LXer: Patent troll lawsuits strike at the heart of free-to-play games, apps
 

Published at LXer:

Over the last few years, wide swathes of the game industry, and the downloadable app industry in general, have been revolutionized by a single idea: letting people play for free while charging some of those players for in-game items. Now, it seems, a shell company is claiming that it has sole ownership of that idea, and is going to court to stop a wide range of game companies from using it.Gametek LLC has filed a lawsuit against 21 of the biggest companies in social gaming, including Facebook, Zynga (Farmville et al), Electronic Arts (The Sims Social), Wooga (Diamond Dash) and 6Waves (Ravenwood Fair), as well as separate suits against iOS game developers such as Backflip (Ragdoll Blaster) and Gameview (Tap Fish).

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