(Emphasis mine)

the test is called "Substantial Similarity" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Substantial_similarity):

There's not a lot of solid case law here, but you can see some previous cases explored over at: http://www.gamasutra.com/view/feature/187385/clone_wars_the_five_most_.php.

You can see from examples like Yeti Town, that completely different art assets, and a different UI layout, wasn't distinct enough. Conversely, Meteors was basically just a modernization of Asteroids, and it was protected.

Honestly, I think they have something here. It's like if you had the trademark to the name Mickey Mouse but not the copyrights to the design. If your new character has the same silhouette as the famous Disney character they're probably going to take issue.

So what I don't understand is why when you only have the rights to the name Star Control, you all but remade SC2? If this hadn't become so acrimonious I imagine they wouldn't have decided to exercise (what they believe to be) their rights. 

Except that Mickey Mouse has a whole lot of protection on it that isn't on the Star Control property.

And I also would say that they did not remake Star Control 2. It's in the same family, and uses similar design concepts, but it isn't the same game. And I'm sure Stardock will press that point very hard if this makes it to court.

And yes, I 100% agree that this wouldn't have gotten so out of hand if the parties hadn't gotten frustrated with each other.

Been busy with having the flu and work, only noticed this DMCA nonsense recently. I sincerely hope you're able to file a counter-claim, get the games back up on Steam/GOG, and crush them in this lawsuit. This is a horrible precedent by them and probably terrifies the entire industry. Maybe that alone will lead to some revisions in the law? ESA should be all over this lobbying congress for a change.

Reminder:

This went to court.

Court determined not-infringing.

Kotaku write up on this that came out this past week: https://kotaku.com/the-fighting-game-capcom-tried-to-get-pulled-from-arcad-1831460432 

Not infringing:

But according to Reiche and Ford this infringes:

What about star wars, or Babylon 5 they use hyperspace. 

Brad is the one who said it is in a different universe, not me.

In Babylon 5 the hyperspace is red!  Expect lawsuit 2 any day now.

You should deploy an update that changes the color of hyperspace to green, or blue.  Not because you have to, but just to turn the knife a little.

Brad and other all other Stardock’s employees affected by this, I wish you the very best through this ordeal.  It is too bad the love of this franchise is the cause of so much anguish.  I sincerely hope you all rise again stronger than ever when this is over.

I hope Paul and Fred Ford win this battle. Star Control Origins had a junky story. It's a pale shadow to the glory that was SC2 in terms of storytelling, intricacy, and depth. Stardock had 25 years of game development, experience, computing and graphical improvements to draw on since SC2 came out and they still couldn't put out a game that matches up much less improves on the original. Doesn't matter how much Brad and his people were fans of the original game. They just don't got the juju. They don't understand what makes a good story. Don't understand the nuances of what creates an enjoyable game experience. Literally all they did was create a new engine from scratch to recreate what SC2's game engine did, and then brought in a slob to write the story. Shame on you guys. And shame on the US legal system if they don't judge in favor of Paul and Fred. 

"Personally, I've been rooting for you guys for a while now because while Paul and Fred made no move to revive the franchise, you spent hard cash and put this monumental task on your shoulders. So I don't see Stardock as the bad guys here, quite the opposite."

Xiaorai ...vacillate, waver...fence-sit ...it has to be a pain hopping from one foot to another....;)

The sad thing about the internet is nothing is ever lost.  The record is eternal, and tends to bite people in the bum frequently...;)

It's why the youth of this world hoping to eke out a future/career really need to avoid social media [in particular].  For someone old enough [like me] not to care/fear it's a doddle, and yet I tend to avoid it all the same...;)

[Really dumb comment suggesting he knows more because he has more money than Jafo removed]

What really sucks about this situation (and I personally think that while FF and PR could have had a case, what they presented was specious and barratry) is that the IP is now poisoned.

Even if Stardock "wins", the damage to the Star Control brand's goodwill due to this stupid fight over property that FF and PR seem to claim (despite their own acknowledgement on the intellectual debts elsewhere) probably make another game in this series too risky for an small developer to take on given other priorities.  The "win" is in quotes because being right does not necessarily equate to selling games, and opportunity cost of making another game for this franchise keeps on getting higher the longer this runs.  What makes me mad is that FF and PR know this too, and I can't believe they are pursuing an "If I can't have it, nobody can" scorched earth policy.  I'm resigned at this point to thinking that this will be the last game in the SC universe, not for lack of us passionate fans, but a poor business case for any further development.  I'm not going to forgive those two for not trying to work something out with Stardock like other software companies did for IP disagreements.  

Star Control 2 had a decent story, but it wasn't this amazing, original titan that certain people seem to "remember" it as.  It was a hodgepodge of tropes and 4th wall violations.  

Don't get me wrong, I loved it as a kid.  But...  I was a kid.  I viewed it as a kid.  I'm an adult now and, seeing it as an adult, I can also pick up its flaws.

I enjoyed SCO's story.  Like many sci-fi stories, it took bits and pieces of other stories and meshed them together to make something new.  I think they did very well in that regard (as did many others, judging from the actual reviewers).  My main complaint is that they didn't necessarily flesh things out enough.  I suppose they're leaving that open to future games though.  

As an American, I'm glad our legal system doesn't follow mob mentality from people who don't grasp what the laws are.  

I'm not sure what Stardock fans here are led to believe, but it's actually Stardock who started this whole legal ordeal. P&F only announced a new game in development, and Stardock took it from there. And instead of realising the mistake and sorting things out while they still could, they just doubled down on it until it was too late.

It's stupid because the games aren't even competing and could've co-existed just fine (the new P&F game not coming out in several years), and it looks like Stardock isn't even aware of the irony of them accusing P&F of riding their wave, and not the other way around, while publishing a game that basically targets SC fans and tries to be the new SC2.

It's always entertaining to see what's happening in Fantasy Land.  All this Science Fiction [gaming] and people end up existing in Alternate Universes....;)

Change Stardock to Disney and Star Control to Star Wars to understand how crazy your argument is.

Kermamorjens, Stardock has said they started the suit because P&F infringed on Stardock's "Star Control" trademark by claiming Ghosts of the Precursors is the true sequel to Star Control.  At the same time as Star Control Origins reached a publicity milestone with the release of the SCO beta at the 25th anniversary of SC2.

P&F changed their original statement: "we are now working on a direct sequel to Star Control II® -- The Ur-Quan Masters, called Ghosts of the Precursors™." to "we are now working on a direct sequel to The Ur-Quan Masters, called Ghosts of the Precursors™.", but the damage had already been done because gaming news called it a sequel to Star Control 2: Star Control creators working on direct sequel to Star Control 2.

Did P&F ever compromise besides that?  No.  I wish they had because then we might have gotten SC2 ships in Fleet Battles.

I agree, I would guess that this DMCA was on the advice of their lawyers rather than something they insisted on. 

In the parallel universe where the initial dispute was settled relatively amicably without lawyers, I doubt they'd have any problem with Origins being this close to SC2.

The fact that they changed it quite quickly demonstrates good faith IMO. As far as I can see it was a mistake that they corrected. 

On the other hand, I've yet to see any justification for Stardock putting the first two games up on Steam. It's pretty hard to do that by accident. 

Stardock thought they had the licence to sell SC1+2 and were giving P&F royalties for those sales.

P&F said the licence expired in 2000 because supposedly SC1+2 stopped being sold for a while.

The end result is nobody is selling SC1 or SC2 now except as used games, and that's really P&F's fault for choosing not to licence it.  In my opinion P&F are trying to choke Stardock into submission until they stop making Star Control games, because of that and the following:

You are right P&F showed good faith about the trademark going forward, but P&F did worse things after their typo.  P&F wanted to search all of SCO for any copyright infringement.  That copyright search started out reasonable, but became too much of a good thing.  Stardock renaming Super Melee to Fleet battles and not having any SC2 ships in multiplayer was reasonable, and P&F still issued a vague DMCA to the SCO beta, which Stardock blocked with the injunction to delay the takedown to after the SCO release date.  Brad challenged P&F on Twitter to stop being vague about what the DMCA was claiming about copyright infringement and P&F said hyperspace being similar and calling the flagship "Vindicator" was infringing.

P&F's side of the argument: https://dogarandkazon.squarespace.com

Stardock's side of the argument (including rebuttals to dogarandkazon): https://www.stardock.com/games/starcontrol/article/487690/qa-regarding-star-control-and-paul-and-fred

Stardock's rebuttal to the similar hyperspace and naming the flagship "Vindicator" argument: https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DxKR37BXQAAN1Vr?format=jpg&name=large

Please let me know if you have more questions.

Stardock paid $300k-$400k for the Star Control trademark, (franchise, and maybe more).  Unlike other IP, you can lose trademarks if you don't protect it. They let P&F freely use the trademark,  they can lose what they bought.

Stardock was nothing but cool while P&F where being vague little b****, working to undermine and steal their thunder the whole time. They where leaching off of the money spent by Stardock to rebuild the Star Control franchise that they let die.

Reading this email (10/4/17) really pissed me off as they started to show their true intentions:  https://cdn.stardock.us/forums/0/0/1/a36c96e5-9216-4c21-b39c-ee73fa7fbd39.png that right there, is them using legal action to stomp on Stardock. That right their is the start of the legal problems brought forth by P&F, Brads next reply was a way to work things out before they got ugly.

The fact that the rights to make the game don't include game lore and world shows just how F'ed up IP law is, and at those looking to abuse it(P&F).

"Reviving the Star Control franchise" is not a task someone gave Stardock to do. Stardock simply decided to take it on themselves. According to P&F, P&F were planning to do it themselves in the future (GotP, 25th anniversary, etc).

Again I find it funny that Stardock (or Stardock fans) think P&F are "stealing Stardock's thunder", while Stardock made what is essentially a wannabe Star Control 2. I wouldn't call any of this stealing anyone's thunder, but surely Stardock is riding the wave of P&F's work more than P&F are abusing SC:O.

In my opinion there could be lots of mutual benefit, and not "stealing", if it wasn't for the hostility.

Actually, P&F have never implied they want to give away the IP. They were very clear starting from the very first email and every email from thereon, that they want to keep the IP for themselves. Stardock then buying trademarks, making SC:O, etc. is something they just decided to do anyway, without P&F:s blessing.

I got the impression that P&F might've let it slide regardess, and let SC:O be SC:O, if it weren't all of the legal mess Stardock started. And Stardock started the legal mess only because of the GotP announcement. Which seems like an incredibly stupid thing to do.

If I'm wrong in all this, and you think the events went differently, feel free to educate me.

Anyway, I've read all the emails that are publicy available, and I haven't found any indication whatsoever that P&F would like to sell or give away the IP, or work with Stardock in any other way. Every time Wardell asked for things like that, P&F politely but very clearly refused.

This is just a guess, but maybe Stardock thought they were buying something more for that 300-400k from the Atari bankruptcy sale (maybe the IP or whatnot), when they in fact only bought the trademark. And maybe that's one reason for everything that followed.