Nintendo has tentatively won a patent law battle it has been waging for 15 weary years – though BigBen Interactive, now Nacon, has already appealed a German court's decision requiring it to hack up about $8.2 million in damages and legal fees. Hey, what's another 15 years of waiting?
In any case, Nintendo of Europe lawyers celebrated the "remarkable" ruling in a December 16 press release (spotted by games fray). Patent attorney Christof Karl and IP lawyer Pascal Böhner explain it's uncommon for German patent law proceedings to calculate damages in the way they have in this instance.
"Particularly significant: the court assumed that Nintendo would have made 100% of the sales made by BigBen," the lawyers write, "without any deductions in view of third-party suppliers that were active in the market." The original patent suit filed in 2010 took issue with what Nintendo's lawyers call an "ergonomic" third-party controller BigBen was selling with "features characteristic of Nintendo's Wii Remote."
While the Mannheim Regional Court had already decided back in 2011 that BigBen, indeed, infringed Nintendo's Wii Remote patent, Nintendo and BigBen dedicated another 14 years to debating how valid that patent really was. Subsequently, German and wider European courts sided with Nintendo in 2017 and 2018 – but BigBen has appealed this most recent ruling in Nintendo's favor.
"The judgment is therefore not yet final," Nintendo's lawyers admit, "but it is provisionally enforceable against provision of security." Poor Wii Remote. Always the plaintiff, never the bride.
Call up your lawyer and enjoy one of the 25 best Wii games of all time.
