That’s what’s happening to Nintendo lately. First there was the lackluster E3 conference. Then word that their GameCube, Wavebird, and Classic controllers were found to be infringements of copyrighted patents. Now, new litigation is heading the way of the big N, this time from Hillcrest Laboratories, Inc., who claim that the Wii remote’s motion control and the interface used with the system were ideas invented by Hillcrest, not Nintendo’s developers.

As reported by Bloomberg’s Susan Decker and Wired.com (via the AP), the suit is looking to prevent the Wii from being imported into the United States. Oh no, what’s Ellen going to give away on her show now?!?

Granted, I don’t have all the facts, but I think the timing of this - coming so close to the previous lawsuit - is just a little suspect, and people are obviously out to hit Nintendo where it hurts. Now, if the Big N really did swipe these ideas without retribution, then that sucks, and more power to those suing, but until that knowledge becomes public, it’ll most likely appear that these people are just trying to get a piece of the action, especially given stats like these:

The Wii is the best-selling game console in the U.S., with 555,000 units sold during the month of July alone. Nintendo said the Wii accounts for 49 percent of the console market, citing researcher NPD Group Inc. (Susan Decker, Bloomberg.com)

So what do you think? Is Nintendo ripping people off? Or are they the victims of overactive capitalism?

This entry was posted on Thursday, August 21st, 2008 at 2:23 pm and is filed under Game Chat, Gaming News. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.