After several years of happy partnership with Activision to make the Guitar Hero games someone at Gibson decided that the oodles of money they were probably getting from licensing fees and royalties weren’t enough. The guitar maker sued Activision claiming that the game series infringed on a patent they held for “simulating a musical performance” which was filed in 1999. As you might imagine Activision filed a counter-suit claiming that their product doesn’t infringe upon Gibson’s patent (for a technology that they never actually made I might add).

A US District Court judge ruled yesterday in favor of Activision, claiming that Gibson’s patent only applies to devices that output an analog audio signal and not MIDI signals or any kind of control signals. After all, the guitar controller doesn’t produce any sort of music in and of itself as a real guitar does. Gibson also had a lawsuit out against Rock Band for a similar patent infringement but with this ruling it’s very likely to be dismissed as well.