16th March 2006, 9:27 PM
A year ago, Sony lost the initial court case to Immersion, which is partially owned by both Microsoft (to settle their case) and Nintendo (already a stockholder... but Immersion's stated reason for not suing them too when they sued MS and Sony was that Nintendo's rumble technology wasn't infringing on the patents. Which is quite possibly true, because the Immersion patents don't completely cover every way of doing force feedback...).
Now, they lost the appeal.
In another year, they lose the second one?
Yeah, this'll be in courts for a while... Sony is doomed, but will drag it out as long as they possibly can. They REALLY don't want to pay Immersion that $90 million judgement, plus pay a $30 million liscencing fee, plus pull all infringing products off the shelves...
No, I'm pretty sure that Immersion was first (the first force feedback joysticks and stuff launched in 1996, which is before the rumble pack... pretty clear there which was first. Rumble was a functionally limited imitation of force feedback (since force feedback is reactive and moves the stick/pad/wheel in response to signals from the game -- not just shaking it, but true feedback...), but as you say, Nintendo's tech is different.
They all liscence it from Immersion, or try to do like Nintendo and find their own route and patent that... but for compatibility with existing force feedback standards, it's probably easiest to just liscence the tech from Immersion, and that is what most companies (Logitech, Saitek, etc) do. Or at least they have since the patents became final in 2000 or so, for sure... MS even liscenced Immersion force feedback tech for their force feedback PC joysticks. And quickly gave up when Immersion came after them for their console stuff too. Only Sony thought they could get away without it... and failed. :)
Now, they lost the appeal.
In another year, they lose the second one?
Yeah, this'll be in courts for a while... Sony is doomed, but will drag it out as long as they possibly can. They REALLY don't want to pay Immersion that $90 million judgement, plus pay a $30 million liscencing fee, plus pull all infringing products off the shelves...
Quote:Create a rumble feature several years before Immersion did.
No, I'm pretty sure that Immersion was first (the first force feedback joysticks and stuff launched in 1996, which is before the rumble pack... pretty clear there which was first. Rumble was a functionally limited imitation of force feedback (since force feedback is reactive and moves the stick/pad/wheel in response to signals from the game -- not just shaking it, but true feedback...), but as you say, Nintendo's tech is different.
Quote:But anyway, how far will this extend? There are a million PC controllers out there with the same rumble tech built into them. Are they going after Logitech next?
They all liscence it from Immersion, or try to do like Nintendo and find their own route and patent that... but for compatibility with existing force feedback standards, it's probably easiest to just liscence the tech from Immersion, and that is what most companies (Logitech, Saitek, etc) do. Or at least they have since the patents became final in 2000 or so, for sure... MS even liscenced Immersion force feedback tech for their force feedback PC joysticks. And quickly gave up when Immersion came after them for their console stuff too. Only Sony thought they could get away without it... and failed. :)
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