NCsoft files motion to dismiss Marvel's lawsuit. Justice 8, assemble!
City of Heroes is a tool that encourages originality, not slavish copying. It allows young and old to exercise their imaginations to create super-powered beings and send them off to interact with the creations of other individuals in a virtual world called Paragon City. If it should be banned, then so should the #2 pencil, the Lego block, modeling clay, and anything else that allows one to give form to ideas. In Marvel’s view of the world, if people should play online games with super heroes, they must only play with licensed Marvel characters, and imagination shall be damned. Marvel’s attempt to monopolize online “hero” games and quash creativity has no basis, and its complaint should be dismissed.Posted by rv at January 20, 2005 03:40 PM to CoH
And it's tough for Marvel to say that they don't want people to copy their characters for their own use. To wit:
How to Draw Comics the Marvel Way
Draw the Marvel Comics Super Heroes