Battletech is back!!!

[CJReich46]

2018? Oh well that gives me some time to get a new PC. 

[SirAndrewD]

Related to the lawsuit? Or no?

Doesn't seem to be. 

Harmony Gold coming out of nowhere and deciding to sue, yet again, is surely a problem, but the courts will have to ask the question "why now?"  Piranha and Harebrained have been advertising and using the "reseen" Mechs since their redesign and there wasn't a peep from HG for five years.  Now on the heels of a new release they sue again, and this after the designs were tweaked to at least be slightly different from the original 80's concepts. 

If the Battletech rights holders feel they've got a decent case, I can't see it holding them back a lot.   I'm hoping that based on Harmony Gold's sudden interest in the IP again, after such a long lapse, and the fact that they're doing virtually nothing with the Robotech/Macross IP anyway, that this one might end up being swept out before it becomes yet another anchor rights on the Battletech franchise.

[Bardolph]

Thanks for the info.
Guess I'll wait a while longer then ;)

[SirAndrewD]

I got a look at the actual paperwork on the lawsuit against Battletech on their public posting, and I'm more convinced that we don't have anything to worry about in regards to this game. 

Harmony Gold is suing Catalyst/Piranha, Harebrained and Jordan Wiesmann as part of one lump suit.  The case against Piranha is the one that looks like it's got some teeth, as Harmony Gold is contending that Piranha sent over concept art to Harmony Gold several times, and the HG legal staff communicated to Piranha that the concepts on the "Reseen" designs were still in their opinion infringing.  It seems that after HG legal rebuffed them several times, Piranha stopped asking permission and just put their designs in Mechwarrior Online anyway.   On the comparison page of the suit, it's clear that Piranha is still using almost the entire design of the original Robotech/Macross Mechs, so it looks hard for them to fully defend their position.  This clearly puts both Mechwarrior Online and Mechwarrior 5 in a bit of jeopardy. 

On the Harebrained side though, it looks like Harmony Gold is doing some really dirty copyright trolling.   They claim that Harebrained is infringing on Robotech/Macross designs, however, the designs they claim are infringing are NOT part of the original "Unseen" designs that were taken from Robotech. 

Instead, Harmony Gold is comparing FASA in house designed mechs like the Atlas, to completely different looking Robotech robots and saying they infringe because....well...because they're both big walking combat vehicles.   It seems that in that part of the lawsuit, Harmony Gold is making a very weak and difficult to prove claim that they own even in house designed mechs because Macross/Robotech came first and the entire idea and core of Battletech is their intellectual property.  Considering the can of worms this opens in regards to all the other big robot universes, and how dissimilar Battletech and Robotech are, I can't see how they're going to win that portion of the suit. 

Of course, it all comes down to the question of why Harmony Gold has waited till now.  The answer is, there is a live action Robotech movie in the works, and of course HG is going to want to reap the marketing benefits of that with their own merchandise and games to coincide with the release.   It would appear this lawsuit is a paving of the way by eliminating brand confusion for their plans for 2018-19.

[Bardolph]

Good info. Harmony Gold can go rot.

[Nefaro]

 ;D


NSFW notice: 

Razorfist's trademark F-bombs, eloquent elucidation, and manic metaphors contained within.

[mirth]

^Weird Al is really pissed.

[CJReich46]

 :o Wow. That's some serious NSFW there, bro.

But he's got some points too.

[SirAndrewD]

:o Wow. That's some serious NSFW there, bro.

But he's got some points too.

Yeah, I pretty well agree with him.  Harmony Gold has essentially made a business out of creating nothing and copyright trolling the licences they acquired from the true creative sources.  Heck, they even sued Tatsunoko, the original creators of Macross, when Tatsunoko dared file a request for relief from the legal fees that HG has incurred by firing off lawsuits left and right for the last two decades.

The good news is that Harmony Gold's licence with Tatsunoko expires in 2021, and with it their ability to keep enforcing these kinds of suits.  Considering how deeply HG has managed to sour its relationship with Tatsunoko recently, I can't see there being much chance that they'll get an extension.   Maybe then Battletech will finally be safe to just exist and continue to be the better property.

[Nefaro]

:o Wow. That's some serious NSFW there, bro.

But he's got some points too.

I planted the "NSFW: Language" warning before the vid. 

Did my duty.      

;D

[CJReich46]

:o Wow. That's some serious NSFW there, bro.

But he's got some points too.

Yeah, I pretty well agree with him.  Harmony Gold has essentially made a business out of creating nothing and copyright trolling the licences they acquired from the true creative sources.  Heck, they even sued Tatsunoko, the original creators of Macross, when Tatsunoko dared file a request for relief from the legal fees that HG has incurred by firing off lawsuits left and right for the last two decades.

The good news is that Harmony Gold's licence with Tatsunoko expires in 2021, and with it their ability to keep enforcing these kinds of suits.  Considering how deeply HG has managed to sour its relationship with Tatsunoko recently, I can't see there being much chance that they'll get an extension.   Maybe then Battletech will finally be safe to just exist and continue to be the better property.

Oh you're not getting any argument from me on that either.

[CJReich46]

:o Wow. That's some serious NSFW there, bro.

But he's got some points too.

I planted the "NSFW: Language" warning before the vid. 

Did my duty.      


I chalked it up to "What a typical day in the Navy sounds like."  :DD

;D

[CJReich46]

<Duplicte deleted>

[Labbug]

http://www.pcgamer.com/mechwarrior-5-mercenaries-hands-on-the-series-goes-back-to-its-roots/

[Manassassas]

Quite an interesting article on RPS about the new Battletech game: https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2017/11/15/battletechs-campaign-mode-is-a-robot-dark-ages

When the game was announced I was a bit underwhelmed at the thought of another turn-based tactics game as I was a huge fan of XCOM 2 and I wasn't sure if it could top that - but the campaign dynamics they talk about in that article sound really interesting, keeping your mercs happy and well-paid for example so they don't decide to leave you in the lurch the day before a battle.