Breaking News: WWE Files Lawsuit

[Guest wrestling365]

The WWE have filed a lawsuit against Jakks Pacific,

whom they have a videogame license with the joint venture

of Jakks and THQ. The suit names as defendants certain

individuals employed by the corporate defendants, including

specifically Jack Friedman, Stephen Berman and Joel Bennett,

the three highest-ranking executives of Jakks, and Stanley

Shenker and James Bell.

 

The suit alleges numerous violations of the Racketeer

Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act; violations of the

anti-bribery provisions of the Robinson-Patman Act; and

various claims arising under state law. By the action, WWE

is seeking treble, punitive and other damages, as well as

a declaration that the videogame license with the joint venture

of Jakks and THQ, and a related amendment to the toy license

with Jakks, are void and unenforceable due to commercial

bribery and other violations of state law. The lawsuit can be

viewed at corporate.wwe.com

[Black Lushus 0]

EDIT: calls bullshit

[Lord of The Curry 0]

It's legit.

[Black Lushus 0]

lame

[Hunter's Torn Quad 0]

Maybe they can resolve this with a game of No Mercy ? Vince and O'Shea taking on two of the executives.

[Guest Trivia247]

guess that means no more Smackdown games

[Spaceman Spiff 0]

Full statement:

STAMFORD, Conn., October 19, 2004 --World Wrestling Entertainment, Inc. (“WWE”) today filed a fourteen count complaint in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York against Jakks Pacific, Inc. (“Jakks”), two foreign subsidiaries of Jakks, THQ, Inc. (“THQ”), a joint venture involving Jakks and THQ, Stanley Shenker & Associates, Inc. (“SSAI”) and Bell Licensing, LLC. The suit also names as defendants certain individuals employed by the corporate defendants, including specifically Jack Friedman, Stephen Berman and Joel Bennett, the three highest-ranking executives of Jakks, and Stanley Shenker and James Bell.

 

The suit alleges numerous violations of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act (RICO); violations of the anti-bribery provisions of the Robinson-Patman Act; and various claims arising under state law. By the action, WWE is seeking treble, punitive and other damages, as well as a declaration that the videogame license with the joint venture of Jakks and THQ, and a related amendment to the toy license with Jakks, are void and unenforceable due to commercial bribery and other violations of state law. The lawsuit can be viewed at corporate.wwe.com.

 

The suit arises out of litigation initially commenced by SSAI against WWE in Connecticut state court for commissions SSAI claimed it had earned while serving as WWE’s licensing agent. During that litigation, WWE discovered certain irregularities in its licensing program beginning in the 1998 time frame when SSAI served as WWE’s licensing agent and Bell served as WWE’s Senior Vice President of Licensing and Merchandising. Specifically, WWE learned in the Connecticut state court proceeding that SSAI split its commissions with Bell on various licenses allegedly procured by SSAI and recommended to WWE management by Bell. WWE also learned that certain licensees had paid monies into a foreign bank account controlled by Shenker during the time he was WWE’s licensing agent. In the Connecticut case, the Court found that Stanley Shenker had committed serial perjury in order to cover up his payments to Bell and his receipt of monies in a foreign bank account from WWE licensees, including Jakks, and granted a default judgment in favor of WWE against SSAI on counterclaims asserted against SSAI. The Court in the Connecticut case has also granted partial summary judgment against Bell in favor of WWE on claims asserted against Bell by WWE.

 

The federal lawsuit filed by WWE against Jakks and the other defendants relates to a series of payments made in 1998 to Shenker’s foreign bank account by two foreign subsidiaries of Jakks. The Company has discovered that the payments in question were then split with Bell by Shenker. Two of the payments in question occurred during the time that WWE was in the process of selecting a licensee for videogames featuring WWE talent. One of the payments was directed to be made by Jakks’ officers on the same day that SSAI and Bell recommended that the videogame license be granted to Jakks. The third payment was made after the videogame license was awarded to a joint venture of Jakks and THQ.

 

In a statement issued today, Linda McMahon, the Chief Executive Officer of WWE, stated:

 

“We very much regret having to take this action today, but regret even more the facts and circumstances which have compelled us to do so. WWE’s intellectual property is a valuable asset of the Company, and we believe the actions taken today are necessary to preserve the integrity of our licensing process and essential to ensure that WWE receives appropriate and fair compensation for the grant of a license to use our intellectual property.”

 

Jakks has been WWE’s toy licensee since late 1995 and the current toy licenses are otherwise set to expire in 2009. The joint venture of Jakks and THQ obtained the videogame license in 1998, with its term also scheduled to expire in 2009, subject to a right to renew the license by the joint venture for another five years on certain conditions.

[Guest wrestling365]

EDIT: calls bullshit

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Calls this BS

[David Blazenwing 0]

Damn... SD vs. RAW better still be coming out or I'll be pissed.

[DrVenkman PhD 0]

Jakks violated Rico!

[RavishingRickRudo 0]

“We very much regret having to take this action today, but regret even more the facts and circumstances which have compelled us to do so. WWE’s intellectual property is a valuable asset of the Company, and we believe the actions taken today are necessary to preserve the integrity of our licensing process and essential to ensure that WWE receives appropriate and fair compensation for the grant of a license to use our intellectual property.”

 

Linda is so hot when she talks legal stuff.

 

"Dear diary: Jackpot." - Quagrudo

[Guest Dynamite Kido]

I wonder if this will have any bearing on weather or not SD vs. RAW will come out on November 3rd or not now?

[Silence 0]

EA and AKI probably wouldn't be good replacements now since I've read about their Ultimate Muscle wrestling games not being as great as the wrestling games that AKI used to produce.

 

On the other hand, their Def Jam games were said to be OK, so I'm not sure who else WWE could find as their new publisher and developer.

 

Since Yukes isn't being sued, though, maybe another publisher will work with them.

[thuganomics 0]

I highly doubt this in anyway will effect any current product releases as it has to do with an incident in 98 with money being transferred behind the WWE's back.

 

Any current product could still be easily released and marketed, and any continuing products WWE could refuse to aid the company on, but they would then face a breach of contract lawsuit.

 

My guess is nothing at all will be noticable from this thing. Instead, we'll get a quick out of court decision as none of these companies want to lose the cash that this lisencing deal brings in.

[Guest DVD Spree]

EA and AKI probably wouldn't be good replacements now since I've read about their Ultimate Muscle wrestling games not being as great as the wrestling games that AKI used to produce.

 

On the other hand, their Def Jam games were said to be OK, so I'm not sure who else WWE could find as their new publisher and developer.

If you think AKI aren't just itching like fuck to make another straight-up wrestling game, you're nuts.

 

I'm not sure whether this will all turn out to be a lot of hot air, and I know Jakks are pretty good on the toys side of things, but as far as the games division goes they could do far worse than get a million miles away from the steaming heap of shit that is THQ. I'm sure EA will be eager to strike a deal if the WWE plays ball, since Acclaim were the only other big player when it came to wrestling licenses.

[Guest curry_man2002]

could someone please explain to me what is goin on in plain english please (a brief few sentence summary so some average 16 year old like myself can understand what the hell has gone on)

 

Thanks in advance

[Guest DVD Spree]

could someone please explain to me what is goin on in plain english please (a brief few sentence summary so some average 16 year old like myself can understand what the hell has gone on)

 

Jakks are dirty. THQ plain sucks.

[CBright7831 0]

NOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!

 

[frisco 0]

If THQ loses the rights to make WWE wrestling games I will be pissed.

They have the contract unitl 2009 which is good. ALso WWE's legal team kind of sucks as evidenced by their comical efforts against the world wildlife fund. Hopefully the two sides will settle this out of court which is what I think will actually happen.

There's some talk EA will get the license but again I hope not. If a new developer is bought into make the WWE games they will be going back to square one and starting the whole process. The Smackdown games are in their sixth year so anything that comes out will be a pretty big step backwards.

[Jobber of the Week 0]

If THQ loses the rights to make WWE wrestling games I will be pissed.

Why? THQ keeps bringing out different wrestling games on different consoles that all suck. The funny thing is that some of the dev teams really know that what everyone wants is an AKI system, but nobody will give it to them.

 

THQ is responsible for abortions like the Xbox/Cube games. SmackDown series hasn't been good for anything other than looking more like the TV product than the other games.

 

Anyway, this is stupid. I was thinking at first they might be suing a current/former worker or something.

[dubq 0]

I don't know why people are shitting on THQ for crappy games. THQ is the publisher. Yuke's is the developer [ie: they make the games]. That, and the Smackdown series hasn't sucked in a while. The HCTP engine, IMO, kicks the over-rated AKI engine's ass... and this is coming from a self-professed No Mercy 64 fanboy, himself.

[AndrewTS 0]

Jaysus people--go to the VG boards for this stuff.

 

Filtering out the bullcrap:

 

The lawsuit will likely affect just Jakks and not THQ, as a press release has already stated. There's no reason to forsee THQ losing the rights to publish WWE games. THQ themselves have acted in good faith.

 

Smackdown vs. Raw is coming out as scheduled.

 

THQ has always been the PUBLISHER.

 

The Smackdown games were developed by Yukes.

 

The Raw games were made by Anchor, but they're canned and Team Gigante is developing the next X-Box game.

 

The Gamecube games were developed by Yukes, although by a different team than the Smackdown games (one that included some former AKI programmers).

 

Now the opinion portion of my reply...

 

If EA *were* to acquire the license (very unlikely at this point in time), I wonder if AKI would be working on it or they'd get another developer to do it? I'd expect another Mayhem sooner than I'd expect another No Mercy.

 

"The HCTP engine, IMO, kicks the over-rated AKI engine's ass... "

 

HAHAHAHAHA!! They absolutely shot gameplay balance to hell with that game. Plus after SD, SD2, Just Bring It, SYM, and HCTP--it still is only *arguably* better than the engine(s) AKI made many years ago that were "perfected" in far fewer games and far more quickly than Yukes titles. If you want to count Yukes' and AKI's Japanese games, it becomes even more embarassing for Yukes.

 

SD vs. Raw is going to be the 6th SD game and I still expect plenty of flaws in gameplay when they should have gotten it down to a science by now.

[mister foozel 0]

I don't know why people are shitting on THQ for crappy games. THQ is the publisher. Yuke's is the developer [ie: they make the games]. That, and the Smackdown series hasn't sucked in a while. The HCTP engine, IMO, kicks the over-rated AKI engine's ass... and this is coming from a self-professed No Mercy 64 fanboy, himself.

i was very disappointed with the HCTP fighting engine

 

i expected, and wanted, basically, an updated version of no mercy

 

i would have very much enjoyed that instead of what HCTP is