Well, now the fight is on anyway. No use at the moment to let anything go. If HG wins the unseen will be pretty much gone as you want it, but as how the indictment (hope that is the right term) has been phrased mechs in general are a thing of the past because nothing that looks like a robot will be okay in the mindset of HG´s lawyers. And I don´t think that any judge will let this happen. But in the end we live in crazy times.
I don't want any of this. These lawsuits are a waste that could have been avoided by just not poking HG and embracing PP instead. HG ignored the Phoenixes, as far as i know, so the matter could have ended there.
This argument is backwards.
FASA created the Warhammer BattleMech, its name, backstory, configuration and game rules. The only thing not FASA for the Warhammer is its visual representation. Over two decades of "unseen" have proven that BattleTech is its own artistic entity, and that it doesn't hinge on the imagery in question. (Using the Warhammer here as a stand-in for all Unseen.)
What FASA, later FanPro and then IMR/CGL did was to try and fill the hole in BattleTech that Harmony Gold punched. They backfilled the hole with designs that, in my uninformed layman opinion, share no copyrightable similarities with the original IP.
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Does anyone else here remember the days when FASA was slammed as FA$A among roleplayers for their perceived crackdown on third parties who made (too) free use of FASA's BattleTech, Shadowrun and other IPs?
If Harmony Gold is in the right, then by all means, they are. My gut feeling says they aren't. But again, that's for the court to decide. Torches, pitchforks, tar & feathers have no place here.
I'm not lumping anything, i'm talking about the unseen art! The name, stats and story have never been challenged, only the art (which is of mechs, so i'm calling them mechs).
Project phoenix showed that HG didn't care about the names or stats. If the mechs truly had been distinct from the art, PP would have been the end of it. Instead both piranha and cgl deliberately tried to edge back in closer to the original unseen.
Is HG right , are they wrong, i don't know. But i fear a judge or jury will give them the benefit of the doubt because what it looks like is battletech encroaching on designs it signed away in 1996. That's not even subtle. The intent was clearly to get as close to the unseen art as they could, which means no matter what else hg does with its time, they are not the aggressors here, they are defending their ip against a repeat offender (or so their lawyers will be able to claim with some justification). Where is the line between ok and infringement? I don't know, but everyone should have expected that to be a question settled in court, and cgl doesn't have the time or money for that.
I think the new classics looks sweet, but they i don't think they are/were a risk worth taking given the legal situation. New designs utterly dissimilar by these artists could have been just as sweet for less risk.
