Pocket Money was designed by David Jones of Nova Productions.
His company sued rivals Mazoomer Games, maker of Jackpot Pool, and
Bell-Fruit Games, maker of Trick Shot.
The Honourable Mr Justice Kitchin analysed the games in detail
before handing down his 53-page judgment on 20th January which
concluded that each game looked different and played in a different
way.
Justice Kitchin considered many similarities between the games.
Some were inevitable; the court heard that more than 100 snooker
and pool titles have been produced over the years.
Justice Kitchin concluded that two features of Jackpot Pool were
"inspired" by Pocket Money: both were games with prizes themed on
the game of pool; and both showed a coin graphic moving across the
screen at certain times during gameplay. Another feature of Pocket
Money – a row of dots to show the anticipated direction of a shot –
had "affected" Jackpot Pool's design, which used a shorter row of
dots; and a pulsing cue synchronised with a pulsing power meter had
been "derived" from Pocket Money – but implemented in a visually
different way.
Trick Shot also shared similarities. The idea of a rotary
controller was inspired by Pocket Money – but the movement of
the cue around the cue ball was not derived from the game, for
example.
However, these were not deemed substantial parts of either the
artistic or literary works held in copyright by Nova.
Justice Kitchin wrote: “It is the cumulative effect of the
copied features which is important. The court must consider
whether, taken as a whole, they constitute a substantial part of
the copyright work."
Nova pointed to its computer program and design notes to
assert infringement of a literary work. But the judge found that
the features which had inspired elements of Trick Shot were “ideas
which have little to do with the skill and effort expended by the
programmer and do not constitute the form of expression of the
literary works relied upon."
“Ideas and principles which underlie any element of a computer
program are not protected by copyright under the [Software]
Directive,” he added.
As for the design notes, Justice Kitchin described them as just
"a series of jottings and ideas.”
Accordingly neither Trick Shot nor Jackpot Pool had infringed on
Pocket Money.
Bell-Fruit's Managing Director, John Austin, said "a massive
amount of cost and resource was put into the preparation of our
defence as well as the time spent in court". He added, "I feel
angry to have been obliged to do it. I hope this judgment will
dissuade future fallacious claims on similar issues."
He said that both companies will be applying to recover their
legal costs from Nova.
Nav Sunner, a games law specialist with Pinsent Masons, the firm
behind OUT-LAW.COM, said:
"This case illustrates the dichotomy in
copyright law between 'idea' and the 'expression of that idea'.
Copyright law protects the latter so wherever possible a games
designer should express his thoughts into a detailed game design
document to clothe the bare bones of the ideas underlying any new
game. It is the detail to which the court will look at to
protect.
"Conversely, taking generic ideas from
previous games should not stop game developers releasing similar
games provided the detail of such games are not used."
