Bomberman gameplay copyrighted?

[simply_bert]

Hi there!

Does somebody of you know if the bomberman gameplay is copyrighted?
I don't wanna use either the bomberman avatars nor the name or so - just parts of the gameplay.
Was already searching on the web - also on the Hudson webpage - but didn't find an information about it, so I decided to ask here in hope somebody knows it.

Greets,
Robert

[ZeHa]

Well there are many many bomberman clones around, and as far as I know, it's not possible to copyright a kind of gameplay. That way, there wouldn't exist many games, just think about the hordes of pacman, tetris, or mario clones you played ;)

[Desktop Gaming]

just think about the hordes of... ...mario clones you playedYou mean, like Great Giana Sisters? :p

[simply_bert]

Yes - you are right, but most of such clones are free.
What if we would like to sell our remake? I'm wondering, because I haven't found many commercial clones of it - and if I found one - it had a bit different gameplay.
But it was also my first thought, that gameplay itself would be hard to copyright - needed just a confirmation.

Greets,
Robert

[Desktop Gaming]

Yes - you are right, but most of such clones are free.Doesn't make any difference - you can't infringe copyright/trademarks even if you are giving it away for free.

You can't copyright gameplay as such. But you'd be treading very thin ice if you were to use copyrighted graphics (even if they were redrawn but remarkably similar), names which might be registered trademarks and so on, i.e. making it clear that your game is a direct rip off of something else.

If that were the case then as ZeHa said, nothing other than Pacman and a couple of other 30 year old games would exist.

[Spiegel]

As far as I know you cant be sued for having a similar gameplay of another game, because then no-one could do a soccer game after "MatchDay" :p

Its like all the tetris-clones, you can make a falling tetramino game with all of the same pieces but you cannot name it Tetris (or anything ended with -tris for all I know)...

Just look at probotector and metroid series.... Both have shooting armored maniacs against hordes of alien invaders... :cool:

[ZeHa]

Yeah okay, Giana Sisters is a special case of course :D

Well, it depends on how close it's cloned, of course. Giana Sisters not only had the same gameplay, it had also very similar graphics and stuff. It really suited the name "clone" :)

Would you game be an exactly cloned game, only with different graphics? Perhaps there are some improvements to be made, and then again, it could be also enough different. But I still think a 1:1 clone, only with different graphics, shouldn't be a problem. But of course I don't want to give legal advice or something...


EDIT: Perhaps you should really dig into that "Giana Sisters" thing and find out why they got sued. Then it shouldn't be a problem to not make that same mistake. Well, the follow-up for Giana Sisters, "Hard'n'Heavy", had exactly the same gamplay, but different graphics, and it got released without a problem (they first intended to make a real sequel, of course, but this wasn't possible).

[Desktop Gaming]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Giana_Sisters

[simply_bert]

Would you game be an exactly cloned game, only with different graphics?

No - the intersection with Bomberman will be only the calssical grid map layout and charachters laying bombs. There will be some unique features and game modes (without destroying the bomberman feeling, though ;) that will make the game quite different. Even the charachters will look completely different, so I hope there will be no problems.

Thanks all!

Greets,
Robert

[Sol_HSA]

I'd say this pretty much depends on how trigger-happy the owners of the original IP are. Some years back, if I remember correctly, hasbro (or some other toy giant) ended up with the rights to lots of old atari(?) classics like pong. Soon afterwards they started suing everyone who was doing pong-like games, be they shareware or commercial, even though there's been zillions of pong-related games before.

And anyway, it looks from where I'm sitting that in the US anyone can sue anyone without pretty much any reason.. =)

[DrWilloughby]

This is a very straightforward question. You can file for a PATENT on gameplay. And can trademark your logos and product names. You can copyright your assets (in fact they are copyrighted implicitly).

No one has yet actually tried to defend the gameplay patents in court, so it's unclear yet whether those will hold up. DEFINITELY don't use other people's assets in any way shape or form. And as for the trademarks, it depends on how aggressively the holder is willing to protect them. The Tetris name is notoriously well protected (you can't name anything ___tris without their lawyers giving you a cease and desist). On the other hand ___ Tycoon has fallen into common usage, so the original publishers of Railroad Tycoon no longer have sway over that mark. There are over a hundred trademarked products that now bear the ____ Tycoon name.

You can look up existing trademarks at www.uspto.gov.

Also keep in mind that this is US law. May be different in other countries, but considering the sales potential of the states, it's best not to ignore US law.

And, of course:
IANAL

EDIT: Just to be clear-- there are very few gameplay patents out there. I would venture a very solid guess that the Bomberman gameplay is not patented, since gameplay patenting really only started happening recently, notably with Microsoft Game Studios. Filing a patent costs 10K minimum, so few publishers consider it.