## Facts

- Atari, Inc. owned a registered copyright in the arcade video game *Asteroids*, released in 1979 and commercially successful.
- Amusement World, Inc. and its president, Stephen Holniker, produced and distributed an arcade game called *Meteors* after attempting to enter the video game market.
- Atari discovered *Meteors* in March 1981, demanded that defendants stop distributing it, and filed suit after defendants refused.
- Both games depict a player-controlled spaceship that navigates a field of drifting rocks and periodic enemy ships, fires projectiles, and earns points; both include sound effects and an attract mode and play mode.
- The court identified multiple shared gameplay features (e.g., rocks in waves, rocks breaking into smaller rocks when hit, enemy ships, explosions, escalating difficulty, and similar control functions).
- The court also found differences in audiovisual presentation and sequencing, including *Meteors*’ use of color and shading, different pacing, and an opening sequence showing the ship launching from Earth.

## Issues

1. Whether the audiovisual output of a video game (on-screen symbols, their movement, and sounds) is copyrightable subject matter.
2. Whether *Meteors* was substantially similar to *Asteroids* in protectable expression, as opposed to sharing only unprotectable ideas or standard gameplay elements.
3. How the idea–expression dichotomy limits copyright protection for video game concepts and methods of play.

## Decision

- The court held that *Asteroids* is a copyrightable audiovisual work, and protection can cover the on-screen symbols, the manner of their movement, and accompanying sounds.
- The court denied Atari’s motion for injunctive relief.
- The court found no infringement because *Meteors* did not copy *Asteroids*’ protectable expression to a substantially similar degree, despite borrowing the general game concept.

## Legal Principles

- Video games may qualify as copyrightable audiovisual works; protectable subject matter includes the audiovisual display generated by the program.
- Copyright does not protect abstract ideas, themes, methods of operation, or gameplay concepts; it protects only the author’s particular expression.
- In comparing works with similar underlying concepts, similarities that are dictated by the idea, functional constraints, or standard features of the genre are given little weight in the infringement analysis.
- Infringement requires substantial similarity in protectable expression under an ordinary-observer-type comparison of the works’ overall protected audiovisual presentation.

## Conclusion

The court recognized copyright protection for a video game’s audiovisual display but refused to enjoin a competing game where the overlap largely reflected an unprotectable gameplay concept and common mechanical features rather than substantially similar protected expression.


Atari, Inc. v. Amusement World, Inc., 547 F. Supp. 222 (D. Md. 1982)