EA Sued Over Madden 06 Feature

von_blapp writes "EA is being sued over the Super Star feature that is included in Madden '06. Pernell Harris, owner of Virtual Jam is suing EA over a confidentiality violation. Harris claims when he met with EA in '03 he discussed a game called Heart Of A Champion, in this game players take high school athletes from the schools to the pros insuring their grades are kept up and even picking their parents for the optimum gene pool. This is the same feature as in the current game released by EA."

Comments

Re:They sort-of deserve it.

[Meagermanx]

This guy should lose. I'm tired of all these "OMG I was the one who thought they should use Mario in a tennis game!! I even posted it on a forum, so I have proof! Nintendo ripped my idea off, so I'm suing!" type of mentalities.
 
Just because somebody has a cool idea and shares it doesn't mean if anybody implements that idea they can sue.
Seriously, if you're not making it, and you're not fine with other people doing it, keep your damn ideas to yourself.
 
And, honestly, how original of an idea is it to simulate a rising star's upbringing and career?

Asinine

[EnglishTim]

Ideas for games are cheap. Everybody's got an idea for a game. Everybody's got hundreds of ideas for games. It's the implementation that counts, and getting that right is damn hard work.

I'm certainly not EA's biggest fan (especially as I work for a competitor!), but I find it difficult to believe that this case has any merit.

Dime a dozen...

[Skreems]

I know two people from college who had the exact same idea (seperately of each other) a couple years ago. I'm sure tens of thousands of people have had the same idea across the country. Did any of them do it? No. EA did. I'm all for "fuck corporations" as much as the next guy, but this is just ridiculous. Ideas are worthless until you actually implement them. I have some ideas that I'm convinced would make fantastic games, but I'm not in a position to make it happen right now. If someone beats me to the punch, I might be a little pissed that I didn't get to do it first, but it's stupid to sue over it.

Re:What a Dolt

[Mr. Slippery]

So did this loser ever copyright or patent the idea?

Copyright protection applies as soon as the work is set down in a fixed medium (written, recorded, drawn, whatever). If he wrote his ideas down prior to this meeting with EA, they're protected by copyright, and he may have a case that the game is a derivative work.

I don't see how patent would apply here.