ZeniMax Files for Injunction Over Oculus Code

cageymaru

cageymaru

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Zenimax has filed an injunction to block sales of Oculus Rift licensed hardware and software that contains disputed code from an earlier lawsuit and subsequent trial. Earlier this year Zenimax was successful in pursuing charges against Oculus that they infringed upon their software and Oculus was hit with a 500 million dollar judgement against them. Since the new injunction filing includes software and hardware that uses the code; this bring the Samsung Gear VR ecosystem into the mix as it licensed its tech from Oculus. It also means that games in the Oculus store infringe upon the Zenimax code.

This is a huge setback for Oculus and their customers! How long would it take for them to reinvent the code that the machine and software run off of? Since the software is digital will this mean that all software purchased previously will suddenly disappear from owner's libraries? I believe that Amazon has done similar with stolen copyrights for books.

ZeniMax Media has delivered on its promise to file for an injunction against Oculus, filing papers with a Dallas court asking that products using disputed code be removed from sale. This injunction specifically relates to lines of code used by developers creating software for Oculus Rift and Samsung Gear VR. If the injunction takes effect, it will have an impact on which games can be sold for those devices.
 
All that work that has gone into Samsung's Gear VR, the Touch controllers, software, Room scale; all for naught.
 
More than likely it will only affect new users. They would try to not affect current customers so as long as you have downloaded it already you would most likely be fine, but if you needed to reinstall on a new machine you'd be SOL.
 
So it seems $500 million was not enough. They want more. In the end its all about money
 
LurkerLito said:
More than likely it will only affect new users. They would try to not affect current customers so as long as you have downloaded it already you would most likely be fine, but if you needed to reinstall on a new machine you'd be SOL.
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This is an injunction. I bet that if the storefront requires internet access then those apps will disappear until they are compliant with the terms of the litigation. Of course I suspect that users would get their money back.
 
Why take it off the shelf and not do some sorta deal where they get part of the profit?
 
Oculus does not give a damn about the highend VR market. They only care about the Facebook drone sitting at their desk. Oculus has not focused on true roomscale enthusiast VR gaming and I feel it will continue not to. That is fully going to sit at the feet of HTC, and they are doing well in leading the way on that. I have a new Oculus here with controllers, but will probably sell it and continue to give focus to Vive.
 
how to lose billions of dollars ?
- buy oculus rift !

what i want to know is , did facebook knew about zenimax claim before they bought oculus ?
because i think zenimax must have filed a suit before facebook came to the picture.
 
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If Zenimax wins this lawsuit and the Oculus store is no longer useable or I can no longer buy games for it I will be requesting a full refund on everything. The headset, the Touch controllers and all software purchased. I've never been one for litigation but if they refuse I may even look into getting an attorney as this lawsuit means Oculus "knowingly" sold stolen data to customers, the repercussions of which are effectively rendering the Oculus Rift as an expanding platform useless moving forward.

I do find this to be a shame because I still prefer the Oculus headset and Touch controllers to the HTC Vive but I will purchase another Vive if given a refund.
 
Stoly said:
BTW its been a while since I read a [H]VR review.
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Has been no reason to actually spend the time doing it much any more since we know how the cards shake out, but trust me, we will be back to it soon.
 
DPI said:
And this is why I bought a Vive. The Facebook stink on Oculus became too much to ignore, even when Rift owners were insisting "Oculus will win the VR HMD war because Facebook has deep pockets". And Oculus VR's attempt at a walled garden store and paying developers off for exclusives was also scummy - you expect that kind of crap from console makers MS & Sony but not it flew in the face of all of bug-eye Palmer's earlier promises.
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I don't want to give Facebook or Oculus too much credit, but it should be noted that it's not called the "Facebook Rift", there is no Facebook VR app for Oculus (yet lol), and they addressed the walled garden issue.

The reasons why I went with the Rift instead of Vive:
1) Facebook has deeper pockets. To be precise, about 6x the market cap of HTC.
2) I was a long time HTC phone user, until HTC failed me one too many times and squandered away their phone market share and opportunities.
3) Rift has an arguably better, and more marketable long term approach to VR, by focusing on more than just gaming. Sony is already eating HTC's lunch this year in the VR gaming market - and will continue to do so despite the fact that it has inferior hardware. Where will the Vive be in the non-gaming VR market?
4) I could actually find a Rift display to test before buying.
 
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Rift Owner with Touch and 3 sensors. Room Dimensions roughly 10x15. No issues with room scale, and that's all the room I can devote to VR so I'm good. Got $5 worth of key retainers guiding my wire from my drop ceiling, nice and clean. No Worries on the Zenimax front, legalese designed to get people to open their wallets.
 
thesmokingman said:
Does zenimax make any products?
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Arkane Studios BattleCry Studios Bethesda Softworks Escalation Studios id Software MachineGames Tango Gameworks ZeniMax Online Studios

Prior to Oculus Rift becoming a big deal, Zenimax gave zero-fucks about this. Cash Grab. Like when Facebook becomes a huge success and all its "other inventors" start crawling out of the woodwork....
 
jkw said:
I wouldn't say it's all doom and gloom for Oculus. The Rift has better controllers, better cable management (except for 3rd, roomscale, sensor), and a more comfortable, lightweight headset.
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Better controllers? No, they continue having tracking issues with them. Better cable management? No. Vive has a WIRELESS option coming from 3rd parties. More comfortable headset? No. Vive has a new headstrap available which is supposed to greatly improve the comfort.

Try again.
 
jnemesh said:
Better controllers? No, they continue having tracking issues with them. Better cable management? No. Vive has a WIRELESS option coming from 3rd parties. More comfortable headset? No. Vive has a new headstrap available which is supposed to greatly improve the comfort.

Try again.
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lol, no tracking issues for me, or anybody I know. Is that wireless option available now? NO. Rift headset is lighter AND comes with integrated headphones AND is still easier to put on.

Your score is not even in the top 5. Insert another quarter and play again.
 
jkw said:
lol, no tracking issues for me, or anybody I know. Is that wireless option available now? NO. Rift headset is lighter AND comes with integrated headphones AND is still easier to put on.

Your score is not even in the top 5. Insert another quarter and play again.
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Okay dude... we get it, you like your Rift.

Hopefully its ecosystem will continue to exist after ZeniMax is done.
 
Drakensoul said:
Okay dude... we get it, you like your Rift.

Hopefully its ecosystem will continue to exist after ZeniMax is done.
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To be fair the guy he was responding to was doing the exact same thing.

I just like VR, I'm not throwing my dreams behind an arbitrary billion dollar company. This whole suit is bad for the industry. Zenimax is giving a big fu to all the gamers that have spent thousands on a rift and games. They're just looking for a payout, they could care less about anything else.
 
akaliel said:
This whole suit is bad for the industry. Zenimax is giving a big fu to all the gamers that have spent thousands on a rift and games. They're just looking for a payout, they could care less about anything else.
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This is pretty much how I'm looking at it. The whole thing just stinks, and so much of what went on in that court room wasn't disclosed to the public.

I've been pretty happy with my Rift setup, and I'm no Facebook fan. Oculus has made some very substantial contributions to VR development, and if it wasn't for the extra funding we would have far less content available. Zenimax hasn't done shit, and that is a fact.

That been said, Oculus needs to get their shit together, fix their tracking issues, officially support the Vive on their store, and stop forcing fucking 180 degree with snap turning as the default on developers.. Or I'll be going with HTC for gen 2.
 
Bad reporting on the new, Zenimax did not WIN the earlier trial, what they won was a breach of NDA regarding the trial since Palmer Luckey couldn't keep his mouth shut. This affected the company, yes, but, Zenimax did not win anything regarding the code.

VERY different thing than what was written here.
 
Revdarian said:
Bad reporting on the new, Zenimax did not WIN the earlier trial, what they won was a breach of NDA regarding the trial since Palmer Luckey couldn't keep his mouth shut. This affected the company, yes, but, Zenimax did not win anything regarding the code.

VERY different thing than what was written here.
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Yeah what Zenimax won was the weakest claim of the whole suit. The odds are stacked against them getting a sales block from it. If they'd won the Carmack stealing claim, they'd be in a much stronger position. Either way, in the end there will be no sales block. Let's imagine it actually does happen. The next step would Zuckerberg admitting defeat and opening his wallet. That's all this has ever been about. Zenimax wanting a multi-billion dollar pay day. Let's not forget they sued Notch over the word Scrolls. There are no "good guys" in this case. Just rich people trying to get richer.
 
jkw said:
lol, no tracking issues for me, or anybody I know. Is that wireless option available now? NO. Rift headset is lighter AND comes with integrated headphones AND is still easier to put on.

Your score is not even in the top 5. Insert another quarter and play again.
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Have not had any probs with the controllers either. They work great and are comfy. I have not tried the Vive.
 
Supercharged_Z06 said:
Not in love with the Facebook ownership either, but I tend to disagree about the highend VR comment. I've got both setups and slightly prefer the Rift. With a 3rd sensor, the Rift fully delivers on roomscale. Both setups work just fine and I enjoy them both, but the Rift's Touch controllers are definitely superior. Hell, I want both to succeed - competition is a good thing and VR needs it. I can't wait for Gen 2 products to hit in a couple of years from now from both camps.
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Agreed on all counts. As soon as the Vive goes on sale somewhere, I'll buy that too.

Competition is a good thing, and if you truly want VR to succeed, you should hope that HTC, Oculus, Sony, and Samsung all succeed at it.
 
Originally I was going to wait for the 2nd gen of these and get something then. Have all the kinks and shortcomings worked out and all. Seemed smart at the time. But then I turned 40. And I found myself that evening logging onto Amazon and clicking on buttons. Suddenly I had a Rift coming in the mail.

I chose the Rift personally because the 3rd sensor roomscale announcement had been made and everything between them was coming to parity. I read their headset was more comfortable, especially for smaller heads and I knew my boys would be into it. And their controllers looked better than the Vive ones. But the real clincher was that Amazon.ca doesn't carry the Vive and I didn't want to pay customs for importing it. Everything else being equal, the Rift won the day.

I had instant buyers remorse clicking that button. The Canadian dollar being as crappy as it is, the whole thing cost me $1200. I never told my wife how much it cost.
 
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