Classic Rockers Send Their Lawyers After Wolfgang's Vault

Latest Wii Sport: The Class-Action Lawsuit Game

from the inevitable dept

Wed, Dec 20th 2006 8:39am — Carlo Longino

In a completely unsurprising move, some lawyers have filed a class-action suit against Nintendo following widespread reports of overzealous gamers breaking the wrist straps on the console's controllers and injuring themselves in the process. Nintendo's already replacing the straps with heartier versions, so somehow the suit's claim that it wants "Nintendo to correct the defect in the Wii remote and to provide a refund to the purchaser or to replace the defective Wii remote with a Wii remote that functions as it is warranted and intended" seems a little off. Of course, these suits are never about the class they're supposedly representing, are they? What's next -- a class-action suit on behalf of out-of-shape people who get muscle pains and soreness after playing games using the motion-sensitive controller?

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23 Comments

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Bumbling old fool, 20 Dec 2006 @ 8:45am

Even Better!

Even better, how about a class action suit against Microsoft and Sony for making xboxen and ps3ers fat by not encouraging physical activity?
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Dec 2006 @ 8:54am

wait, the suit claims that Nintento should replace the controllers that broke?

umm...they are doing that themselves, right?

i bet nintendo did a limited study on how a user will handle the wiimote. from my understanding, very little motion is needed to determine movement. evenstill, moving faster/harder/longer doens't make you move faster/harder/longer in the game. they figured everyoen would be nice and calm, not trying to be the next mace windu or yoda by swing everything around.

nintendo should have thought of that, and made the controllers stronger to hold up to 10x the force produced by the uber movement.....ohwell

another reason why america is the "greattest nation in the universe"
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- Anonymous Coward, 20 Dec 2006 @ 9:45am
  
  Re:
  I find that moving fast helps you time things better and more realistically. After playing wii sports for god knows how many hours, I havent yet dropped the wiimote once. I dont know whether the strap would hold. Ill just say that in real sports if you dont WIPE YOUR HANDS, theyll be sweaty and you will drop your racket/club/ball/bat
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- DittoBox, 20 Dec 2006 @ 12:04pm
  
  Re:
  You know it to be true...
  
  http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2006/11/13
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Sanguine Dream, 20 Dec 2006 @ 8:57am

Oh come on...
we all knew that with the motion sensor technology Nintendo was planning for the Wii that there was an ambulance chaser out there waiting for a chance to sue Nintendo over something related to the Wii.

"Nintendo to correct the defect in the Wii remote and to provide a refund to the purchaser or to replace the defective Wii remote with a Wii remote that functions as it is warranted and intended"

Don't be surpised if the document that this bit came from was written in anticipation of a lawsuit against Nintendo
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sonny, 20 Dec 2006 @ 9:20am

I have an idea...
lets sue the makers of baseball bats and golf clubs, they don't even HAVE straps!! I hit my self in the head with a baseball bat and broke my t.v. with a golf club... is there a lawyer in the house..???
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E, 20 Dec 2006 @ 9:23am

The lawsuit is complete BS anyway. If you read it, it calls the wiimote defective because the strap does not prevent the wiimote from "leaving the hand." Anyone see a problem with that? Like the fact that if the strap breaks, it means the wiimote has already slipped out of the gamer's hand?

I have to say, I've gotten overzealous myself while trying to smack those pins in some wii bowling. But every time, the strap has come to save my ass (and my friend's TV). And since it happened twice in one session, I've learned to better control it (and not play so drunk). These people who are swinging it around so hard that it flies out of their hand and the strap snaps are OBVIOUSLY playing harder than they need to, and should sue their parents for both their natural and nurtured intellectual defects.
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Dec 2006 @ 9:23am

Re: Oh come on...
Don't be surpised if the document that this bit came from was written in anticipation of a lawsuit against Nintendo

i completely agree with you on that. note the use of wii remote and no mention of the strap... some overzealous lawyer probably figured that a motion sensing controller was bound to have problem due to the motion sensing, never realizing that nintendo is a god among video game companies and the motion sensor would work just dandy. it's overzealous american gamers that were the problem, and the straps just couldn't handle it. i know they've recalled the wiimotes in japan but does japan have an equivalent of wiihaveaproblem.com?
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- American man, 20 Dec 2006 @ 10:40am
  
  Re: Re: Oh come on...
  Nice way to throw Americans under the bus coward. I'm sure the Wiimote launching is not a problem exclusive to American gamers. It's a problem exclusive to fucking idiots. At a certain point the strength of your swing does nothing more than endanger the people and objects around you. There are more than enough warnings on the packaging materials and on screen during the game to let anyone with half a brain know to pay attention. btw, if lawyers can sue Nintendo for this bullshit then Nintendo should be able to counter sue all the idiots for using the product incorrectly.
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  - Buzz, 20 Dec 2006 @ 10:42am
    
    Re: Re: Re: Oh come on...
    LOL! *signs American man's comment*
    
    We really should be able to sue stupid people for their untold damage on society.
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Confused, 20 Dec 2006 @ 9:24am

I've been playing with my friend's Wii (no jokes please) since the day it launched. The straps seem plenty strong and I have to let go of the thing as I was using it. I would like the lawyers who created this lawsuit to show how these straps break through intended use.

These people must be swinging these things around by the strap, that's the only way I could see these things breaking.
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Robert, 20 Dec 2006 @ 9:45am

Replace them with what?
I'm quite sure that if Nintendo replaced the straps with titanium threaded straps someone somewhere would find some way to still break their TV, hand, or someone else's head one way or another. Heck, I've seen soiled little brats break TV's, controllers and systems when the controllers weren't motions sensitive, and had cords, all from temper alone.
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AC, 20 Dec 2006 @ 9:47am

Straps
I got a wii on launch day and have never had a problem with the controller flying out of my hand unless I'm under the influence. I'm not sure what all these people are doing to break the straps but they aren't using it like it was intended.

I hate stupid people.
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anonymous coward, 20 Dec 2006 @ 10:04am

how long until some kid gets an eye poked out by his buddy swinging wildly with a wii controller?

i'll bet there is a lawsuit before the end of the year with the required hyperbolic media headline for the Dateline expose, "Video games blinding our children...".
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Anonymous Coward, 20 Dec 2006 @ 10:06am

You know, maybe their mistake was in trying to remind you to put the strap on. That is some kind of implicit warrant that the strap works. Maybe if they just begged you to be careful and then to put two and two together, they wouldnt be considered liable, since they just told you to be careful.
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a dude that can't stand lawyers, 20 Dec 2006 @ 10:07am

Shoot (uh..i mean sue) the lawyers,
for enabling this stupidity that is infecting the US. time for a gene pool cleansing. Lawyers first, then the stupid people (because it's not really their fault)

ok .. a little severe, but honsetly.. there would be fewer of these suits if the ones that got thrown out resulted in fines or penalties for the lawyers involved with starting it.
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philanthropy, 20 Dec 2006 @ 10:13am

Lawyers first, then the stupid people (because it's not really their fault)

That made my day.
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THE MAN, 20 Dec 2006 @ 10:19am

great idea
I am going to be rich. All I need is to fing a child........If I really try hard and significantly maim and blind mine, maybe my wife won't be so pissed off when we are rich.
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- Anonymous Coward, 20 Dec 2006 @ 10:32am
  
  Re: great idea
  im no expert but im pretty sure if you "fing" a child you go to jail, not get rich.
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dave, 20 Dec 2006 @ 10:32am

Re: Shoot (uh..i mean sue) the lawyers
I've got a better way. Screw 90% of civil law and take the warning labels off products, then let natural selection do it's part.
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Buzz, 20 Dec 2006 @ 10:34am

Brilliant
I own a Nintendo Wii. I can reaffirm the fact that these people who are throwing their Wii remotes across the room are using way too much force. It's nothing but sheer stupidity. The game does not recognize/promote stronger motions. It doesn't even have the capacity to do so. It does recognize speed, but people don't seem to understand that a slight flick of the wrist is dozens times faster than a full-fledged arm motion.

Obviously, in a real game of tennis, you need that power to make the ball fly faster. In Wii, very small, quick motions do the trick. I second the motion in that I hate stupid people. I very rarely have to tell people to calm down when playing my Wii because they see how relaxed I am when I play. They see that I can win games with minimal physical effort.
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Liberty Dave, 20 Dec 2006 @ 1:08pm

No one is surprised
This is our society here in the United States, and most other places of the world. You're not responsible for anything that goes wrong in your life, it's not your fault, it's the fault of someone or something else.

This is what we get when we allow this philosophy to gain ground.

This is what we get when lawyers can get rich off of these types of lawsuits. Just like in a free market, if there's a market for something (meaning you can make a profit on something) then people will attempt to fill that need due to the fact that you can make a profit at it. Lawyers have seen that they can make money on class action lawsuits in the U.S. due to our inability to curtail this activity, and our liberal minded judges that would actually allow this crap to be heard at all.

It sucks, but it's always going to happen, it's going to get sillier (from spilling hot coffee on your crotch to suing for being fat because you ate too much fast food) and it's not going to stop until major changes are made in the minds of people.
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Triggy, 19 Jan 2007 @ 10:20am

This Made My day
Seriously, this is the high point of my school day right now. Thank you all.

And I also agrre with it all. I've played my friends Wii, and the strap saved me, as well as his tv on quite a few occations. Idiots that get over-zealous with the wiimote deserve to get maimed.
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