Midway Manufacturing Co. v. Artic International, Inc.

Midway Manufacturing Co. v. Artic International, Inc.
Court	United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit
Full case name	Midway Manufacturing Co. v. Artic International, Inc.
Argued	November 29, 1982
Decided	April 11, 1983
Citation(s)	704 F.2d 1009
Case history
Prior history	547 F. Supp. 999 (N.D. Ill. 1982)
Court membership
Judge(s) sitting	Walter J. Cummings Jr., Richard Posner, Luther Merritt Swygert
Case opinions
Majority	Cummings, joined by a unanimous court

Midway Manufacturing Co. v. Artic International, Inc., 704 F.2d 1009 (7th Cir. 1983), was a legal case where the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit found that Artic violated Midway's copyright in their arcade games Pac-Man and Galaxian. The lawsuit was part of a trend of "knock-off" video games in the early 1980s, with courts recognizing that a video game can qualify for protection as a copyrighted audiovisual work.

Both Galaxian and Pac-Man were bestselling games in the early 1980s, with Pac-Man generating over $1 billion in revenues, as well as sequels, merchandising, and a cartoon. The dispute arose when Artic began to distribute an alleged clone of Pac-Man, and a circuit board that could speed-up the gameplay of Galaxian. While Midway registered their copyrights as audiovisual works by submitting video recordings of their games being played, Artic argued that this did not protect the games themselves, as the game's graphics were not fixed like a conventional video. The district court disagreed, finding that both games were protected as audiovisual works, and enjoined Artic from distributing their infringing hardware. The decision was affirmed by the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit.

The case was among several early decisions finding that video games qualify for copyright protection as audiovisual works, despite their graphics varying between game sessions. Since Artic's version of Pac-Man was nearly identical to Midway's, the real issue was whether Pac-Man qualified for protection as an audiovisual work, which it did. This helped establish that an unauthorized clone of a game will be considered a copyright violation. In finding that the Galaxian speed-up kit was a copyright violation, the decision also established that a copyright holder has the exclusive right to modify their game and produce derivative works. This issue was revisited in Lewis Galoob Toys, Inc. v. Nintendo of America, Inc., where courts found that it was not a copyright violation for the Game Genie to modify the gameplay of popular Nintendo games. The issue of derivative works has provoked further discussion from legal theorists, arguing whether Artic's modifications of Galaxian actually copied anything from the original game.