Well, someone bringing a lawsuit doesn't mean the system is failing. Anyone can file a lawsuit for anything. If I had a good lawyer, I could drum up something t

Well, someone bringing a lawsuit doesn't mean the system is failing. Anyone can file a lawsuit for anything. If I had a good lawyer, I could drum up something to sue almost any company for, patent-related or otherwise. I probably wouldn't win, but I'd force them to spend a lot of money defending themselves. If anything that's more an indictment of the broader legal system than patents. Regardless this is more of a software patent issue (an area of patent law I don't think anyone would argue is working) than one relating to game mechanics. The patents in both cases could easily be applied to non-game software. To my knowledge, nothing like this happens in non-software gaming.