Nintendo Patents Insanity

theodp writes "Nintendo scored a patent Tuesday for a Sanity system for video game, which covers causing a game character to hallucinate - e.g., see bleeding walls and hear maniacal laughter - as its sanity decreases in response to encountering a creature or gruesome situation."

Comments

Call of Cthulhu ?

[morcego]

I wonder of the writers/copyright holders of Call of Cthulhu would say to that.

Re:Call of Cthulhu ?

[EasyTarget]

I wonder of the writers/copyright holders of Call of Cthulhu would say to that.

"Prior Art"

I hope.

Re:Call of Cthulhu ?

[lilmouse]

Actually, "Prior Art" would only work if they already had a video game with weird effects. However, that bit about a nontrivial innovation would apply. If you play CoC, and make a video game out of it, then the idea of measuring sanity doesn't take a whole lot to come up with. "Gee, there's already this thing called 'sanity' in CoC...I'd better put that in the video game too!" In that sense, you could fight the patent.

--LWM

Re:Call of Cthulhu ?

[RailGunner]

So would ASC Games, makers of Sanitarium.

Sierra On-Line has prior art, as well: Phantasmagoria II had a main character who hallucinated and saw the walls bleed as he descended into madness.

Further proof software patents are stupid.

Re:Call of Cthulhu ?

[sesshomaru]

Well, there is the old game from Infocom, The Lurking Horror, which was more of a knockoff of Call of Cthuhlu, they didn't actually get the license. The other problem is that it didn't have a Sanity system.

Of course, while I don't remember hallucinations in that game, there were hallucinations if you wandered aimlessly through the desert in Infidel, another Infocom game.

Illbleed for the Dreamcast had something sort of like a sanity system, in that your mental state was affected by the horrors you witnessed, and could lead to a heart attack.

Maybe Nintendo was afraid of what happened with SEGA's Crazy Taxi where a Simpson's licensed Crazy Taxi-like game was released by another company (Simpson's Road Rage). (Not that this excuses this kind of patent, of course.)

Re:Call of Cthulhu ?

[wo1verin3]

What about the dream scenes in Max Payne? The player relived the murder of his wife and child with erie music and moving walls/floors....

Re:Call of Cthulhu ?

[default luser]

But this patent isn't like a poison or drug effect, it was filed in response to Eternal Darkness.

This game is UNIQUE. You have a sanity meter, and as it goes down your character starts hallucinating. You bring the meter back up by killing enemies, and thus regaining your confidence. Sometimes, the hallucination was obvious, designed to make you laugh (walls bleeding, walking on the celing, strange noises, etc).

But some instances were devilishly clever. One time, I was playing late at night, with the lights off. Suddenly, the sound cuts out and I see a big pixelated "MUTE" on the screen.

I start looking around in the dark, trying to see if my stupid ass had rolled over the remote, when the sound suddenly cut in and my character screamed "WHAT IS GOING ON!". Freaked me out.

It doesn't matter that the "MUTE" didn't look quite like my TV's overlay, at that point I was too into the game to think that out. Best trick ever pulled on a player. Why is this unique? The nastier tricks were rare, and never repeated (something you can't say for, say, status ailment effects, which are usually the same, or predictable).

Other nasty tricks that only happened once:

Hallucinating and seeing additional ghouls in an area I'd already cleared, with them appearing right behind me.

Hallucinating that I'd blown my head off trying to reload a flintlock pistol. Thought I'd have to restart the whole battle until the hallucination ended.

Re:Call of Cthulhu ?

[Aeiri]

It doesn't matter that the "MUTE" didn't look quite like my TV's overlay, at that point I was too into the game to think that out. Best trick ever pulled on a player. Why is this unique? The nastier tricks were rare, and never repeated (something you can't say for, say, status ailment effects, which are usually the same, or predictable).

I still don't understand when people say these things, I played Eternal Darkness and not only was I killing too many enemies to possibly get my meter down, but even once it did get down I never had any "nasty" tricks pulled. That's the REASON I played the game, I thought it was going to be a bunch of nasty tricks put together, but it turned into a boring game.

Also, putting "MUTE" on the screen wasn't the nastiest or best trick ever pulled. In MGS2 (I didn't really enjoy this game, I just got really bored and ended up playing through it), at the end, you enter this big room and a bunch of enemies rush at you from all directions. I was fighting, fighting, fighting, then all the sudden it executed the "MISSION FAILED" stuff, same music, same screen, everything, but in the top left hand corner the game was still going on instead of zooming in on you.

When I heard the music and saw the screen come up I threw the controller across the room and refreshed a page on here (slashdot). Glanced at the screen again and noticed instead of "MISSION FAILED" it said "FISSION MAILED". I was utterly confused for a good 10 seconds, then I noticed the screen in the corner, I picked up the controller, moved left, moved right, and hurried to kill the people that were attacking me for the last 20-30 seconds.

That was the best trick ever pulled, and I would like a game made SOLELY for these purposes, Eternal Darkness didn't have enough apparently, since I never saw one in the 8 or so hours I played it.

Re:Call of Cthulhu ?

[Chris Burke]

I still don't understand when people say these things, I played Eternal Darkness and not only was I killing too many enemies to possibly get my meter down, but even once it did get down I never had any "nasty" tricks pulled. That's the REASON I played the game, I thought it was going to be a bunch of nasty tricks put together, but it turned into a boring game.

You basically had to deliberately allow your sanity meter to go down and not recover it beyond killing enemies. Picking the green idol at the beginning makes this easier, since the green enemies do more sanity damage. You had to be careful then, though, because strong enemies would do a lot of sanity damage and you would eventually take health damage instead.

I let my sanity ride at about 0 most of the time, because I really liked the creepy sound effects, bleeding walls, skewed angles, and the occasional funny trick. But in general I agree that the idea was very underused. Mainly because very few of the sanity effects actually affected the game. Either it was something completely ignorable, like bleeding walls, or a "hallucination" that would end and warp you back one room with no harm done.

Also, putting "MUTE" on the screen wasn't the nastiest or best trick ever pulled... instead of "MISSION FAILED" it said "FISSION MAILED".

Cute. Actually the MUTE thing wasn't the best trick in ED by far, especially because it was obvious it wasn't for my TV. Some better tricks (on the player) in order of increasing freakiness:

Room full of zombies start beating the snot out of you and an authentic replica of the game's "Controller not found please check your connection" dialogue appears.

You access the save menu, and suddenly a progress meter appears saying "deleting..." as you watch your save games vanish.

And the best: You finish a mission and return to the "hub" level of the mansion, and suddenly a screen appears: "Thank you for playing Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem. Continue the battle against the Ancients in Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Redemption, coming soon to the Game Cube!"! That one actually got me to shout "What the fuck!" at my screen. Then I laughed because suddenly I understood how Shenmue players felt.

In summary, Eternal Darkness was a great game, but its main gimmick was underdeveloped and somewhat dissapointing despite a few gems (that you missed, much is the pity). Oh, and patenting an Insanity Meter is fucking retarded.

Prior Art?

[lilmouse]

Anyone played Doom while on LSD?

--LWM

Re:Prior Art?

[Asprin]

I had a friend in grad school (physics) who noted from personal experience that Sonic The Hedgehog was "invariant under LSD transformation".

Re:Prior Art?

[ShortSpecialBus]

Have you ever looked at the back of a $20 dollar bill??

On Weed????

Eternal Darkness?

[leafsfanatic]

Didn't they do this already with Eternal Darkness for the Gamecube? Way to patent something years after you put out the product!

Re:Eternal Darkness?

[waynelorentz]

Who knew Nintendo and Apple had so much in common?

Re:Eternal Darkness?

[RPI Geek]

From TFA:

Filed: December 14, 2000

Re:Eternal Darkness?

[Iriel]

However, the specifications of the patent can be easily cirumvented by altering a small number of details.

Many people on Slashdot keep forgetting (or never learned) that Nintendo patenting a sanity system in a video game doesn't mean that any sanity system is covered under this. For the patent to be granted, it has to contain enough specifications to make it unique. You cannot patent an idea. The Nintendo patent on the sanity system is simply one implementation of it. If someone wanted to to yank the old delerium system from the White Wolf tabletop systems (with their permission, of course), then they wouldn't have to worry about the patent in the least, as long as it wasn't a direct copy of Nintendo's specs on a video game sanity system.

As long as there has been 'reasonable modification' to the currently patented system registered, another company could create a game with their new 'insanity engine' and even patent that as having significant improvment on an existing patent.

Nintendo isn't trying to monopolize the horror/action horror video game industry people. They just want to protect their own specific method of inciting character insanity in the video game engine.
</finallytakingabreath>

Re:Eternal Darkness?

[th3space]

I'd pay to see Link or Mario lose their shit...I really, truly would. NeoGeo prices, at that.

Re:Eternal Darkness?

[thebdj]

The Spec means nothing. The considerably broader claims are what is actually covered by the patent. That spec could read on several embodiments of the same system and in the end only one of those embodiments may be specifically covered by this patent, or the claims could be so broad to cover then all. However, their coverage is not limited to these embodiments, so any other system that reads along the claims could still be infringing the patent. As I have said tons of times, please read patent law and procedure of the United States. There are many things that you (the Slashdot community) really DO NOT KNOW or UNDERSTAND.

Re:Eternal Darkness?

[kansas1051]

You're entirely correct. The scope of a patent is determined by its claims. Claim 1 of the nintendo patent is incredibly broad:

1. A method of operating a video game including a game character controlled by a player, the method comprising:

(a) setting a sanity level of the game character;

(b) modifying the sanity level of the game, character during game play according to occurrences in the game, wherein a modifying amount of is determined based on a charater reaction and an amount of character preparation; and

(c) controlling game play according to the sanity level of the game character, game play being controlled at least by varying game effects according to the game charater sanity level.

IMHO, tons of video games anticipate this claim, including the original quest for glory (getting drunk) at least one of the Ultimas (eating mushrooms), and any of the grand theft autos.

Even more interesting, is that the USPTO was only able to cite one reference during examination, thereby explaining this broad claim.

first post

[mofag]

does that mean my boss needs to pay Nintendo?

Obvious

[avgjoe62]

Isn't this patently obvious? How can one patent something so unoriginal? Besides, my in-laws are prime examples of prior art...

Details

[HD Webdev]

Filed: December 14, 2000
PCT Filed: December 14, 2000
PCT NO: PCT/US00/33717
371 Date: September 3, 2002
102(e) Date: September 3, 2002
PCT PUB.NO.: WO01/62359
PCT PUB. Date: August 30, 2001

Nethack!

[Tiredoflurkin]

Rogue/ Nethack had this 20 YEARS ago, albeit in ASCII.

Let's just get this out of the way

[Anonymous Coward]

1. This patent isn't for a future product. It's years old and it's for the game "Eternal Darkness".
   
2. Nintendo is like, never ever in a billion years going to enforce this patent. Ever. If you look at their patent record you'll find they patent damn near everything but don't use the patents for anything. This is just the standard corporate "patent shield" technique, and it works very well; right now Sony and Microsoft have to pay rediculous license fees for the right to make rumble controllers, but Nintendo doesn't, because Nintendo picked up a patent before the company doing all the suing got theirs.
   
3. If Nintendo wanted to enforce this patent they'd have very little luck since Eternal Darkness is a complete and total rip off of Call of Cthulu. (This is a good thing. Call of Cthulu is awesome, and so is Eternal Darkness.)

Sanity Patent Insane

[gkozlyk]

Does this mean the USPTO could be sued by Nintendo in the future for all these ridiculous software patents.

Eternal Darkness.

[Gen. Rasputin X]

The only game I can recall with a decent sanity system was Eternal Darkness for the gamecube. I'm sure there were others, but that was the only one that left an impression on me.

The Silent Hill games have an insanity system, but it's less related to the characters and more related to the world.

In theory, the new Cthulhu game has a sanity system, which may count as prior art, and that brings up an interesting idea. Does a system that has been developed but not yet released count as prior art?

I'm just hopeful that this leads to some new games exploring insanity.

American McGee's Alice?

[StressGuy]

in addition to the other examples already given.

On a related note, Redneck Rampage got all squirrly when Leonard drank too much. Someone planning to patent in-game drunkeness?

As a devout Marxist would say....

[ValhallaOne]

You can't fool me....there ain't no Sanity Clause...

Makes Sense

[burtdub]

InsanityTM is the only way to describe their business plan over the past ten years, be it the Donkey Congas, the Mario Party series, or the N64 game system.

Re:Patent Sanity?

[MarkGriz]

That's insane.

Seriously, how can this type of patent not get laughed out of the office?

Agreed.

It's patently insane.

Or nethack :)

[Rei]

Prior Art

Quaff what? [elr or *] r
Wow! Everything seems so cosmic now!
You hear the quarterback calling the play.
You hear Nieman and Marcus arguing.
You hear Doctor Doolittle!
You hear bees in your (nonexistant) bonnet!
The Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal bites!
You hit the samurai rabbit.
The Christmas-tree monster bites!
Open what? [fGi or *] f
The Barney the Dinosaur bites!
The Totoro bites!
The rodent of unusual size bites!
The tin contains sauteed Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles. Eat? [yn] y
You consume sauteed cockatrice.
You die...

Do you want your posessions identified? [yn]

A Madness to Their Method

[Quirk]

The Discovery Channel ran a great little series on the Amazon Rain Forest. In one episode they used time lapse photography to show the slow sure growth of an Epiphyte that chose as its host one of the largest giant trees of the Rain Forest. The Epiphyte, starting from a sprout grew to completely obscure the giant tree. The tree blocked from sunlight died in the embrace of the epiphyte. When the host tree died a swath of the forest ecosystem died with it. The spooky part was that by the time the tree began to die you couldn't see it, the epiphyte completely engulfed the tree.

As a Canadian, watching the suffocating growth in Intellectual Property rights in America, I get a recurring image of the epiphyte choking the life of that giant tree. One day what nurished American industry will disappear choked off by patents, maybe we won't even see it die.

great...

[ate50eggs]

it's hard enough maintaining my sanity without a licencing fee.

ROTT

[LynchMan]

Hmm. Wouldn't ROTT (Rise of the Triad) be prior art (circa 1997-1998 maybe?). I remember it having a 'shroomin' mode - where if you ate some mushrooms, it got all trippy for a minute or two...

But I guess that taking drugs is not covered by this patent:

character's sanity level that is affected by occurrences in the game such as encountering a game creature or gruesome situation

Let the pill popping games begin!

Easy:

[abb3w]

I wonder of the writers/copyright holders of Call of Cthulhu would say to that.

Cthulhu fhtagn, Cthulhu fhtagn! Ph'nglui mglw'nafh Cthulhu R'lyeh wgah'nagl fhtagn!

OK, unleashing the Old Ones to devour your competitors is a little unscrupulous, but at least it's not unleashing lawyers.

(And yeah, there's some prior art in Angband and other roguelikes, but I think it's more binary (off/on) than progressive in effect. There might be some substance to the patent.)

Re:Possible prior art: nethack and falconseye

[saddino]

No. Patent Name
1 6,935,954 Nintendo-Patent [max 1] died in the USPTO. Killed by Prior Art.

Re:Realism in games

[g_lightyear]

On the patentability: Yes, there's oodles of parallel prior art.

On the game itself:

Mustn't be missed. The sanity system is *effective*; it really honestly does warp the player's perspective, make it honestly difficult to know what's real and what isn't, and does actually inspire a creepy sense of dread.

It makes you go out of your way to not create the situations that end up with you being insane. Loss of sanity happens through a few different ways, but basically it's "do something nuts, and go nuts; get hit by something freakish, and go nuts".

If a creature gets the jump on you, your sanity drops. If you get the first shot in, you keep your sanity unless it hits you physically - and then your sanity drops. Physical damage gets fixed, but the psychological damage can only be fixed through a different mechanism.

It's absolutely brilliant, and makes for *riveting* gameplay. Patents like this, which make it harder for people to innovate gameplay, shouldn't be allowed, IMO, if they're overly broad. It's too good an idea to only end up in one game from one company on one system - something like this belongs all over the place.

It's just brilliant.