A Californian judge has dismissed accusations that Ubisoft had infringed on various patents when launching its polemical DRM technology, Uplay. A Texan company called Digital Reg filed the lawsuit against a number of games and technology companies, from Adobe to EA, Valve and Zynga. Some companies, such as Valve, have already settled the suit with an out of court payment, while Ubisoft has challenged the case and come out victorious. According to the suit, Ubisoft was accused of violating six different patents regarding the regulation of access to restricted content. However, United States district judge Claudia Wilken threw out the case, claiming Ubisoft was "immune from an infringement suit" due to a previous settlement Digital Reg had agreed with Valve. The Steam owner settled on a deal with Digital Reg in which, rather than go to court, it instead agreed to license its patents for use on Steam. However, the terms of the settlement also agreed it was legal to use the patents through a third-party platform. It was therefore judged that using the DRM system through Uplay meant Ubisoft was no longer in violation of Digital Reg's patents. "Ubisoft is determined to aggressively fight patent cases that target the company and its innovations and technologies," read a statement from the company. "Ubisoft is committed to defending itself against patent assertion entities - referred to as patent 'trolls' -- that assert invalid or inapplicable patents against the company or the industry." Uplay has been the source of much contention since its launch alongside Assassin's Creed 2 in 2009. However, the service has had many of its restrictions lifted over the years, including its controversial requirement that players stay online and connected to Uplay at all times, even when playing single-player games. As a result, most Uplay games now require a single activation upon launch, at which point the game is able to be played offline. Most recently, the PC version of Watch Dogs required a mandatory activation via Uplay. Source Cvg
