Nintendo vs. Anascape: ‘Pay up, Mario’

Last week saw a potential conclusion to the headache-inducing case involving Nintendo of America and the small, Texas-based game “company,” Anascape. The good folks of the Texas judicial system ordered that Nintendo pay Anascape $21 million for patent infringements in the designs of their WaveBird, GameCube and Wii Classic controllers. Nintendo does plan to appeal with hopes that the total will be reduced.

Nintendo wasn’t the only whipping boy in the case, with Microsoft also being targeted for similar features utilized in their various controllers. Rather than get legally pwned however, Microsoft and Anascape reached a confidential settlement prior to the beginning of Nintendo’s trial.

A total of 12 patents were involved, including some that are so nebulous they could be used to describe nearly any game controller that has come out in the past decade: “3D controller with vibration,” seriously? Maybe Sony had the right idea after all.

The most perplexing aspect of this case is the fact that Anascape owns at least 12 patents regarding game hardware, yet they have no products currently for sale that make use of these patents. Beyond that, the company doesn’t seem to have any public activity aside from suing major game companies.

While America’s legal system is completely open to ambiguous accusations regarding game hardware, it’s a shame that the industry isn’t understood by those in power. These patents describe basic practices used by hardware developers on a regular basis. Anascape suing Nintendo for producing a “game controller with [an] analog pressure sensor” would be like a random pedestrian suing Magnavox for making televisions with cathode ray tubes.

If you’re reading this, Anascape, thanks for proving that money-grubbing patent trolls still exist in a world fraught with ethical business practices and basic human decency.