Nintendo Being Sued for Something or Other. May lead to ban on Classic controller sales.

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»Nintendo Being Sued for Something or Other. May lead to ban on Classic controller sales.

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It was already known that Nintendo was on the hook for $21 million in a patent suit over the company's controllers. A Texas judge last week denied the game maker's request for a new trial, and Bloomberg is reporting that the judge will issue a ban to halt sales of the controllers tomorrow.

However, if the ban were to be issued, it would not take effect until after a Nintendo appeal on the original ruling was resolved. Nintendo could also avoid the ban by posting a bond or putting royalties into an escrow account, according to Bloomberg.

The original suit sought to have Nintendo's Wii Classic Controller, Wii Nunchuk, GameCube controller, and GameCube WaveBird all deemed in violation of an Anascape patent for a "six degrees of freedom" interface device. A jury found that all of those products, with the exception of the Wii Nunchuk, infringed on Anascape's patent.

Linky.


I quite easily believe it, as Nintendo was sued a dozen times or so when they first made the Wiimote public. What confuses me, however, is how the Wavebird, Gamecube controller and Classic Controller are what is being sued over. They are not motion controllers, and they do not offer any more than four axis of movement. I don't understand what the company is suing for, as nothing in the Gamecube controller (essentially a redesigned N64 Controller), Classic Controller (an SNES pad with analog sticks added) or even the Wavebird was new when it came out, much less now. Rumours say it is the analog sticks, but if that were the case far more companies would be getting sued. Even more oddly, the Nunchuck was part of the suit but the judge later determined it didn't infringe on the companies patents. Very confusing.

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So who Exactly is suing them?

Some more info: The company that filed the lawsuit is called Anascape. The lawsuit is surrounding analog sensors, tactile feedback in the buttons and rumble.

I didn't do much searching, but I wonder when the filed a patent on this (it was probably after joysticks had force feedback)...

Patents like this are obvious and make our patent system suck.

I disagree. Force feedback alone wasn't the issue at hand in this lawsuit. It was force feedback combined with the other two things, which didn't start showing up until the Dual Shock 2 hit. The fact that Sony licenced the technology throws the arguments saying that the company is just trying to bully Nintendo out the window.

Looks like the company is just sitting on patents just to collect money and not do a thing with them.

I'm gonna buy like 50 classic controllers, put them on my new credit card. If they are banned, sell 'em. If it doesn't happen, return 'em.