Nintendo wins Australia payout over game-copying device

Gaming giant Nintendo said Friday it had won 556,500 US dollars' compensation from an Australian firm for selling illegal game-copying devices.

Nintendo said it won a Federal Court case against online console and accessory seller GadgetGear over the gadgets, known as R4 cards, which pirate games for its handheld DS system.

"GadgetGear and its directors have now acknowledged that game copying devices infringe both Nintendo's copyright and Nintendo's trademarks and that they are illegal circumvention devices," the Japanese company said.

"As a result, GadgetGear and the directors have agreed to permanently refrain from importing, offering for sale and/or selling game copier devices."

GadgetGear and directors Patrick and James Li were ordered to pay Nintendo 620,000 Australian dollars (556,500 US dollars) in damages and hand over all its stock of copiers for destruction.

Nintendo said it was mulling further action against other Australian sellers of pirating gadgets, and would use "all means available to it under the law".

This month, an Australian man agreed to pay Nintendo 1.3 million US dollars in an out-of-court settlement after illegally uploading New Super Mario Bros. to the Internet six days before its global release.

(c) 2010 AFP