10 Gaming Moments That Led To Massive Lawsuits

Everyone was trying to break into the suddenly burgeoning video game market in the early 1980s, including Universal Studios. So they set about taking a look at this up-and-coming little Japanese company that had only recently made its American debut called Nintendo. They could, hopefully, learn from their success, and make a fortune making video games based off of their various properties.

Or they could say screw all that work and just make a fortune by suing them.

Universal alleged that they were owed damages for any confusion distinguishing the character King Kong from the character Donkey Kong, and that Nintendo either had to license the name Donkey Kong from them, or pull the game from the market outright. Too bad Universal apparently doesn't keep very good records.

Less than a decade prior, Universal had sued RKO Pictures, makers of the original film, for the rights to make a new King Kong film under the basis that the character - originally conceived in the 1920s - had entered into the public domain.

Naturally, Universal lost the suit, largely due to the very precedent they themselves set in their own battle to freely use the character.