Why is it difficult to protect game ideas with legal rights?

When talking about games, the topic of 'that game is very similar to that game' is endless, and this kind of topic often leads to controversy. Taking the word guessing game ' Wordle ', which has been a huge hit all over the world, as an example, Ars Technica, an IT news site, explains 'Why is it difficult to protect game ideas with legal rights?' increase.

Wordle and IP law: What happens when a hot game gets cloned | Ars Technica
https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2022/01/wordle-and-ip-law-what-happens-when-a-hot-game-gets-cloned/

Wordle is a browser game developed by Josh Wardle, a former Reddit employee, who guesses the subject five-letter word during six trials. Initially, Mr. Wardle published Wordle just for himself and his partner to play, but as a result of adding the function to easily share the play results on Twitter, the popularity has become overheated. Despite being a simple game, it was bought by American news giant The New York Times for hundreds of millions of yen.

The problem with the 'Pakuri app' is around this Wordle. As mentioned above, Wordle is a browser game created by Mr. Wardle privately, and there is no app version. However, as a result of Wordle's popularity igniting, many Wordle pakuri apps have appeared in the iOS and Android app stores.

It seems that Apple has taken measures for the Pakuri app that was distributed on iOS, and it was deleted all at once on January 12, 2022. The following article explains in detail what kind of game Wordle is and how the Pakuri app was deleted all at once on iOS.

Immediately after it was reported that a lot of copy apps of the popular word guessing game 'Wordle' were flooded in Apple's App Store, they disappeared all at once --GIGAZINE

Ars Technica argues that Wordle is 'difficult to legally protect a particular game idea in the first place.' Wordle is a game that guesses a five-letter word, but at least in 1955, the person who gives the theme decides the correct answer, the person who solves it writes the word he thinks, and the person who gives the theme answers. There was an analog game that could be called a 'two-player version of Wordle' that gives hints by comparing it.

In patent applications, novelty and inventive step are required for the products filed, so there is a possibility that those with 'prior art' do not meet the requirements. According to Ars Technica, the existence of the same type of game 'Jotto' that existed before Wordle is a prior art, so it is difficult to recognize that Wordle has novelty and inventive step. There are cases where the US Patent and Trademark Office has granted patents for ideas that have little novelty or inventive step, such as the ghost mode of racing games and the concept of sanity of ' Eternal Darkness ~ Invited 13 People ~ '. The process of filing a patent is so tedious that it is practically difficult to file a patent for a game idea that is not 'completely new.'

As mentioned above, it is difficult to 'legally protect the idea of the game'. However, on the other hand, it is possible to 'legally protect the concrete expression method of the idea', and in the case of Wordle, the design aspects such as Wordle's user interface and layout are legally protected. And that. Ars Technica sets a precedent for this type of proceeding, citing the case that The Tetris Company, which manages the copyright and license of ' Tetris ', sued and won a Tetris clone game that existed in the App Store.

In the case of Wordle this time, 'trademark' is also a seed. The name 'Wordle' has been filed as a trademark of software released in 2010 and software released in 2013, and although these applications have been withdrawn, it is a unique name for the puzzle game developed by Mr. Wardle. I can't say. Focusing on the App Store, there was a game of the same name before Mr. Wardle developed Wordle.

Wordle! On the App Store
https://apps.apple.com/us/app/wordle/id1095569891

For games that are easy to imitate, such as Wordle, there is a danger that their status will be threatened by numerous Pakuri games, even if they are popular. Ars Technica touches on the copyright law issue I've discussed this time and commented, 'For better or for worse, Wordle clones are inevitable.'