Bethesda vs Interplay – Bethesda wins in a big way

Last week we reported on the seemingly eternal battle between Bethesda and Interplay over the rights to the Fallout MMO having reached its conclusion through a settlement between the opposing companies.

The details of the settlement weren’t available at the time – but in a press statement released by Bethesda, we now know that in the end, Bethesda won – in a big way.

The court battle

Bethesda bought the rights to the Fallout IP in 2007 for the reasonable price of USD5.75 million – as part of the deal, original IP owners Interplay were then able to licence the brand for the Fallout MMO, so long as they met certain requirements.

The requirements were:

Full-scale development was to begin 2 years after the date of agreement (2009).
Interplay would have to secure $30 million in financing to develop the MMO.
Interplay would have to secure 10,000 subscribers – and give 12% of profits to Bethesda.
The product would have to meet Bethesda’s quality standards.
Fallout MMO was to launch 4 years after the agreement (2011).

Fast forward to 2009 – 2 years after the agreement was made, and nothing was really cooking with Interplay’s MMO.

As a result, Bethesda proceeded to sue the pants off of Interplay, claiming they have rescinded on their promises by not having gone into full-scale production of the game.

On top of that, there was also trademark infringement issues surrounding the original Fallout games being sold by Interplay.

Interplay rebutted by showing work-in-progress files for the MMO, done by Masthead Studios which was sub-licensed by Interplay to work on the MMO. The thing is, Bethesda claimed that they had no prior knowledge of this (as per the agreement) and then sued Masthead for copyright infringement.

Masthead and Bethesda settled their case – but Interplay was left in the lurch with nothing to show, or any real footing to stand on.

Work-in-progress Fallout MMO

The settlement

Despite the court case going on for 2 years, we all know Interplay wasn’t going to come out of this victorious – but the settlement cut them a really raw deal.

In the settlement that was reached, Bethesda is now the owner of the entire Fallout IP – with Interplay no longer holding any right to produce a game under the brand. On top of that, from the end of 2013, Interplay will also lose all right to the original Fallout games, which will then go to Bethesda.

What does Interplay get out of the settlement? USD2 million – likely for whatever IP rights they might still have with the original games. All of which will likely go toward the lawyer’s fees, for which each company is footing their own bill.

So I guess this means we probably won’t be seeing a Fallout MMO any time soon.