Lawsuit
Konami filed a lawsuit against Roxor Games on an infringement of various rights on May 9, 2005 in the Eastern District of Texas, a district known for its bias for the plaintiff in patent cases. Additionally, they amended their complaint on July 1, 2005, to include the dance game "MC GROOVZ danceCRAZE" (a game produced by Mad Catz to accompany their 3rd party dance mat). Konami primarily claims that Roxor has infringed their dancing game patent rights, but also goes on to claim that the refitting of arcade cabinets "has been done in an infringing and unfair way".
On July 10, 2005, however, Konami amended its complaint to include the In The Groove PS2 game and its publisher RedOctane. On July 25, 2005, Roxor Games filed a counterclaim against Konami. In the counterclaim, Roxor denies the claims in Konami's complaint, stating that 'In The Groove' does not violate patent law and that claiming that Konami has engaged in unfair competition.
However, the lawsuit ultimately ended in a settlement. On October 18, 2006, Roxor announced that Konami had acquired the intellectual property rights to the In the Groove series as part of the settlement to this litigation. The musicians and developers of the game would later go on to create Pump it Up Pro, a spinoff of the Pump it Up series featuring music and features from ITG.
Read more about this topic: In The Groove (video game)