08-08-2017, 05:28 PM | #8 | |
Join Date: Sep 2004
Location: Orem, Utah, USA
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Re: Harmony Gold vs. BattleTech, Round N
Quote:
While all this was going on the folks in Japan who owned the story rights to Macross started making several sequels as movies and series. They then tried to sell the overseas distribution of those stories and ran into trouble with Harmony Gold. HG asserted in court that when they got the exclusive rights to the Macross series they also had the right to anything created as a spin off or sequel (despite the fact that Japanese courts had ruled that company they did business with only had rights to the first Macross). series/movie). To further their cause, and due to the nature of US IP law they began aggressively going after anyone doing anything Macross related however loosely. This included joining with the studio behind a totally unrelated cartoon Exo-squad to do a line of Robotech Exo-squad toys (Macross and Mospedia mecha who's inclusion in the toy line made no sense from a story standpoint for either series) so they could join in a court battle with FASA who claimed that Exo-squad was a result of their pitching a Battletech cartoon to that studio. The result was a court ruling all of the mechs in the Battletech 2e and most from Citytech 1e and the LAM's from Aerotech 1e belonged to HG in spite of the rights Fasa got from the toy and model company. This is why all those mechs were relegated to the status of Unseen in Battletech until Project Phoenix came up with altered versions that they could sell. This is also why you can't find non bootleg copies of any of the later Macross movies and series anywhere Robotech was distributed. Except Macross 2 and Macross plus that sliped in before all the court mess. Mind you this is all based on my recollection of reading about the events as they happened and may contain some misinformation. Now it looks like Harmony Gold is trying to assert that their ownership of Macross, Southern Cross and Mospedia means they own the entire idea of human piloted mecha. Despite the fact that they aren't doing anything new with what they have since Shadow Chronicles bombed and their are multiple examples of others using the same idea both before and after. |
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