Report: Interplay countersues Bethesda over Fallout rights
The infighting between Fallout's father and newly adopted guardian continues. According to a forum post by supposed Interplay stockholder frymuchan, Interplay has been given a 10-day extension to answer a preliminary injunction filed by Bethesda, which claims Interplay no longer holds rights to sell the original titles in the series. Following the release of Fallout 3, Interplay began selling the original titles across multiple PC-based digital distribution services.
Previous court filings by Bethesda claimed that Interplay's plans to develop a Fallout MMO -- codenamed Project V-13 -- were no longer valid because Interplay did not commence development prior to an agreed date of April 4, 2009. According to the post by RagingBull forum user "frymuchan" -- who claims to have received the information from official court documents -- Interplay claims it did issue a letter to Bethesda prior to the April date outlining details of a Fallout MMO, but Bethesda told it "for no apparent reason" that Interplay was no longer allowed to develop the game. Interplay believes that Bethesda's interference with licensing agreements to make the original titles in the series available digitally is unreasonable based on the current contracts in place.
Frymuchan also claims that Interplay has filed a countersuit versus Bethesda over statements it made to third party companies to whom it was attempting to license the original titles. According to the post, Bethesda released statements to companies such as GameTap and Good Old Games, claiming Interplay had no rights to license Fallout 1, 2 or Tactics for sale on its services. Interplay's counterclaim maintains this "unreasonable interference" puts Bethesda into breach of contract and makes the license sale "null and void," therefore reverting the agreement back to a sub-licensing deal between Interplay and Bethesda. In short, Interplay claims Bethesda now only holds rights to Fallout 3 with options for a fourth and fifth game in the series.
It's an argument of apocalyptic proportions and we're expecting more details when the extension expires next week.
[Via GamePolitics and Destructoid]
