As reported on Duck and Cover

FALLOUT® MMO RIGHTS RESTORED TO
BETHESDA SOFTWORKS® IN INTERPLAY LITIGATION

All Fallout® Intellectual Property Rights Belong Exclusively to Bethesda

January 9, 2012 (Rockville, MD) –ZeniMax® Media Inc. today announced that a settlement had been reached in the lawsuit filed by its subsidiary, Bethesda Softworks®, against Interplay Entertainment Corporation in 2009, Bethesda Softworks LLC v Interplay Entertainment Corp., seeking cancellation of the license granted to Interplay to develop a massively multiplayer online game (MMO) based on the Fallout brand. Bethesda maintained in its complaint that Interplay had failed to meet the conditions for the license and the license was therefore of no continuing validity.

Under the terms of the settlement, the license granted to Interplay to develop the Fallout MMO is null and void, and all rights granted to Interplay to develop a Fallout MMO revert back to Bethesda, effective immediately. Interplay has no ongoing right to use the Fallout brand or any Fallout intellectual property for any game development. ZeniMax will pay Interplay $2 million as consideration in the settlement, each party will bear its own costs of the litigation, and Bethesda will continue to own all Fallout intellectual property rights. Interplay will be permitted to continue to sell the original Fallout ®Tactics, Fallout® and Fallout® 2 PC games through December 2013, after which time all rights to market those games revert to and become the sole property of Bethesda. Under the original agreement pursuant to which Bethesda had acquired the Fallout property, Interplay was granted certain merchandising rights to sell those original Fallout games, but those merchandising rights will now expire on December 31, 2013.

The lawsuit against Interplay arose after Bethesda Softworks acquired all Fallout intellectual property rights from Interplay in April 2007, and conditionally licensed back to Interplay certain trademark rights to make a Fallout MMO, provided Interplay secured $30 million in financing for the MMO and commenced full scale development of the game by April 2009. Bethesda alleged in its complaint that Interplay failed to meet either condition of the license back agreement but refused to relinquish its license and insisted it would develop a Fallout MMO. Bethesda filed suit to declare the license void.

In a separate but related matter, Bethesda commenced a second action against a purported developer of the Fallout MMO, Masthead Studios, Bethesda Softworks LLC v Masthead Studios Ltd. In the course of the original lawsuit against Interplay, Interplay had claimed that it had engaged Masthead Studios to develop the Fallout MMO under its license, and contended that Masthead was engaged in full scale development of that game. Bethesda filed its separate lawsuit against Masthead to assert copyright infringement and other violations of Bethesda’s intellectual property rights. Under the MMO license granted to Interplay, Interplay was not permitted to sublicense any rights granted without the prior approval of Bethesda, approval which had never been requested or granted. In responding to Bethesda’s lawsuit, Masthead denied that it had been using any of Bethesda’s intellectual property in developing an MMO. Masthead and Bethesda settled that second lawsuit on December 29, 2011. In the settlement, Masthead acknowledges it has no legal right to use any Fallout intellectual property, and agrees it will not use any such intellectual property of Bethesda in the future. No payments were made by either party as part of this settlement. The two settlements resolve all pending litigation over the Fallout intellectual property owned by Bethesda.

Robert Altman, Chairman and CEO of ZeniMax, expressed satisfaction on behalf of the Company with the resolution of the two lawsuits saying, “While we strongly believe in the merits of our suits, we are pleased to avoid the distraction and expense of litigation while completely resolving all claims to the Fallout IP. Fallout is an important property of ZeniMax and we are now able to develop future Fallout titles for our fans without third party involvement or the overhang of others’ legal claims.”

Following the purchase of the property, Bethesda Game Studios, the 2011 ‘Studio of the Year’ and the development team behind the 2011 ‘Game of the Year’, The Elder Scrolls® V: Skyrim™, developed Fallout® 3. ZeniMax Media’s publishing subsidiary, Bethesda Softworks, published Fallout® 3, a highly acclaimed sequel which won ‘Game of the Year’ honors in 2008, for Xbox 360® video game and entertainment system from Microsoft, PlayStation®3 computer entertainment system, and Games for Windows. Bethesda also published the popular title, Fallout: New Vegas®, in 2010 for the same platforms. Fallout: New Vegas® Ultimate Edition, which will include the original game and the award-winning downloadable content in one special package, is planned for release by Bethesda in early 2012.

Bethesda seems to like suing people, they sued Mojang (Minecraft) for making a game called "Scrolls" as well.

While I enjoy Bethesdas game I hope they lost this one, Interplay did invent the IP and should have the right for the MMO, Bethesda already have a famous IP which would make a good MMO.

Originally posted by Loke666

Bethesda seems to like suing people, they sued Mojang (Minecraft) for making a game called "Scrolls" as well.

While I enjoy Bethesdas game I hope they lost this one, Interplay did invent the IP and should have the right for the MMO, Bethesda already have a famous IP which would make a good MMO.

I agree Loke, Bethesda went overboard on this one, and I think they are going to end up paying the price on this one. I just hope Interplay decides to acutally make an MMORPG and not make another shallow and childish CORPG which passes for a MMORPG these days.

Lawyers will be Lawyers and business is business.  Everything working as expected.

Originally posted by Loke666

Bethesda seems to like suing people, they sued Mojang (Minecraft) for making a game called "Scrolls" as well.

While I enjoy Bethesdas game I hope they lost this one, Interplay did invent the IP and should have the right for the MMO, Bethesda already have a famous IP which would make a good MMO.

If you would have took the time to read why they did it, you would know why. Basically, Mojang was trying to trademark Scrolls in every possible way. Bethesda had to step up and stake some claim to their game or watch as Mojang took it in every single way.

Too many people see Notch and Mojang as perfect and infalliable, but their a game company like everyone else. I'm sure they would start suing some people if they used a name that was related to Minecraft, or Cobalt.

As far as this whole fiasco goes, I hope Bethesda gets the right to the game. I know Interplay started it, but money troubles happen and they had to give up the rights so someone else could keep the series alive. There is no way Interplay can make a good MMO version of the Fallout universe.

Originally posted by Loke666

Bethesda seems to like suing people, they sued Mojang (Minecraft) for making a game called "Scrolls" as well.

While I enjoy Bethesdas game I hope they lost this one, Interplay did invent the IP and should have the right for the MMO, Bethesda already have a famous IP which would make a good MMO.

Er? I see you posting alot here, most of it stands out for actually making sense.
But dont you realise that Interplay had begun development with Masthead? Do I realy need to goto into specifics about how Earthrise and its engine are fundementally broken? I think Earthrise has been shut for a month and its not even a year old.

It's Dead Jim.

It was ever alive?

So has Bethesda actually started development? What about Fallout 4? Are they going to be developed at the same time?

Originally posted by KhinRunite

So has Bethesda actually started development? What about Fallout 4? Are they going to be developed at the same time?

Fallout 4!!!???   OMG I just got a <beep>!!!!!

Originally posted by Loke666

Bethesda seems to like suing people, they sued Mojang (Minecraft) for making a game called "Scrolls" as well.

While I enjoy Bethesdas game I hope they lost this one, Interplay did invent the IP and should have the right for the MMO, Bethesda already have a famous IP which would make a good MMO.

Can't say I agree.  Interplay was trying to profit off the success of Fallout 3 by using the IP to produce what would have likely been a terrible game.  Interplay hasn't made anything good in a decade.

well for who ever that has the rigths to it, the main question is will there be a Fallout MMO?  I actually got to play fallout 3 sort of today for the first time (yea yea but i never gave it a chance till now)  and i would love to see a MMO out of this.

There already is a Fallout MMO. You just aren't allowed to talk about it on here. 

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Originally posted by TruthXHurts
There already is a Fallout MMO. You just aren't allowed to talk about it on here. 

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You mean FOnline? Sure people can discuss it, just in another board though.

     We should be thankful considering how crappy the last Interplay Fallout was.  Fallout;Brotherhood of Steel, basically a consul bastardization of the series.  They slapped that together after firing all the good people from Black Isle.   Interplay was never going to make a MMO, they just wanted more.

Originally posted by Draemos

Originally posted by Loke666

Bethesda seems to like suing people, they sued Mojang (Minecraft) for making a game called "Scrolls" as well.

While I enjoy Bethesdas game I hope they lost this one, Interplay did invent the IP and should have the right for the MMO, Bethesda already have a famous IP which would make a good MMO.

Interplay was trying to profit off the success of Fallout 3 by using the IP to produce what would have likely been a terrible game.

Thats not true at all. Interplay never tried to profit off the success of Fallout 3. Interplay was currently working on project 13 and they have been fighting ever since then to get the rights back so they can produce Fallout Online. It has nothing too do with Fallout 3. It has too do with the ownership rights of the fallout name, and bethesda won those rights on January 2012, in which Bethesda received full rights to the Fallout Online game for two million dollars

To be honest you, myself, and anyone here don't really know whats going on unless your actually working with interplay or bethesda. If you want to read about the lawsuits you should do some research Here---> http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interplay_Entertainment

Lets be honest here, anyone whos played Earthrise can tell you that taking this project away from masthead was the humane thing to do.

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Originally posted by Crunchy221
Lets be honest here, anyone whos played Earthrise can tell you that taking this project away from masthead was the humane thing to do.
 

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+1

It seems like a good thing to me.

Interplay sold Bethesda something. . .Bethesda made a decent product with the IP.

They sold a   conditional     licence  back to interplay basically stating they needed $30 mil in funding and to start full scale development (aka don't make a crap browser game)

Interplay did not meet the requirements - Bethesday (Now the onwner of the rights) did not want the IP tarnished and pulled the plug.

I don't think this is happy lawyers suing for no reason.  It makes sense to me.

Oh goody, so Bethesda can continue to bend the Fallout IP over a table and have their way with it. Wondeful.

F*ck off, Bethesda.