It wasn’t complex at all. It’s incredibly simple
Comment on Sony AI patent will see PlayStation games play themselves when players are stuck
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 3 days agoThey patented a very specific algorithm for a very specific kind of game. You can still do knock-offs of the system in the same way you can make RTS games without asking Blizzard’s permission or platformers without asking Nintendo’s.
I would suspect that SoM’s system is complex enough that nobody’s been eager to try and replicate it. But they high level concept of randomized enemy generation isn’t something you can patent. Neither is randomizing story elements between NPCs.
Lemming6969@lemmy.world 3 days ago
FinalRemix@lemmy.world 3 days ago
Digital Extremes was going to do something somewhat similar with their nemesis system jut had to scrap it because of that patent. So now we have the mediocre Lich/Sister/Boyband systems in place instead.
UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world 3 days ago
The Lich system was pretty close to the mark. Possible that developers gave the underlying features of SoM a wide berth out of caution, but so much of this seems to boil down to “we don’t want to risk the possibility of a lawsuit” rather than “we can’t just do our thing and see if WB’s lawyers care enough”.
So long as you’re not directly ripping off the code from another system, patent courts have been pretty generous in interpreting overlapping abstract concepts.
But any kind of suit is scary, particularly for studios that aren’t geared up to fight them.