Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

@weeble1000 - I understand your source of confusion.

It seems that Moon Design was worried that it they ok'd the use of the Heroquest trademark, or turned a blind eye, that if Hasbro get angry about the new game that they (Hasbro) would come after Moon Design.
This has also been mentioned in many of RiTdes posts about it recently.

It doesn't make much sense however. Hasbro does not have any case in regards to the trademark. We've seen that clearly identified.
They might be able to raise a concern on copyright grounds, but even if that's the case their only beef would be with Gamezone, and not Moon Designs.

I guess Moon Designs was just worried that they would be pulled into any litigation anyway because of their licencing of the trademark, that they'd somehow 'approved' of the full content and what Gamezone was doing, and somehow became responsible.

Or the whole thing is a tactic to get more leverage on getting a piece of the KS pie.

bubba wrote:
[a bunch of polite, friendly, and informative stuff]

Pedantic tends to have a pejorative connotation, and could be used with the intention of being insulting, so I just wanted to make sure I hadn't pissed you off or something. Yay for computer-mediated communication! Sometimes there's just not the right emoticon . See, what the Hell does that mean?


Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Azazelx wrote:


Now, I'm obviously a complete layman, but my query is why doesn't/didn't GZ register the Section 28 in the US if this is all so well known/easy to find out?

And at this point, I'm wondering why someone from Dakka hasn't registered it in the last 2 weeks - before GZ/GW/MR/HB do

No product, no trademark. You have to be selling something in order to have a trademark.

weeble1000 wrote:
This is an interesting legal question and it really should have been worked out before the launch of the Kickstarter.

Maybe GameZone figured it could always hide out in Spain if things went badly.

I think that's the key, they should have had this worked out beforehand, and definitely shouldn't have told backers there was "No chance of a C&D" when Moon Design had flatly refused to license the US trademark to them (saying they would not do so without written permission from Hasbro for the project to proceed). From the posts Moon Design made after the fact, they were really clear about this with GameZone ahead of time, but GameZone tried to forge ahead anyway.

 Catyrpelius wrote:

 judgedoug wrote:
@silent25 and @catyrpelius
Ah, I see what you're saying. Personally, to me, I don't care too much about it being "officially official", all I care about is the feel. If the core mechanics stay the same (which are not protectable), then it'll still be HeroQuest to me but with much cooler models.
Basically, I could easily have a copy of HeroQuest '89 and buy all new sweet minis and terrain and have nicer cards made, but I'd rather be able to buy it all in one go, which is why the Gamezone HQ redux was so appealing to me.

If this is the case I'd recommend checking out descent 2.0. It's the basis of Heroquest but with modern rules and beautiful components.

Not a big fan of either Descent or Descent 2.0. I tried, I really did... but they're too tactical-wargame-y for my taste. My group also plays WHQ and AHQ often (as well as Dragonstrike and others) but none have the feel that HeroQuest does.

weeble1000 wrote:

No product, no trademark. You have to be selling something in order to have a trademark.

Aha, I see. Thank you.

You generally have a period after registering a trademark in which you can take your time to release a product. In Canada, it's 5 years, and it's likely similar in the US. If anyone feels like spending the money to register a trademark, feel free to later release your Heroquest paper doll cut out board game for 99 cents 3 years from now, you should be fine in terms of owning the trademark so long as it wasn't previously registered.

 judgedoug wrote:


Not a big fan of either Descent or Descent 2.0. I tried, I really did... but they're too tactical-wargame-y for my taste. My group also plays WHQ and AHQ often (as well as Dragonstrike and others) but none have the feel that HeroQuest does.

Agree. HQ has a unique simpleness to it which allows for informal DMing instead of a rigid system which can be gamed and tactically impacted. And it is simple enough for non RPGers and non Wargamer to easily get in to with no explanation.

I backed MYTH hoping it turns out like that, but if not, I can still play HQ with my ratty old stuff. It would have been nice to have a shiny new box and board and a few new models and rules.

 judgedoug wrote:
But... why? Maybe I am just totally not understanding this part, and forgive me if I am. If Hasbro's trademark is DEAD, and Gamezone's game is sufficiently different - rules, art, models, design - what does it matter?

Because the first word in the Kickstarter's title should have been "Unofficial". I don't know Spanish IP law, but here an artist is recognised as possessing moral rights beyond those granted by trademark and copyright. They put a spin on their refusal to mention Stephen Baker, but they should have, because a refusal to attribute work to its creator looks a lot like plagiarism.

And frankly, this is the sort of thing trademark law is for: to protect the customer and the IP creator from third parties who would try to muddy the waters so it isn't crystal clear who did what.

Just read this over at BGG.
http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/1081721/kickstarter-payment
Anyone who used Gamezone's shipping calculator should check with their credit card companies. People are getting the shipping charges from the calculator charged against them.

Trying to find the source of it, but people at BGG are also tossing around MD was asking for $58,000 CAD as part of the deal to use the Heroquest trademark in the US. That is a hard nut to swallow.

Around 10% of the kickstarter when it was suspended and the kickstarter still had significant life?

While it's a large amount it seems like cutting off the nose to spite the face...

They were asking for that and written approval from Hasbro to proceed, though- not just one or the other. So I don't think there is actually a path forward on Kickstarter due to the second part.

 silent25 wrote:
Just read this over at BGG.
Trying to find the source of it, but people at BGG are also tossing around MD was asking for $58,000 CAD as part of the deal to use the Heroquest trademark in the US. That is a hard nut to swallow.

Of course, totally conjecture, but that sounds roughly 10% of what it was when it was suspended. MD could have been asking for 10% of gross. 58,000 CAD is an odd number and does not correlate nicely to a nice even number like USD50,000 or EUR50,000.

@Rigeld2. Agree, though even if the KS had hit $2M, it would still be ~3% of the total. That could be the difference between making money on the project and losing money. Remember, Reaper only made ~$50K profit on their first kickstater.

@RiTides, sorry wasn't meaning to make it sound like that was the only thing MD was asking for. And agree, think this KS is done. Stick a fork in it.

$58,000 was the initial funding amount for the KS

http://www.kicktraq.com/projects/2113976860/heroquest-25th-anniversary/

 judgedoug wrote:

 silent25 wrote:
Just read this over at BGG.
Trying to find the source of it, but people at BGG are also tossing around MD was asking for $58,000 CAD as part of the deal to use the Heroquest trademark in the US. That is a hard nut to swallow.

Of course, totally conjecture, but that sounds roughly 10% of what it was when it was suspended. MD could have been asking for 10% of gross.

Bubba says otherwise; that Moon Design had asked for a reasonable percentage of profits, which wouldn't be 10% I don't think, but I don't have any industry specific numbers. 10% for a license is absurd when it comes to patents, for example.

Asking for a percentage of gross Kickstarter funds would be pretty unreasonable. It would be like asking for a percentage of gross revenue, and I have trouble fathoming that as a license for a trademark.

 silent25 wrote:
@Rigeld2. Agree, though even if the KS had hit $2M, it would still be ~3% of the total. That could be the difference between making money on the project and losing money. Remember, Reaper only made ~$50K profit on their first kickstater.

@RiTides, sorry wasn't meaning to make it sound like that was the only thing MD was asking for. And agree, think this KS is done. Stick a fork in it.

The amount of money it made in the first few days (I think a record for this kind of KS right?) would be very surprised if it didn't appear in some form or another in the near future, even if this one ultimately gets stymied. Although, I don't think it will.

I agree, Pacific- it will be back, but more than likely with a different name, or on another platform so they can keep the name intact.

 judgedoug wrote:
As I mentioned previously, back in the late 80's Enix wanted to bring it's popular "Dragon Quest" game to the USA (on the Famicom/Nintendo Entertainment System). However, the "Dragon Quest" trademark already existed in the USA, so for the USA market the series was retitled "Dragon Warrior". The same product existed in both Japan and the USA (with localization translations) but with slightly different names. Everyone knew it was the Dragon Quest series but was marketed in the USA as Dragon Warrior.

Could Gamezone...
- remove the HeroQuest commerical from their video
- call the product HeroQuest in Spain, but The Hero's Quest for the USA market (or something else, Quests of Heroes, etc)
- launch the Kickstarter with the name The Hero's Quest 25th Anniversary Edition
- explicitly explain in the opening paragraph that it is called HeroQuest in Spain and has been retitled The Hero's Quest for the international/non-Spanish market

With new art assets and redesigned rules, no copyrights are affected. With a different name for USA/international distribution, there is no trademark conflict.

Would that satisfy the conflict?

I can see the new name: Hero Warriors - The Quest - 25th anniversary edition

They could go pig latin and call it ErohayEstquay.

Argh! Ninjaed. Delete, mods, please. Someone beat me to my lame joke.

There has been an interview with the head of Gamezone, translated and discussed here: http://boardgamegeek.com/thread/1081546/interview-with-gz-in-a-spanish-website

These seem to be the facts:
1. They have the trademark to produce a game of some nature in Spain calling it "HeroQuest". This is legal, they could do a monopoly-like game calling it heroquest quite legally

2. They have developed a game derived from MBs HeroQuest by altering sufficiently all the features by which copyright is judged. This is also legal, indeed there are many examples in RPGs at the moment of doing this with old games such as D&D first edition, an example is Swords & Wizardry. http://www.swordsandwizardry.com/

The problem comes, as I see it, is where they take the second item and try to market it under the first giving the impression they have the right to produce a new edition of the actual game orignally made by MB. They acknowledge in the interview that this is a commemorative version, not a new edition. If they want to produce a clone in memory of HQ go ahead, just don't call it "HeroQuest".

Putting those two things together puts them back at risk of breaching copyright principles, as I understand them.

Moon Design didn't want to get sucked in to any potential legal wrangles over this, thus demanded to see evidence of Hasbro saying, "go ahead, make your version and call it HeroQuest, we're fine with that"

Psychman wrote:

These seem to be the facts:
1. They have the trademark to produce a game of some nature in Spain calling it "HeroQuest". This is legal, they could do a monopoly-like game calling it heroquest quite legally

2. They have developed a game derived from MBs HeroQuest by altering sufficiently all the features by which copyright is judged. This is also legal, indeed there are many examples in RPGs at the moment of doing this with old games such as D&D first edition, an example is Swords & Wizardry. http://www.swordsandwizardry.com/

The problem comes, as I see it, is where they take the second item and try to market it under the first giving the impression they have the right to produce a new edition of the actual game orignally made by MB. They acknowledge in the interview that this is a commemorative version, not a new edition. If they want to produce a clone in memory of HQ go ahead, just don't call it "HeroQuest".

Putting those two things together puts them back at risk of breaching copyright principles, as I understand them.

So its OK to produce any type of game called "HeroQuest", and its OK to produce a specific game thats very similar to "HeroQuest", but its not OK to call the game thats similar to "HeroQuest", "HeroQuest"?

There seems to be more than enough publicity now for a KS for a game thats similar to HeroQuest, commemorating HeroQuest, and called HeroQuest in Spain but called something else in the USA... and to give Moon Designs the two finger salute (one finger in the USA of course - its their trademark after all.)

They could even presumably mention "Compatible with Milton Bradley's HeroQuest boardgame (1989)" in slightly smaller letters, even on the US version... think, aftermarket parts, rather than rip-off.

Alabaster.clown wrote:

Psychman wrote:

These seem to be the facts:
1. They have the trademark to produce a game of some nature in Spain calling it "HeroQuest". This is legal, they could do a monopoly-like game calling it heroquest quite legally

2. They have developed a game derived from MBs HeroQuest by altering sufficiently all the features by which copyright is judged. This is also legal, indeed there are many examples in RPGs at the moment of doing this with old games such as D&D first edition, an example is Swords & Wizardry. http://www.swordsandwizardry.com/

The problem comes, as I see it, is where they take the second item and try to market it under the first giving the impression they have the right to produce a new edition of the actual game orignally made by MB. They acknowledge in the interview that this is a commemorative version, not a new edition. If they want to produce a clone in memory of HQ go ahead, just don't call it "HeroQuest".

Putting those two things together puts them back at risk of breaching copyright principles, as I understand them.

So its OK to produce any type of game called "HeroQuest", and its OK to produce a specific game thats very similar to "HeroQuest", but its not OK to call the game thats similar to "HeroQuest", "HeroQuest"?

There seems to be more than enough publicity now for a KS for a game thats similar to HeroQuest, commemorating HeroQuest, and called HeroQuest in Spain but called something else in the USA... and to give Moon Designs the two finger salute (one finger in the USA of course - its their trademark after all.)

I'm not certain, but there still may be problems if they called it "HeroQuest" in Spain, due to the combination of original name attached to the clone boardgame suggesting authorised new edition therefore not paying royalties to the original designer etc., but I really don't know on that. I reckon they would be safer and much more secure simply renaming it.

Moon design, I believe, couldn't give a hoop what happens then, as they are not linked to a potential legal minefield, which, if you reread their statement, was their original condition in the first place, before Gamezone ignored their decision, and their demand for a license fee came into the picture.

The hiccup is the dead trademark. Forget copyright for a minute.

HeroQuest was at one point both a Hasbro and Games Workshop trademark. Those marks are lapsed and dead and the product is no longer in print.

However, GameZone's planned 25th Anniversary Edition of HeroQuest specifically calls to mind the now out of print Milton Bradley HeroQuest game and its associated, now defunct, trademark. That is the intent. GameZone has stated that this is the intent. I think one could probably make a colorable argument of trademark infringement via lingering association of the now dead HeroQuest mark with currently active marks, like Hasbro and Milton Bradley. There may also be room for a colorable argument of trademark dilution along the same lines.

That's a stretch, and I said earlier that dead marks do not rise from the grave thirsting for statutory damages, but having thought it over, a creative argument along the lines described above might just amount to the type of black sorcery aimed at doing exactly that. There's no telling if it would be successful, and I don't know if there is any US precedent along those lines. There's also no telling whether Hasbro or Games Workshop would dare to attempt such baleful legal necromancy.

Do any of y'all legal-minded folks have a thought on this hypothetical?

weeble1000 wrote:
The hiccup is the dead trademark. Forget copyright for a minute.

HeroQuest was at one point both a Hasbro and Games Workshop trademark. Those marks are lapsed and dead and the product is no longer in print.

However, GameZone's planned 25th Anniversary Edition of HeroQuest specifically calls to mind the now out of print Milton Bradley HeroQuest game and its associated, now defunct, trademark. That is the intent. GameZone has stated that this is the intent. I think one could probably make a colorable argument of trademark infringement via lingering association of the now dead HeroQuest mark with currently active marks, like Hasbro and Milton Bradley. There may also be room for a colorable argument of trademark dilution along the same lines.

That's a stretch, and I said earlier that dead marks do not rise from the grave thirsting for statutory damages, but having thought it over, a creative argument along the lines described above might just amount to the type of black sorcery aimed at doing exactly that. There's no telling if it would be successful, and I don't know if there is any US precedent along those lines. There's also no telling whether Hasbro or Games Workshop would dare to attempt such baleful legal necromancy.

Do any of y'all legal-minded folks have a thought on this hypothetical?

My understanding is different.

The hiccup is Moon Design have a specific condition for permitting the use of the name "HeroQuest" for the proposed boardgame in the US. They can do this as they hold the Trademark for the name "HeroQuest" in the US. Their specific condition for granting the license, is an official statement from Hasbro, who hold the rights (copyright?) to the boardgame itself that Gamezone have permission to produce a new edition of the game, thus protecting gamezone and Moon Design from accusations of infringement of the IP of the actual game.

Gamezone haven't produced that, indeed have said on several occasions that they are altering all the components and rules sufficiently that they do not need Hasbro's permission. If they did this and gave the game a different name, it would be legal as game mechanics cannot be copyrighted, but changing details to avoid paying copyright royalties, then giving the game the same name as the original and selling it essentially as a new edition of the original, would appear unethical at best, and possibly open them up to accusations of IP infringement again.

So the issue is about the copyrights, its always been about the copyrights.

Gamezone are completely free to issue a game commemorating the old HeroQuest boardgame, cloning the rules, as they have planned, but the problem is actually calling it "HeroQuest" without authorisation from Hasbro. If the called it, say "25 years of Heroes Questing" or something like that, they would be fine becvause they are not claiming it is the same game.

The thing is, Moon Design might not have an objectively reasonable basis to be concerned about liability. If Moon Design is concerned about legal exposure, it might also have considered tortious interference.

Moon Design complained to Kickstarter, causing quantifiable harm to the campaign. Hell, I would have been more worried about that as opposed to what Hasbro might do, as there was a large and daunting dollar amount raised as part of the campaign like a big flashing beacon of potential damages. There's also the fact that Stafford is known to have desired to make a HeroQuest board game, and arguably has a motivation to interfere with GameZone's Kickstarter in order to prevent GameZone from successfully establishing business relationships along those lines.

That risk seems a lot closer to home than wondering whether Hasbro will somehow come back and try to foist liability on a completely unrelated company that just happens to have picked up a word mark that Hasbro had used at one point in time.

This thing could get really ugly really quickly even if Habro stays out of it (and maybe even especially if Hasbro stays out of it), and again, this is why such matters should generally be handled in a more cool-headed manner. In worrying about one type of exposure, Moon Design may have exposed itself to something far more damaging. Consider what GameZone might do if Hasbro steps in and states that it does not feel that it has any rights to enforce in the matter. Like I said before, the only harm I have seen to date is the harm done to GameZone in the form of the torpedoed Kickstarter campaign, and we all know the dollar value of that campaign.

Is Psychman a UK based lawyer?

That would be a welcome addition to the ranks here!

weeble1000 wrote:
The thing is, Moon Design might not have an objectively reasonable basis to be concerned about liability. If Moon Design is concerned about legal exposure, it might also have considered tortious interference.
Moon Design complained to Kickstarter, causing quantifiable harm to the campaign....[snip]... In worrying about one type of exposure, Moon Design may have exposed itself to something far more damaging. Consider what GameZone might do if Hasbro steps in and states that it does not feel that it has any rights to enforce in the matter. Like I said before, the only harm I have seen to date is the harm done to GameZone in the form of the torpedoed Kickstarter campaign, and we all know the dollar value of that campaign.

Wow, I hadn't even thought of that. But, honestly, does anyone really believe Moon Design did it for anything other than as a money-grab? "Pay us to use the HeroQuest license, but also we want you to have Hasbro's permission, but also we want to make our own Heroquest boardgame, but WE won't need Hasbro's permission only you do, regardless give us lots of money."

The only ting I know for certain is...judgedoug sure does love and want him some Heroquest!