Speak of the devil and he shall appear! To cut a long story short (which you can find out more on here), the folks at PlayStation have been in legal squabbles with the folks at Dbrand because they both want to make PlayStation console faceplates! Yadda, yadda, yadda, patents bad, artistic cancel culture, you know, sunshine and rainbows all around.

PlayStation recently announced it’s ‘console covers’ will be releasing in January 2022, coming in 5 different colours as shown above, set to match with the current and upcoming coloured controller variants. The upcoming controller colours are confirmed to be Nova Pink, Starlight Blue and Galactic Purple, so I guess someone’s been taking notes from the Nintendo School of Controller Naming… Not that I can blame them, I mean, ‘neon green’ and ‘metallic black’ sound like perfume chains launched by BTS!

Despite the January 2022 global release, Galactic Purple will be coming to the PlayStation Direct online store early in the US, UK and Germany. Sales there will start on January 14th, while the full global release will roll out to other retailers on February 11th. Black and red versions will be available via the store from January 21, while other retailers get them on February 18.

Do you want the bad news or the good news first? When the Dbrand madlads started selling their PS5 Darkplates in February this year, they sold out within a few hours and will currently be out of stock until May! The good news (for PlayStation) is that Dbrand had to release a statement a month ago declaring how ‘Darkplates are dead’, after a cease and desist letter from Sony lawyers threatening to sue if they continued… Yayyy capitalism!!!

PLOT TWIST, days later the Dbrand madlads released ANOTHER statement essentially saying “oh, honey boo boo, we said Darkplates are dead, we didn’t say anything about Darkplates 2.0”, at which point, every PlayStation exec decided to commit honorable sudoku in the bathtub with Keurig’s latest Ribbed For Her Pleasure Coffee Machine… I’m exaggerating, but not by much.

Product Poems:

Darkplates and Dark Souls imply existence of Dark Bowls and Light Souls?

There was once a young woman named Barbie, one day she got bit by a zombie! But she didn’t turn, for soon she would learn, she had no brains- “oh, harder Harvey”!

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The post Saga Continues! PlayStation Console Covers V Darkplates! first appeared on Get2Gaming.

In case my analyses on the Steam Deck controller patent and the Dbrand-Sony PS5 squabble didn’t tip you off, I suppose you could say I have severely Orwellian anti-corporate views on patents in gaming tech and mechanics, to put it mildly.

Sony recently patented a collaborative path-building mechanic that’s reportedly near-identical to the system found in their PlayStation exclusive Death Stranding (Psst, click here if you want to get the director’s cut of the game). The patent is titled “Terrain radar and gradual building of a route in a virtual environment of a video game,” citing Hideo Kojima as the creator, despite having (as far as I am aware of) no mention of any kind of royalties to Kojima for using his version of the system (not that that would make things much better).

In short, this is basically the same debacle as Warner Bros patenting the nemesis system making it so other creatives can’t use it to make games with a new spin on the format. Click here for the full Sony patent if you’ve got a handful of hours to kill and a fetish for dense legal jargon.

The patent’s core features for it’s patent of the mechanic include tracking info on who creates which pathways in-game, how often they’re used, basically all the bells and whistles of Death Stranding.

Speaking of which, Hideo Kojima has gone on record stating his dislike of the PS5 version titled as ‘The Director’s Cut’ because the original experience is a fully complete Kojima-accurate experience anyway, whereas ‘director’s cut’ usually denotes a version where the director has more creative control that wasn’t allowed for during the first release. I rank that three Etymology Points out of 5, for a deeper dive into the use and artistic philosophy of director’s cuts, have a butcher’s at Hbomberguy’s video on the topic… You know, this guy:

Needless to say, this is one of those rare times where I’ll admit that the ‘slippery slope’ argument is actually valid! And if you’ll indulge my intertextual poetic interlude coming up: First they came for the loading screens and I did not speak because… Well, I wasn’t born yet for that one! Then they came for the multiplayer collaborative features, and I 100% spoke the f*ck up because I’m into that shit! Then they came for the first-person shooters and I was like “okay, well I’m none to good at those, whatevs”. Then they came for the soulslikes and I said “who ’bout to catch these hands”, at which point the judge gingerly gestures over to Bobbert Kotique.

Product Poems:

I knew a mug name Tina, she from Shiganshina, cooking rice balls but can kick it back hard on Fifa.

Dying Light implies Living Darkness… Sleep paralysis weird, yo.

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The post On Sony Patent for Death Stranding Pathfinder Sytem! first appeared on Get2Gaming.

Sony has recently gained a patent that allows allows them to make covers and skins for PS5 consoles. The patent was filed for in 2020 and confirmed under the title ‘Cover For Electronic Device’ this year, including diagrams of PS5 faceplates.

Considering the last time I got talking about patents in gaming, let’s just say there’s a couple potential concerns regarding the practice of patenting certain types of tech, to put it mildly. Mainly how it is arguably a slippery slope to restricting outlines of creative input from people who want to put a new spin on existing tech and game mechanics.

Luckily, the new PS5 patent describes itself as covering “the ornamental design for a cover for an electronic device”, so as long as no one copies that specific design, I doubt you’ll get in trouble for painting ahegao faces on yours and selling it for £69.69 (nice)… Well, that’s what I’d like to say.

The Canadian peripheral firm Dbrand has been in a lengthy legal battle with Sony over its creation of unique version of faceplates known as ‘Darkplates’. Darkplates recently sold out after a successful February discount sale. Unfortunately though, Dbrand has also announced that Darkplates are dead and Sony killed them, which is to say, Sony Interactive Entertainment filed a cease and desist letter that made Dbrand stop selling their product… The aristocrats!

BUT WAIT, there’s more! Not long after Dbrand announced the “death” of its Darkplates, they posted an update to their website. “Checkmate, lawyers” followed by a confirmation of Darkplates 2.0 for PS5 consoles… Yay capitalism!

“You can’t successfully sue someone over an alleged ‘design infringement’ without a registered design patent […] Sony did not have a registered design patent for the PS5’s side panels when we launched Darkplates (or for many, many months following the release). We didn’t think they’d ever get one. They did. Here we are.” – Dbrand.

“[Darkplates 2.0] successfully closes the loop on this dispute and neutralises any future infringement claims from Sony” – Dbrand.

“Happy to license this design to you, Sony, you’ll find that our rates are outrageous” – OOOOH! And the crowd goes wild!

Product Poems:

PS5 Controller. True boulder holder. Like Xbox X.

Bobby Kotick, small streaming stick. Purge from Blizzard like Morty, Rick.

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The post PS5 New Patent and Dbrand Battle: What to Know first appeared on Get2Gaming.