Just a few short days after a class-action lawsuit filing in the California court system claiming that SEGA and Gearbox released and sold Aliens: Colonial Marines to the public under the pretense of false advertising, the two companies have responded by unsurprisingly dismissing it .
“SEGA cannot comment on specifics of ongoing litigation, but we are confident that the lawsuit is without merit and we will defend it vigorously,” the publisher said.
Gearbox, however, wasn’t quite so soft of the wording, defending its use of unlabeled demonstration walkthroughs.
“Attempting to wring a class action lawsuit out of a demonstration is beyond meritless. We continue to support the game, and will defend the rights of entertainers to share their works-in-progress without fear of frivolous litigation.”
As it stands, there’s little doubt that due to the very focused nature of the lawsuit that this whole scenario will ultimately end up just being withdrawn or thrown out by a judge. The damage has likely been done in the eyes of players however in terms of the public relations perception, more so for the developer Gearbox than Sega.
The response comes after news that co-developer Timegate Studios has filed for bankruptcy.
[Via Kotaku]
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I lost a lot of respect for Sega for even putting this out on store shelves and was really hoping a lawsuit towards the developer was forthcoming. Now it looks like that’s not happening as sega continues to support this mess and blacken their name further.
I loose respect for Sega every time they release a shitty game, at this point I have lost count.
You just lost a fan SEGA. Never thought i’d see the day where SEGA could be put next to the EAs and Activision blizzards of the industry. I didnt just lose a bit of respect, but all of it after this. No morals whatsoefuckingever.
Gearbox is right that showing a demo isn’t a lawsuit-worthy issue, but that Sega continued to use the false footage to advertise the game in commercials…well, for that, those suing SEGA may have a case…
This is true. Their continued use of that footage in ads is definitely grounds for false advertising. However, as it stands, this lawsuit will fail.
I suggest he gets his case together, with rooted evidence, and tries again. Right now, the body of this evidence just reads of a suit filed from emotion, and those usually fail in the hands of the law.
What i don’t understand is that gearbox is getting away with this, Sega has also fault on this, they allowed to bring the game out, and that is not good in my opinion. Sega have to learn that they must make their own games again and don’t give them to 3the party company’s. Look @ sonic generations, Binary domain, Yakuza 4. Ok Sumo digital makes the Sonic all star racing games, their also good.
One thing to remember with this is that Fox is also licensing out Aliens to Sega. They basically pressure Sega to bring out the game, and Sega was already rather irate with how many times Aliens kept getting pushed back by Gearbox and Timegate.
Basically, everyone’s to blame for this disaster. It’s a PR storm all around.
I find the reactions with regards to SEGA quite amazing. People are talking about SEGA having no morals and being an evil company. How so? SEGA poured something like $50,000,000 into the game, pushed it back a few YEARS, and then released it. They’re a business, and they need to NOT lose money in order to continue operating. So should they release a mediocre but fully functional game, or should they just drop all of that work and not make a penny off of their investment? Should they sell the game, or should they lay off potentially hundreds of employees with families and livelihoods?
If SEGA’s guilty of anything, it’s stupid business practice. Some of the top ranking employees at SEGA decided they wouldn’t bother checking up on Gearbox, and so they got away with doing virtually no work on the game for who knows how long. And you know, sales for the game dropped pretty quickly. The consumer dished out a harsh punishment in the form of the free market system.
The E3 demo that this whole lawsuit depends upon was almost a year old when the game was released. Since its release, there were at least half a dozen trailers that didn’t look quite so impressive. SEGA still had that demo footage up on the web, but there was PLENTY of time for any person interested in the game to see that the final build of the game wasn’t nearly what we saw at E3. Hell, even that “Contact” trailer looked pretty mediocre. Sure, the scripting and editing was slick, but those models were very unimpressive.
I still remember that absurd Killzone 2 “demo” back when we were in the last generation of consoles. That thing was almost assuredly prerendered, yet they claimed it was gameplay footage. I don’t remember anyone pressing charges against Sony for that. Maybe it’s because, like Aliens, there were trailers released closer to the game’s release that showed what the game was really like.
Aliens: Colonial Marines was a big, exciting AAA title that had a lot of fans eagerly anticipating it. I was one of those duped fans. But I can see bullshit in this lawsuit. What do you expect to win here? A refund? You’re taking SEGA to court for $59.99 plus tax? SEGA didn’t make you buy the game, they didn’t stop you from returning it, and by purchasing it you weren’t put into some sort of life-altering financial bind, or charged a bunch of sneaky extra expenses because they wrote a misleading, overly long contract. It’s a $60 game… that’s it. It also works. You can play through it, unlock all of its content, get the Achievements/Trophies, play online, just as you’d expect based on the trailers released shortly before the game launched. I’ve played games where you couldn’t even do all of those things as advertised, but nobody sued the publishers or developers.
Hiring a lawyer and taking SEGA to court over less than $100 of buyer’s remorse is a wonderful way to waste more of your time, and spend more of your money. If you’re that appalled by the game, then boycott SEGA and/or Gearbox, and let them know that you are, and why. That way you won’t have to go through the public humiliation of getting laughed out of court and having to pay SEGA and Gearbox’s legal fees. And considering neither SEGA nor Gearbox called that demo representative of the finished product, could this be considered defamation of character? I doubt either company would press those charges upon the party/parties involved in this lawsuit, but I don’t think they’d be wrong to follow through with it.
im confused by ur rant. r u saying that u agree with damion perrines illegitment lawsuit toward sega and gearbox for selling an outstanding 6 year development title that delivered everything they said it would do. gearbox had the balls to go the distance and release actual game footage a year before release. its a perfect game without a single bug or screen tear. with the most advanced a.i. ive seen. people should be thankful they even took the time to make a game for customers. what are they a video game developer? customers should buy anything the company makes reguardless if the game works or not.
by the way u have alittle something on ur nose
companies are going to continue doing the bare minimum. seeing what they can get away with and still make a profit. the only way to get them to listen to the consumer is to put a dent in their porfit. economics 101 in other words money talks and bs walks