Marvel is gay

[Saint_Proverbius]

• The lawsuit claims South Korea-based NCSoft and San Jose-based Cryptic Studios violated Marvel's trademark characters in their game City of Heroes. Marvel seeks unspecified damages and an injunction against the two companies to stop using its characters.
  
  The personal computer game enables players to design superheroes' look and abilities and then battle against other players' characters in a virtual city. Like similar so-called massively multiplayer role-playing games where thousands of players can be playing simultaneously at any given time, City of Heroes claims to offer a myriad of combinations so that no two players' characters are exactly the same.
  
  But in its lawsuit, filed Wednesday in U.S. District Court, Marvel argues that the game's character creation engine easily allows players to design characters that are virtual copies of its own superheros, including "The Incredible Hulk."

Marvel's "The Incredible Hulk" is a copy of the old, old DC superhero "The Demon". IIRC, the guy gets angry and turns in to a demon. The only big difference is that the demon is a demon rather than a radiated mutant.

In fact, DC should sue Marvel for making superhero comics, since DC was first.

 

[Otaku_Hanzo]

You know, Marvel was a decent company at one time. This is definitely shit though. Guess everyone wants to jump on the sue bandwagon these days.

Can you sue someone for shitting the same color as you?

 

[almondblight]

Marvel stole a helluva lot from DC. Green Arrow -> Hawkeye. Swampthing -> Man Thing. JLA -> The Avengers. Flash -> Quicksilver. Plastic Man -> Mr. Fantastic. The Tarantula -> Spiderman. I know there's more, this is just off the top of my head.

So...yeah, screw this.

 

[Sol Invictus]

Marvel sued pretty much every Freedom Force website on the internet and forced them to shut down because they hosted free Marvel superhero skins.

What a bunch of dickheads.

 

[errorcode]

and i bet they're surprised when no one plays they're Marvel Universe MMP. I don't think they realize that all they're doing is pissing off the market base they're hoping to attract.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Marvel stole a helluva lot from DC. Green Arrow -> Hawkeye. Swampthing -> Man Thing. JLA -> The Avengers. Flash -> Quicksilver. Plastic Man -> Mr. Fantastic. The Tarantula -> Spiderman. I know there's more, this is just off the top of my head.

Captain Marvel ->Superman/DC's Captain Marvel.

But yeah, you'd think if anyone was suing anyone, it would be DC suing Marvel over all the times Marvel ripped off DC. It's rather lame that Marvel is suing CoH over CoH having a lot of customization of powers and looks for their heroes, even if a few of those powers are similar to Marvel heroes. Marvel's been ripping off other comic superheroes for years, not just borrowing powers from DC characters, but borrowing characters in their entirity.

 

[errorcode]

DC and Marvel have agreements to basically not fuck with each other. Once one side were to start it would quickly spiral out of control in a blizarred of suits and counter-suits.

kind of a MAD situation, really.

 

[Diogo Ribeiro]

Marvel stole a helluva lot from DC. Green Arrow -> Hawkeye. Swampthing -> Man Thing. JLA -> The Avengers. Flash -> Quicksilver. Plastic Man -> Mr. Fantastic. The Tarantula -> Spiderman. I know there's more, this is just off the top of my head.

Actually, Swamp Thing came after Man Thing, even if only by a scant month. No copying there

 

[Quigs]

yeah, they work semi-well together, even so far as to do a few "what if?" type books, like wolverine vs batman (bats won, 2 outta 3. used chemicals to desolve adamantium)

 

[Major_Blackhart]

I'll have to remember this when our company plays marvel in the soft ball league.

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

HomeLAN Fed has an interesting piece on this suit:

http://www.homelanfed.com/index.php?id=27494

Either way, I am embarrassed and ashamed of Marvel’s actions. This lawsuit hits me square in the chest as both a gamer, and a fan of superheroes. It strikes my by it’s idiocy, not to mention its total hypocrisy.

Case in point, Deadpool, a fairly popular character from the Marvel universe. The character, who is a mercenary named Wade Wilson. He is gifted with superhuman healing and is an expert at various weapons. The character first made its appearance in the 90’s, a full decade after DC Comics brought a similar character to the page. I say similar, though that might be an understatement.

DC’s character, Deathstroke the Terminator, was a mercenary with super-healing abilities and advanced weaponry…named SLADE Wilson. Marvel blatantly ripped off DC’s character. Interestingly enough, Deathstroke got his first solo comic in 1991, the same year that Deadpool first appeared. Deadpool showed up in February and Deathstroke the Terminator #1 appeared in August.

Marvel has made money on Deadpool. A fair bit, in fact. He went from occasional player to actually headlining his own comic. On the other hand, none of the gamers running around in City of Heroes calling themselves Hulk have made a cent. How is this fair? Two words: it isn’t.

You know what what be great though? If Atari spends all that money on D&D Online and then Vivendi sues them because you can make an elf ranger in the game like that faggy blonde bitch in Lord of the Rings because Vivendi owns the rights to LotR. Wouldn't that be sweet?

When you think about it, this suit really opens the door for a lot of bullshit like the above. If Marvel wins that suit, then it opens the door to all kinds of suits about character similarities in all types of games.

 

[manco]

I think Marvel's on thin ice with this one. In the late 80's, Data East made a BIG TIME street fighter clone called "Fighter's History". In it, were such cacom riffs as "girl ryu, and stretchy person". Capcom of course wanted some sweet justice, but the judge was all like "dudes, you can't copyright a fucking gi, and there was a stretchy indian in Master of the Flying Guillotine, good bye".
Oh, was DC's the Demon really before may of 63? That's crazy! But shit, the hulk's really a jeckle and hyde riff, so doesn't that flirt wih public domain?
but yeah, if Capcom couldn't stop Ryu with tits, Marvel is screwed...

 

[chaedwards]

Nice

Marvel is gay

faggy blonde bitch

RPGCodex, where perceived racism is smacked down but anti-homosexual remarks are ignored.

 

[Mr. Hand]

I find absolutely nothing wrong with anti-homosexual comments.

 

[chaedwards]

I find absolutely nothing wrong with anti-homosexual comments.

And why is that?

 

[Saint_Proverbius]

Maybe we need an "I am annoyingly gay" forum so people like the above can express their opinions without derailing threads.

Anyway, back on the actual topic.

but yeah, if Capcom couldn't stop Ryu with tits, Marvel is screwed...

Hopefully that's the case, because like I said, if Marvel does win this then you open the door for all kinds of copyright holders to sue all types of media for even slight similarities. If Marvel can sue CoH because you can possibly make something similar to a Marvel superhero in the game, then WotC could sue EQ2 or Dark Age of Camelot for allowing Dark Elf ninja-like rangers or any number of other overused cliches based on their books. id Software could sue Bungie for the similarities between the Doom Marine and the guy in Halo.

 

[Spazmo]

Re: Nice

RPGCodex, where perceived racism is smacked down but anti-homosexual remarks are ignored.

Well, Saint is a republican, and is consequently a creature of pure evil as well as a massive homophobe. It's a shame, but there you are.

 

[dojoteef]

Damn double post bs. There should be a check in the forum software that sees if a post is just a double post and warn you before you actually make that mistake.

 

[dojoteef]

Well in the colloquial sense, the word gay has come to mean obscene, lewd, or even lame. It hasn't gotten to the point yet in popular culture that the word has become taboo, such as the word nigger, which was just a word to describe a social group. It became something more, namely a 'racial' slur, simply for the manner in which it was used.

For now though, the term gay does have a common usage that might be offensive to some. It isn't something isolated either, it's pervasive throughout popular culture including movies, books, etc. So until it does become taboo, it will continue to hold that dual meaning and be used in both manners.

Another thing of note, is the fact that the same can't be said for the words homosexual or lesbian. They don't have these extra meanings, for whatever reason. So maybe there are other motivating factors as to why gay does have such differing meanings between the colloquial usage and the more precise usage. After all the word gay originally never meant to refer to homosexuals. It is just a term that people of that group started using to refer to their lifestyle, which was subsequently picked up by everyone else, outside of the fact of being of a different sexual orientation. It gave them a means of describing how they felt not only how they engaged in sexual acts.

Anyway, back to the topic. Marvel is just one of the many companies now that try to sue on a whim. I think it's ultimately the lawyers faults. They are the ones that say the points are valid enough to try a suit on, in my opinion simply to make money off of large corporations. My reasoning behind this is, if a lawyer loses the case it doesn't matter because they've made so much money off of their client. If they happen to win, then they get money from the settlement, utlitmately they get paid oodles of money.

 

[Reklar]

I thought Marvel bought out DC Comics when they went bankrupt? Or was it the other way around, I can never remember. Regardless of who owns what, I don't think Marvel has much of a legal leg to stand on as far as copyright law is concerned because I doubt, aside from some sort of miraculous confession, that they can prove intent and the supposed evidence of the violation is solely based on player-made characters who have no say in how the tool is created, only how it is used. In addition there is the fact that NC Soft monitors character names and skins and either changes the violations or deletes the characters, which is specified in the EULA. Anyone happen to know where the case is being heard/tried and if any activist groups have taken sides yet?

-Reklar
(a Fallout/RPG fan)

 

[DarkSign]

Well lets see here.

As a lawyer I hit WestLaw and looked this up. There are actually court cases about trademark infrigment concerning superheroes...and a TEST for the originality of a superhero.

But Cryptic really needs to frame the issue in a different way. It wasnt Cryptic that made the character...it was the player. Merely allowing someone the ability to drive their car into a police station doesnt mean that Ford is responsible. Its what the customer does with it that counts.

I remember the Marvel C&D runs on FF websites. I mean for god's sake! People are adding to the longevity of your product! They are enjoying you! No one is making money off it!

The problem is that no matter how jerky Marvel acts, they will still make money because we all have their characters in our nostalgic hearts.

Bastages!

'Nuff said?