For almost two years now Nintendo has been embroiled in a legal battle with MARI Mobility Development Co., Ltd., formerly known as MariCAR, for the latter’s service of offering customers the opportunity to drive around Japanese streets in go-karts while dressed as various Mario characters. Nintendo’s reasoning for the suit is “unfair competition and copyright infringement acts.”
Now, after the Intellectual Property High Court ruled in Nintendo’s favor, the terms of the legal ruling have been released online and translated by Japanese Nintendo. It turns out the company now owes Nintendo 50 million yen, or around $460k, in compensation. The previous estimate was 10 million yen.
Here’s what Nintendo had to say in the previous press release (via Japanese Nintendo):
And the defendant company’s act of lending costumes of Mario and other characters among others, while also acknowledging that presentations of Mario and more of this company’s characters are well-known among customers from both inside and outside Japan as displays for this company’s products, have also been acknowledged as being applicable to unfair competition acts.
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This company intends to continue taking necessary steps against infringement acts on intellectual properties including this company’s brands from hereafter, in order to protect this company’s precious intellectual properties which have been established with great effort for many years.
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Written by Tom Brown
Whether it’s an exciting new entry in a series long established or a weird experiment meant only for the dedicated, Tom is eager to report on it. Rest assured, if Nintendo ever announces Elite Beat Agents 2, he’ll be there.
