A law student who feels that they have no obligation to comply with the rules and regulations governing their intended practice of law. Why I am I not surprised.
I don't feel that way at all, and you have a good point on crossing the line from information to advice, which I'm going to heed from now on. I just had to give you a snarky reply 'cause it's Slashdot;-)
you definitely don't want to ignore this. The Pac-Man copyrights are well-established and well-defended in court
Yeah, good point, he did say that too.
THIS ISN'T LEGAL ADVICE. I'M A LAWYER BUT NOT YOURS.:)
Beyond that, it's a good idea for you to start adding that disclaimer to basically everything even touching on the law you ever post here. Without it, you could inadvertently form an attorney-client relationship (A-C relationship forms when the "client" is reasonable in believing one has formed, regardless of your intent, IIRC) and get pwned hard down the line.
Thanks for the tip. We haven't studied A-C client relationship formation yet, but I know some of the clinics at my school make clients sign a disclaimer acknowledging that the attorney they meet with is only advising but not representing them. Good thing you disclaimed that, too. If I get into trouble for adding that disclaimer you're off the hook for advising me to;-)
You cannot possibly have enough information to give out this advice. While most of your comments in the topic have been merely informative, for which I have much sympathy, this crosses well over the line. Knock it off.
Having actually studied copyright law, I have to say it's not so clear as you make it out to be.
Are you a lawyer, or have you just "studied copyright law", perhaps as part of a survey class or something? 'Cause if the former, you might want to throw in some disclaimers since your interpretation is incorrect and inconsistent.
Incorrect? Quite possibly. Inconsistent? I think you misunderstand me. Like you, IANAL yet. Duly noted on the disclaimer.
Specifically, when you say:
In your example, it doesn't sound like you really changed much at all, like characters or story; you just changed the words attached to certain things.
... the implication is that he would have been fine if they changed "characters" or "story".
That's not the implication at all. The point was that it doesn't make sense for him to be saying "gotta change characters or story! gotta change characters or story!" when in his example he didn't change either. What he changed to make it compliant was literal text copied from the original.
"Character" is what we're talking about here. The concept of a player sprite running around a maze collecting things and being chased is not protected by copyright. That's equivalent to "boy-meets-girl".
I agree.
The character PacMan, a yellow circle with an eye and a wedge-shaped mouth, dating/married to Ms. PacMan, is protected by copyright, as are the characters Blinky, Pinky, Inky and Clyde. Each is sufficiently developed enough that they are not a mere abstract.
Well, having only read the summary before my post, I assumed OP had made sufficient artistic difference to have a good argument that his characters were distinguished. At the very least call them different names and give each one a distinctive marking or something. Now that I've followed the link, I see that it's not the case, and he even refers to the hero by the name "Pacman" in descriptions on the web site, which is a really blatant violation. But my point still stands that the "Green Gobbler" idea I was responding to was not automatically distinct either, à la K.C. Munchkin.
Similarly, the character Harry Potter is protected by copyright, as would be Romeo Montague, provided Shakespeare were alive within the past 70 years. The story of teenagers in love? No. The specific and well developed characters? Absolutely.
Yeah, like I said I foolishly took OP at his word that he'd made good-faith efforts at artistic originality and only copied the game concept and mechanics. I thought it was the "teenagers in love" equivalent for Pac-man, not the "Romeo Montague". Shoulda followed the link.
"Having actually studied copyright law, I have to say it's not so clear as you make it out to be."
In a case like this, where he's basically copied the art and taken a large portion of the name, yes, it really is.
Yeah, I didn't see there was a link until after I replied. I assumed we could take him at his word for having done "original art", like he would at least have 3-d rendered it or made the ghosts look like real ghosts instead of pac-man ghosts, or something. Turns out, no, he just made them look as much like the originals as he could. That's straight-up copying.
"Yeah, you might want to take your own advice."
Apparently you completely and utterly missed the text in brackets.
Actually, because it was in parentheses, I thought it was an example (like this) and not your own disclaimer. My bad.
I think he does have a leg to stand on. Remember when Apple sued Microsoft for copying the "look and feel" of Mac OS into MS Windows?? The judge said "look and feel" was not copyrightable and threw the whole thing out.
No, that's not at all what the judgment was. Instead, it was: "look, you dumb****s, you signed a contract granting Microsoft the rights to do this!" Copyright of look and feel has been upheld in multiple cases.
I was just about to say this. Yes, correct... The judge did find some 170+ elements that Microsoft did copy and would have been guilty of infringement had Apple not given Microsoft license to use these elements. They worded their agreement poorly and Microsoft had a pretty clear license to use elements of the Mac OS look and feel under that agreement.
And my point was that the court said to look at the individual elements. If Apple's "look and feel" argument had been valid, they wouldn't have looked at who owned the individual elements because it would have been the overall nature of the work that would constitute infringement, but the court decided to look at individual elements instead.
I looked at this developer's page and he's got himself a real problem here. The characters, the "Super Pac" name, the maps, the pills, the gameplay, etc. all constitute a good case of copyright infringement.
Yeah, they all look like the originals. I actually think there's an almost open-and-shut case based on the images, which the author of SuperPac seems to think are original enough but I think the law would see as copies. I just think it's those specific elements and not the general "look and feel" that would constitute the cause of action.
Trademark infringement, incidentally, may not apply because while "Super Pac Man" is a trademark, "Super Pac" is less clear.
Yeah, but look at his site, he uses the name "Pacman" in several places to talk about the character. So even if his name isn't a trademark violation, he's using their trademark to describe his product.
However, copyright infringement applies because the detail of the gameplay, the characters, the look, the feel and the objective... more than 75% of the "idea" that constitutes the intellectual property known as the Pac Man game, is in this developer's product.
Again, I think this is where we disagree. The basic premise of copyright is to protect not an idea but the expression of the idea. The images are copyrightable, the map is copyrightable, but the gameplay and the "idea" of running around a maze chomping dots are not.
...and he completely shot himself in the foot by making direct reference to the Namco game in his description....Since there's a good chance that users may confuse this product as being related to, derivative of, an offshoot, etc. of the Namco branded game, there is significant opportunity for harm to their brand image and their market for Pac Man games. It doesn't matter if the distribution is limited or they think the "chances" aren't likely it will outstrip Namco's sales of Pac Man, it's about whether or not it could be easily confused, in principle.
Agreed, and agreed.
Fishexe states he's studied copyright law. I take that to mean he's had coursework but isn't a lawyer. If he were a copyright lawyer he'd say so. I'm not saying this to attack the messenger but just to establish some parity here... I have also studied copyright law.
Correct. I don't consider myself an expert, I was just trying to point out how much more complicated things were than Xest was trying to depict them as.
I am not a copyright attorney but I have worked for an ISP's internet security group and had direct contact with General Counsel on matters of DMCA. Also, I am both a copyright owner, and a co
I think he does have a leg to stand on. Remember when Apple sued Microsoft for copying the "look and feel" of Mac OS into MS Windows?? The judge said "look and feel" was not copyrightable and threw the whole thing out.
No, that's not at all what the judgment was. Instead, it was: "look, you dumb****s, you signed a contract granting Microsoft the rights to do this!" Copyright of look and feel has been upheld in multiple cases.
It's a little bit more complicated than that. Apple had given them license to use the particular elements, but claimed that their use together infringed the copyright on their OS by duplicating its "look and feel". The court basically said not to look at "look and feel" overall, instead to look at the individual elements, and since these were licensed, they had no case. It would have come out exactly the same if the elements were original, put together to duplicate the Apple "look and feel".
As for cases upholding "look and feel" copyright, the ones I know of are mostly old cases and have mostly been overruled, though if you know better than I, I'd love to have cites so I can update my knowledge of the issue. In fact there was even a case (name escapes me at the moment) where the court ruled it was fine to copy all the menu text and layout exactly because it was needed for a "compatability mode".
We may disagree as to whether the amount of copying rises up to the level of infringement, but there is a clear copyright infringement claim to be made here. The DMCA is appropriate.
I agree with that, but mostly because I've now looked at the site, and the images are basically copies of the original images. It's not because of any of the things moortak was talking about and I was disputing.
What part of "different art" don't you understand?
Which is irrelevant.
No it's not, it's the whole point of what nten was saying and the whole thing that Xest was missing. Xest was making a claim that copying "look and feel" was a violation based on assuming "look and feel" included the art.
One doesn't need to copy the exact art assets to face copyright infringement issues.
No shit, Sherlock. I never said they did need to. I was responding to someone who said "copying look and feel with different art" was the same as "copying the characters".
People like you need to realize that the law doesn't much such hard distinctions and there is no case law to back up your interpretation.
And people like you need to learn (A) to actually argue the point at issue instead of something basically unrelated and (B) that you're full of shit because Apple v. Microsoft is case law that p. much says EXACTLY my interpretation.
They provide a secure anonymous drop-box so that people can leak to them without leaving a trail by which to get caught. (It's important to note that Bradley Manning got caught because he went around bragging to others about leaking; WikiLeaks didn't blow his cover, he did that himself)
So what was Bob Woodward doing when he refused to reveal the identity of Deep Throat? What have countless other journalists done in refusing to reveal sources, to the point of being put in jail for contempt of court?
THIS got insightful? WTF? The clear difference, the absolutely painfully OBVIOUS difference, was that Bob Woodward knew the identity of Deep Throat and Deep Throat relied on him not to tell. The difference is that Woodward didn't do a single thing I just described. Deep Throat knew the whole time that if Woodward woke up tomorrow and had a change of heart, he would be revealed. The anonymous drop-box is a mechanism which presents that possibility, because Assange and Co. never know who does the leaking unless the sources choose to reveal their identities. You have to trust journalists, you don't have to trust Wikileaks.
The best thing you can do is start to fight it, then negotiate for Namco to give you permission in exchange for a cut.
You cannot possibly have enough information to give out this advice. While most of your comments in the topic have been merely informative, for which I have much sympathy, this crosses well over the line. Knock it off.
Dude, this is Slashdot. Advice based on insufficient information is the name of the game.
Want to avoid DMCA woes? Don't make a pixel-for-pixel copy of someone else's game.
It wasn't literally "pixel-for-pixel" and that's part of the problem. People think you have to literally make a digital or photographic copy for it to be copyright infringement. This is not true. It has always been copyright infringement to recreate an image by painting, drawing, or digitally imitating it if it ends up resembling the original enough that a reasonable person would take it to be a copy, except in limited circumstances (such as parody, social commentary etc. which this game is clearly not). So not only don't make a pixel-for-pixel copy, don't draw from scratch something that ends up looking like a copy either.
Or you could do what this guy did and do make a pixel-for-pixel copy that adds enough awesomeness that even though it would be an open-and-shut case the original copyright holders don't even want to take action for fear of squelching the awesomeness.
As a law student I understand the need to disclaim everything, but it seems really funny to say that "you should consult an attorney" (which was the gist of the entire post) is not legal advice. Also, your link uses the phrase "audiovisual game". That's good for a chuckle.
Definitely true though that many IP attorneys are nerds who are likely to be sympathetic. Someday soon I'll be yet another.
Now examine your situation. First, did you commit their copyright or not? Copying the game play is most likely copyright infringement.
This seems to be a common misconception. As a law student who's studied copyright, let me clear this up right now: copying the game play is never copyright infringement. On the other hand, he appears to have copied nearly all of the images (yes, redrawing something from scratch to look like the original is "copying" in most cases) and is probably on the hook for that.
One iron rule: Don't talk to them without a lawyer. Anything you say will be used against you.
Right on, and I would add to that: don't talk to Slashdot without a lawyer. Anything you say to the Slashdot community or that the community says back will also be used against you. It was really poor judgment to let us know what the game in question and the company sending the takedown notice were, rather than trying for anonymity with something like "I am selling a game which is a remake of a well-known game and the publisher has issued a takedown notice"...be generic or you risk hurting your case.
Yeah, that. ESPECIALLY #2. If you go into court against Namco now, everything you've said on/. and everything we've said back can be entered into evidence against you, and the other side will know your legal strategy too. This may not sound like a big deal now, but you never know what could happen. The large numbers of posts saying "dude, all you did was rip off pac-man!" could be entered into evidence to show that even a sympathetic community can't tell the difference between yours and the original, for example. That's just one possibility out of many.
Your game is a complete knock off of the original. From your website, it looks like you copied:
(1) the pac man character
(2) the ghosts
(3) the dots and power dots
(3) the style of the maze
It's amazing how, in a world full of copyrights and trademarks and patents and intellectual "property" and all sorts, that people just don't understand any of it.
The items you list above CANNOT be a "clear case of copyright infringement" because you cannot copyright an idea.
While you're correct that you cannot copyright an idea, you can copyright and image, and all of the above-listed things were images copied into the new game from the original.
I hope you aren't a lawyer.
You just said a work and a derivative work are the same thing "If you draw it yourself to look like the original, it is still a copy.".
That's not only wrong, but stupid.
Except that it's legally accurate. Comedy III Productions v. Gary Saderup. 25 Cal. 4th 387 (2001). (among many others)
If you look at the screenshot, it's pretty obvious that he didn't take the graphics from Namco Bandai.
Actually, that's not at all obvious. It's obvious he didn't copy and paste the original verbatim images, but that's not all that copyright covers. It's a violation of a copyrighted image to hand-redraw that image, unless the image is sufficiently transformed to constitute an original and independent work of art. It's generally a violation of copyright to create new images in a way that's intended to so resemble the original that people have trouble telling the difference. There are some exceptions around parodies and social commentary, but this is definitely neither of those.
Slashdot Mirror
Gentlemen prefer Ladies, Androids prefer iOS
There, that looks much better.
Good to know. Thanks.
I use linux all of the time and even when I'm not.
I see you got the new cranial implant with embedded Linux too, eh?
A law student who feels that they have no obligation to comply with the rules and regulations governing their intended practice of law. Why I am I not surprised.
I don't feel that way at all, and you have a good point on crossing the line from information to advice, which I'm going to heed from now on. I just had to give you a snarky reply 'cause it's Slashdot ;-)
He also gave this advice:
Yeah, good point, he did say that too.
THIS ISN'T LEGAL ADVICE. I'M A LAWYER BUT NOT YOURS. :)
Beyond that, it's a good idea for you to start adding that disclaimer to basically everything even touching on the law you ever post here. Without it, you could inadvertently form an attorney-client relationship (A-C relationship forms when the "client" is reasonable in believing one has formed, regardless of your intent, IIRC) and get pwned hard down the line.
Thanks for the tip. We haven't studied A-C client relationship formation yet, but I know some of the clinics at my school make clients sign a disclaimer acknowledging that the attorney they meet with is only advising but not representing them. Good thing you disclaimed that, too. If I get into trouble for adding that disclaimer you're off the hook for advising me to ;-)
You cannot possibly have enough information to give out this advice. While most of your comments in the topic have been merely informative, for which I have much sympathy, this crosses well over the line. Knock it off.
Will do.
Having actually studied copyright law, I have to say it's not so clear as you make it out to be.
Are you a lawyer, or have you just "studied copyright law", perhaps as part of a survey class or something? 'Cause if the former, you might want to throw in some disclaimers since your interpretation is incorrect and inconsistent.
Incorrect? Quite possibly. Inconsistent? I think you misunderstand me. Like you, IANAL yet. Duly noted on the disclaimer.
Specifically, when you say:
In your example, it doesn't sound like you really changed much at all, like characters or story; you just changed the words attached to certain things.
... the implication is that he would have been fine if they changed "characters" or "story".
That's not the implication at all. The point was that it doesn't make sense for him to be saying "gotta change characters or story! gotta change characters or story!" when in his example he didn't change either. What he changed to make it compliant was literal text copied from the original.
"Character" is what we're talking about here. The concept of a player sprite running around a maze collecting things and being chased is not protected by copyright. That's equivalent to "boy-meets-girl".
I agree.
The character PacMan, a yellow circle with an eye and a wedge-shaped mouth, dating/married to Ms. PacMan, is protected by copyright, as are the characters Blinky, Pinky, Inky and Clyde. Each is sufficiently developed enough that they are not a mere abstract.
Well, having only read the summary before my post, I assumed OP had made sufficient artistic difference to have a good argument that his characters were distinguished. At the very least call them different names and give each one a distinctive marking or something. Now that I've followed the link, I see that it's not the case, and he even refers to the hero by the name "Pacman" in descriptions on the web site, which is a really blatant violation. But my point still stands that the "Green Gobbler" idea I was responding to was not automatically distinct either, à la K.C. Munchkin.
Similarly, the character Harry Potter is protected by copyright, as would be Romeo Montague, provided Shakespeare were alive within the past 70 years. The story of teenagers in love? No. The specific and well developed characters? Absolutely.
Yeah, like I said I foolishly took OP at his word that he'd made good-faith efforts at artistic originality and only copied the game concept and mechanics. I thought it was the "teenagers in love" equivalent for Pac-man, not the "Romeo Montague". Shoulda followed the link.
"Having actually studied copyright law, I have to say it's not so clear as you make it out to be."
In a case like this, where he's basically copied the art and taken a large portion of the name, yes, it really is.
Yeah, I didn't see there was a link until after I replied. I assumed we could take him at his word for having done "original art", like he would at least have 3-d rendered it or made the ghosts look like real ghosts instead of pac-man ghosts, or something. Turns out, no, he just made them look as much like the originals as he could. That's straight-up copying.
"Yeah, you might want to take your own advice."
Apparently you completely and utterly missed the text in brackets.
Actually, because it was in parentheses, I thought it was an example (like this) and not your own disclaimer. My bad.
"You should consult an attorney" is not legal advice. I suppose you haven't taken the MPRE yet.
So why disclaim it if it's the only advice he gave? And yes, I am a neophyte, I freely admit there are a zillion things I don't know yet.
I think he does have a leg to stand on. Remember when Apple sued Microsoft for copying the "look and feel" of Mac OS into MS Windows?? The judge said "look and feel" was not copyrightable and threw the whole thing out.
No, that's not at all what the judgment was. Instead, it was: "look, you dumb****s, you signed a contract granting Microsoft the rights to do this!" Copyright of look and feel has been upheld in multiple cases.
I was just about to say this. Yes, correct... The judge did find some 170+ elements that Microsoft did copy and would have been guilty of infringement had Apple not given Microsoft license to use these elements. They worded their agreement poorly and Microsoft had a pretty clear license to use elements of the Mac OS look and feel under that agreement.
And my point was that the court said to look at the individual elements. If Apple's "look and feel" argument had been valid, they wouldn't have looked at who owned the individual elements because it would have been the overall nature of the work that would constitute infringement, but the court decided to look at individual elements instead.
I looked at this developer's page and he's got himself a real problem here. The characters, the "Super Pac" name, the maps, the pills, the gameplay, etc. all constitute a good case of copyright infringement.
Yeah, they all look like the originals. I actually think there's an almost open-and-shut case based on the images, which the author of SuperPac seems to think are original enough but I think the law would see as copies. I just think it's those specific elements and not the general "look and feel" that would constitute the cause of action.
Trademark infringement, incidentally, may not apply because while "Super Pac Man" is a trademark, "Super Pac" is less clear.
Yeah, but look at his site, he uses the name "Pacman" in several places to talk about the character. So even if his name isn't a trademark violation, he's using their trademark to describe his product.
However, copyright infringement applies because the detail of the gameplay, the characters, the look, the feel and the objective... more than 75% of the "idea" that constitutes the intellectual property known as the Pac Man game, is in this developer's product.
Again, I think this is where we disagree. The basic premise of copyright is to protect not an idea but the expression of the idea. The images are copyrightable, the map is copyrightable, but the gameplay and the "idea" of running around a maze chomping dots are not.
...and he completely shot himself in the foot by making direct reference to the Namco game in his description....Since there's a good chance that users may confuse this product as being related to, derivative of, an offshoot, etc. of the Namco branded game, there is significant opportunity for harm to their brand image and their market for Pac Man games. It doesn't matter if the distribution is limited or they think the "chances" aren't likely it will outstrip Namco's sales of Pac Man, it's about whether or not it could be easily confused, in principle.
Agreed, and agreed.
Fishexe states he's studied copyright law. I take that to mean he's had coursework but isn't a lawyer. If he were a copyright lawyer he'd say so. I'm not saying this to attack the messenger but just to establish some parity here... I have also studied copyright law.
Correct. I don't consider myself an expert, I was just trying to point out how much more complicated things were than Xest was trying to depict them as.
I am not a copyright attorney but I have worked for an ISP's internet security group and had direct contact with General Counsel on matters of DMCA. Also, I am both a copyright owner, and a co
I think he does have a leg to stand on. Remember when Apple sued Microsoft for copying the "look and feel" of Mac OS into MS Windows?? The judge said "look and feel" was not copyrightable and threw the whole thing out.
No, that's not at all what the judgment was. Instead, it was: "look, you dumb****s, you signed a contract granting Microsoft the rights to do this!" Copyright of look and feel has been upheld in multiple cases.
It's a little bit more complicated than that. Apple had given them license to use the particular elements, but claimed that their use together infringed the copyright on their OS by duplicating its "look and feel". The court basically said not to look at "look and feel" overall, instead to look at the individual elements, and since these were licensed, they had no case. It would have come out exactly the same if the elements were original, put together to duplicate the Apple "look and feel".
As for cases upholding "look and feel" copyright, the ones I know of are mostly old cases and have mostly been overruled, though if you know better than I, I'd love to have cites so I can update my knowledge of the issue. In fact there was even a case (name escapes me at the moment) where the court ruled it was fine to copy all the menu text and layout exactly because it was needed for a "compatability mode".
We may disagree as to whether the amount of copying rises up to the level of infringement, but there is a clear copyright infringement claim to be made here. The DMCA is appropriate.
I agree with that, but mostly because I've now looked at the site, and the images are basically copies of the original images. It's not because of any of the things moortak was talking about and I was disputing.
What part of "different art" don't you understand?
Which is irrelevant.
No it's not, it's the whole point of what nten was saying and the whole thing that Xest was missing. Xest was making a claim that copying "look and feel" was a violation based on assuming "look and feel" included the art.
One doesn't need to copy the exact art assets to face copyright infringement issues.
No shit, Sherlock. I never said they did need to. I was responding to someone who said "copying look and feel with different art" was the same as "copying the characters".
People like you need to realize that the law doesn't much such hard distinctions and there is no case law to back up your interpretation.
And people like you need to learn (A) to actually argue the point at issue instead of something basically unrelated and (B) that you're full of shit because Apple v. Microsoft is case law that p. much says EXACTLY my interpretation.
They provide a secure anonymous drop-box so that people can leak to them without leaving a trail by which to get caught. (It's important to note that Bradley Manning got caught because he went around bragging to others about leaking; WikiLeaks didn't blow his cover, he did that himself)
So what was Bob Woodward doing when he refused to reveal the identity of Deep Throat? What have countless other journalists done in refusing to reveal sources, to the point of being put in jail for contempt of court?
THIS got insightful? WTF? The clear difference, the absolutely painfully OBVIOUS difference, was that Bob Woodward knew the identity of Deep Throat and Deep Throat relied on him not to tell. The difference is that Woodward didn't do a single thing I just described. Deep Throat knew the whole time that if Woodward woke up tomorrow and had a change of heart, he would be revealed. The anonymous drop-box is a mechanism which presents that possibility, because Assange and Co. never know who does the leaking unless the sources choose to reveal their identities. You have to trust journalists, you don't have to trust Wikileaks.
You cannot possibly have enough information to give out this advice. While most of your comments in the topic have been merely informative, for which I have much sympathy, this crosses well over the line. Knock it off.
Dude, this is Slashdot. Advice based on insufficient information is the name of the game.
Want to avoid DMCA woes? Don't make a pixel-for-pixel copy of someone else's game.
It wasn't literally "pixel-for-pixel" and that's part of the problem. People think you have to literally make a digital or photographic copy for it to be copyright infringement. This is not true. It has always been copyright infringement to recreate an image by painting, drawing, or digitally imitating it if it ends up resembling the original enough that a reasonable person would take it to be a copy, except in limited circumstances (such as parody, social commentary etc. which this game is clearly not). So not only don't make a pixel-for-pixel copy, don't draw from scratch something that ends up looking like a copy either.
Or you could do what this guy did and do make a pixel-for-pixel copy that adds enough awesomeness that even though it would be an open-and-shut case the original copyright holders don't even want to take action for fear of squelching the awesomeness.
...You really should consult an attorney.
As a law student I understand the need to disclaim everything, but it seems really funny to say that "you should consult an attorney" (which was the gist of the entire post) is not legal advice. Also, your link uses the phrase "audiovisual game". That's good for a chuckle.
Definitely true though that many IP attorneys are nerds who are likely to be sympathetic. Someday soon I'll be yet another.
He needs to remake his game with original characters/level designs/storyline, i.e. actually become creative, or partner with someone who is.
...or partner with Namco to release the game legitimately and give them their fair cut, rather than sneaking around like he was.
Now examine your situation. First, did you commit their copyright or not? Copying the game play is most likely copyright infringement.
This seems to be a common misconception. As a law student who's studied copyright, let me clear this up right now: copying the game play is never copyright infringement. On the other hand, he appears to have copied nearly all of the images (yes, redrawing something from scratch to look like the original is "copying" in most cases) and is probably on the hook for that.
One iron rule: Don't talk to them without a lawyer. Anything you say will be used against you.
Right on, and I would add to that: don't talk to Slashdot without a lawyer. Anything you say to the Slashdot community or that the community says back will also be used against you. It was really poor judgment to let us know what the game in question and the company sending the takedown notice were, rather than trying for anonymity with something like "I am selling a game which is a remake of a well-known game and the publisher has issued a takedown notice"...be generic or you risk hurting your case.
Yeah, that. ESPECIALLY #2. If you go into court against Namco now, everything you've said on /. and everything we've said back can be entered into evidence against you, and the other side will know your legal strategy too. This may not sound like a big deal now, but you never know what could happen. The large numbers of posts saying "dude, all you did was rip off pac-man!" could be entered into evidence to show that even a sympathetic community can't tell the difference between yours and the original, for example. That's just one possibility out of many.
Namco had the original idea for Pac Man in the friggin' 1970s!
There, fixed that for you. (source)
Your game is a complete knock off of the original. From your website, it looks like you copied: (1) the pac man character (2) the ghosts (3) the dots and power dots (3) the style of the maze
It's amazing how, in a world full of copyrights and trademarks and patents and intellectual "property" and all sorts, that people just don't understand any of it.
The items you list above CANNOT be a "clear case of copyright infringement" because you cannot copyright an idea.
While you're correct that you cannot copyright an idea, you can copyright and image, and all of the above-listed things were images copied into the new game from the original.
I hope you aren't a lawyer. You just said a work and a derivative work are the same thing "If you draw it yourself to look like the original, it is still a copy.". That's not only wrong, but stupid.
Except that it's legally accurate. Comedy III Productions v. Gary Saderup. 25 Cal. 4th 387 (2001). (among many others)
Somehow anti-DMCA stuff gets filed into terrorism at CMU apparently.
Well, given how the RIAA has tried to use anti-terrorism laws on infringers, they probably felt that was a reasonable response.
If you look at the screenshot, it's pretty obvious that he didn't take the graphics from Namco Bandai.
Actually, that's not at all obvious. It's obvious he didn't copy and paste the original verbatim images, but that's not all that copyright covers. It's a violation of a copyrighted image to hand-redraw that image, unless the image is sufficiently transformed to constitute an original and independent work of art. It's generally a violation of copyright to create new images in a way that's intended to so resemble the original that people have trouble telling the difference. There are some exceptions around parodies and social commentary, but this is definitely neither of those.