Upcoming RPG Patent Troll?

[phavoc]

I ran across this information this evening regarding a company called Universal Horizons that has filed a patent with the US Patent office about RPG gaming. The company claims they are only trying to protect their intellectual property, but their patent request seems to indicate they are trying to patent a concept that has already been in use for a while. I've never heard of anyone patenting a game system (and in some places you legally cannot). The US patent office has had some real big swings and misses in the past and something like this potentially threatens to put a damper on the RPG industry until it could get sorted out in the courts.

You can read more about this here: http://www.bedroomwallpress.com/

You can also find the companies FB page and some horribly obtuse official responses to specific questions here: https://www.facebook.com/pages/Universal-Horizons/556806171033910

 

[DivineWrath]

This might be an over reaction. The basic concept of patents is it help create new ideas, not steal existing ones. Patents allow creator of ideas to control who gets to use their ideas. This allows creators to create new content without fear that their ideas will get stolen after they show it to the world. This allows creator of ideas to dictate how they can try to make money on their ideas, thus encouraging people to become creator of ideas.

There are many rules to prevent abuse, like when patents expire and minimum amount of documentation required. These help to prevent stagnation, maximize utility of patented idea once the patent expires, and to help prove they did create something new and original.

 

[sideranautae]

The RPG patent thing is going nowhere.

 

[MongooseMatt]

The RPG patent thing is going nowhere.

I think you are probably right.

 

[sideranautae]

The RPG patent thing is going nowhere.

I think you are probably right.

I have successfully gotten a few patents through for companies I've worked for. This attempt may even get the atty's in trouble with a judge for wasting the Court's time. It is that bad of an attempt.

Also see very recent landmark decision from SCotUS about s/w patents that hinges on denying over them being nothing but an "abstract idea"..

 

[phavoc]

I do certainly hope it gets struck down. SCOTUS recently swatted down another software patent, but there's been an issue over the last few years where the Federal Circuit Court has continually upheld patents that SCOTUS strikes down and sets precedents for them NOT being upheld.

From what I understand it didn't pass muster the first time around, but that doesn't mean it's dead. I do hope it DOES get killed, however, as it seems to be so damn ambiguous - which is the real danger. IF they get it approved then they CAN become a troll. Which will cost the industry time and money till it all gets sorted out. Greenmail works on many scales, and sometimes it's quite profitable simply because it's cheaper to pay them off and make them go away.

 

[phavoc]

For those who were overly dismissive about the potential for issues related to the RPG patent application, I give you this - the very real patent trolling over the symbol of Pi.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-h-bailey/can-pi-be-trademarked_b_5513392.html?utm_hp_ref=business&ir=Business

It turns out that a guy trademarked the symbol Pi, with a period following it. Pi itself is a mathematical construct and as such cannot be trademarked or patented. But this guy did an end-run by adding the period. He then approached a company that sold math novelty items with the symbol of just Pi and essentially tried to greenmail them. Here is the relevant section of the article:

To underscore that he means business, Ingrisano, through his lawyer, Ronald Millet, sent a letter to Zazzle.com, a Pi novelty company, demanding that they "mmediately cease and desist" their "unlawful" usage of the Pi trademark or "any confusingly similar trademark," and, within 14 days:

He didn't own the Pi trademark but he's trying to leverage the "confusingly similar" part of the law into legal blackmail. Thus far I haven't heard of any settlement yet.

So it just goes to illustrate that things like the patent request put forth by Horizon needs to be shot down before they get it. It's potentially bad news for the gaming industry.

 

[Prime_Evil]

The patent in question can be found here:

http://appft1.uspto.gov/netacgi/nph...rchnum.html&r=1&f=G&l=50&s1=20140038722.PGNR.

It looks like it is aimed specifically at mutli-genre games as it specifically tagets processes designed to transfer a character from one genre or 'virtual setting' to another. Games such as such as GURPS or the Hero System might be affected by it. It specifically covers cases where the "correlations to create the new virtual entity [in the new setting are] independent of a player selection or input" - at a stretch this could cover any situation in Traveller where the rules state what occurs when you use skills at a different tech level to your native one or where you travel to a planet with different environmental characteristics to your homeworld. The patent only covers the application of numerical modifiers in therse situations though.

Overall, this looks like a fairly broad business process patent that will cover both tabletop and computer games. However, I can't see that it embodies any new invention that is not obvious to those familiar with the prior art in the RPG industry. The language in the patent application obfuscates the nature of the claim and makes it sound like a software patent rather than a generic patent on game mechanics.

A representative of Universal Horizons recently posted the following clarification on their Facebook page:

The patent issue: I will respond, but will continue to delete negative, derogatory, or flaming comments. This is our FB page. We cannot shut down anyone's favorite game or redefining water as was earlier suggested. The sky is not falling, designers are free to create very dynamic RPGs and systems. Please read and understand:

We are a small company that invented a very specific process for shifting characters through genres, and we want to protect it using a patent. We consulted a lawyer who confirmed the same and encouraged a process patent. We want to protect the process we invented.

Many are commenting on the abstract that uses abstract language. The details of a patent are referred to within the cited definitions and the main book. This does not affect any previous publications or any other future publications that do not copy our process.

Someone then asked how is their process to translate characters from one genre to another new, different, and unique to that used in previous RPGs. A representative from U.niversal Horizons replied:

TY for asking! Our process uses character skills that are defined by genre characteristics from an origin genre to a target genre. The process alters the skills by applying a correspondence that compares the two genre's characteristics and creates a mapping. Each skill has three classifications, each genre has ten...most (RPGs) transfer (Characters) directly from one game to the other with no process. Any character that moves from one system to another without a process cannot be patented. This covers the majority of genre-shifting systems.

One commentator noted that a number of games provide specific correlations, and in some cases mathematical formula, for converting stats and skills from one setting or game system to another.

Another respondent asks:

Can you tell me how your Patent doesn't infringe on the works of Bioware, specifically their system for bringing Characters from Mass Effect to Mass Effect Two, which asks the user to move over a virtual entity from one system to a different system, which contains different systems, that maintains the identity of the previous work, along with the information relevant to that character, and that system, which is transfered again when you move to Mass Effect 3.

Unfortunately I think its likely that this patent will be granted and it then remains to be seen what Universal Horizons will do with it...