things, for additional disclosure which was contained in a supplement to the Company’s proxy statement. The settlement did not provide for a payment of monetary damages to the plaintiff or the purported class. The application by the plaintiff’s counsel for fees and expenses was granted by the court. Take-Two says that the suit was without merit, but that they settled to “save the time and expense of continued litigation”.

In April 2008, St. Clair Shores General Employees Retirement System, a stockholder, filed a purported derivative action against Take-Two’s directors and ZelnickMedia alleging the same things Solomon did. The suit also contained an additional complaint about the “poison pill” adopted by Take-Two’s board in March 2008, and an additional claim against ZelnickMedia for aiding and abetting the directors’ alleged breach of fiduciary duty.

Because the action was duplicative, the plaintiff agreed to stay all proceedings in the case in favour of the Solomon case. The resolution of the Solomon matter resulted in the resolution of this matter, which was voluntarily dismissed by stipulated order on August 3, 2009, without the payment of any costs or expenses. Also in April 2008, Michael Maulano, an alleged stockholder, filed a purported class action in New York Supreme Court, New York County, against Take-Two . The resolution of the Solomon matter resulted in the resolution of this matter, which was voluntarily dismissed by stipulated order on July 16, 2009, without the payment of any costs or expenses.

[Pic]

The class action will be dismissed in exchange for an aggregate payment of $US20,115,000 into a settlement fund for the benefit of class members, of which $US15,200,000 will be paid by Take-Two’s insurance carriers, and $US4,915,000 will be paid by Take-Two.

“We are pleased to have reached this settlement, which represents another important step forward for the Company,” said Strauss Zelnick, Chairman of Take-Two.

Daniel Chabot, described as a bishop in the Church of Raël, runs an employee-coaching firm in Quebec. He claimed that when Ubisoft Montreal found out he worships UFOs, they ended the training program he was conducting for them.

A Quebec judge threw out his lawsuit, which only sought $US10,000. Lord, those Canadians are temperate people. Down here it would have been for several million. And it would have gotten tossed, too.

You might remember the Raëlians, who aside from the whole UFO-religion kookiness were at least on the ball to pick the week between Christmas and New Year’s, the slowest news cycle of the year, to fool mainstream journalists with their claim they’d cloned a human. The announcement was later declared a hoax.

Court Rejects Lawsuit by Raëlian Church Bishop Against Ubisoft [Montreal Gazette via GamePolitics]

Rock Band developer Harmonix is turning the legal tables on Konami, slapping the publisher-developer with a lawsuit of its own. No, not for pain and suffering caused by Rock Revolution, but for patent infringement.

Why does this sound eerily familiar? You may recall that Konami, who also developed the rhythm game Guitar Freaks for Japan, hit Harmonix with a suit last summer. That suit claimed that Rock Band violates a pair of patents Konami obtained in 2002 and 2003, which relate to “simulated musical instruments, a music-game system and a musical-rhythm matching game.”

Now it’s Harmonix’s turn to sue.

The Boston based developer, which is owned by MTV Games, claims Konami is violating its own patent for game controllers that simulate musical instruments, one that Harmonix claims is an improvement of earlier video game controllers that simulate musical instruments. The Harmonix patent actually cites Konami’s other rhythm game Beatmania as an example of a control system that has been improved upon.

Harmonix’s suit, much like Konami’s, is seeking cash and a motion to stop the Rock Revolution publisher from selling its plastic instruments. We’d think the game buying public has done a pretty respectable job of doing the latter due to lack of interest.

Viacom’s Harmonix Sues Konami Over ‘Rock Revolution’ [Bloomberg]

Pentavision! Who’s that? Why, the Korean developer of the DJ Max and DJ Max Portable series of rhythm games, of course! At issue was that Pentavision made a music game without Konami’s permission.

To be fair, Konami’s actually claiming patent infringement and intellectual property rights infringement, or as close to it as we can gather. Konami of Korea issued a statement about the lawsuit earlier today, so we’re trusting Google Translate to guide us through Korean legalese.

Konami looks to have filed the lawsuit in the Seoul Central District Court yesterday, seeking damages and to prohibit Pentavision from selling offending products.

Konami filed suit against Harmonix, MTV and Viacom earlier this year over patents it alleges were violated by Rock Band.

We’ve contacted Konami for comment and will update when we hear more.

음악 시뮬레이션 게임 “DJ MAX 시리즈”에 대한 특허침해소송 제기의 건 [Konami Korea - thanks, Riyu!]

Even though Rockstar conceded that its Pig Pen was somewhat modeled on the real life PlayPen — I assume both are located in strip malls in really bad parts of town — the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals said there’s not enough for an infringement claim. And it did so in an opinion that took every opportunity at snark. How dare they! Are they jurists or bloggers? Writes Judge Diarmuid F. O’Scannlain (note to self: New Warcraft name):

“Both ‘San Andreas’ and the PlayPen offer a form of lowbrow entertainment; besides the general similarity, they have nothing in common. The ‘San Andreas’ game is not complementary to the PlayPen; video games and strip clubs do not go together like a horse and carriage or, perish the thought, love and marriage.”

I hope he was popping his suspenders with a spinning bowtie when he wrote that.

PlayPen lawyer-mans Ken RosenbergRobert F. Helfing wasn’t happy with the outcome.

“This ruling now permits people who create artistic works that purport to convey the look and feel of a particular geographic location to use any trademark that appears on any building in that location in the name of art. When you use a trademark or logo of an existing business, as was done in our case, you create the impression that our client is somehow associated with the game, which is not the case.”

Helfing hasn’t discussed the possibility of an appeal, but that would naturally be to the U.S. Supreme Court. I’d love it if they granted cert for this. Jack Thompson would shit an exact replica of himself.

It claims the offending box art for Activision’s SCORE International Baja 1000: The Official Game is “likely to confuse, cause mistake or deceive the public as to the existence of an affiliation, connection, or association between THQ and Activision, when in fact there is none.”

THQ also notes in the lawsuit that it has spent “in excess of $US1 million on advertising, marketing, and promotion for the THQ game” and that it publicly released the cover art for Baja: Edge of Control “more than four months ago.”

The publisher says that it didn’t blindside Activision with its lawsuit, having contacted Activision on October 8th about its “concerns” about the packaging. The lawsuit specifies that THQ has attempted multiple times to “convince Activision to stop production of its packaging art voluntarily” something that Activision has refused to do.

A copy of the suit can be read at Patent Arcade.

New Case: THQ v. Activision Blizzard [Patent Arcade]