There is a European patent EP1064974B1 and a Japanese application
JP2001009152.

You can locate family members by going to
http://ep.espacenet.com/numberSearch?locale=en_EP
entering one member's number (US6347998 in this case). Then
click on the result to get the details. On the right there's
the "Also published as".

See the Gauss page of EP1064974B1.

1. A game system comprising:

an input apparatus which is manipulated by a player;

performance data memory device which stores performance data
stipulating a series of manipulations of said input apparatus arranged
in correspondence with a predetermined musical piece;

manipulation guide device which specifies the series of manipulations
of said input apparatus arranged in correspondence with said musical
piece to the player based on said performance data;

said performance data comprising information which specifies timings
of manipulations relating to at least one timing manipulation member
provided on said input apparatus, and information which specifies at
least one selection manipulation member to be manipulated in
correspondence with the manipulation of said timing manipulation
member from a plurality of selection manipulation members provided on
said input apparatus;

See the discussion here on the debian list.

Patent concerns

* From: "Tom \"spot\" Callaway" <tcallawa redhat com>
* To: fedora-games-list redhat com
* Subject: Patent concerns
* Date: Wed, 16 Jan 2008 14:46:02 -0500

Hi folks,

I hate for my first post to this mailing list to be a depressing one,
but I need to pass along some bad news.

Due to patent concerns, we won't be able to include any games in Fedora
which meet the following criteria:

A game where "targets" move across the screen to a predetermined point
or line, where the player hits a button/key/mouse click as the target(s)
crosses that point or line, and gets points.

This means:

No "Guitar Hero" clones.
No "Dance Dance Revolution" clones.

I need your help to make sure that we don't have any other games that
meet this criteria, either on the wish list or in Fedora.

If you're not sure, ask me.

Thanks in advance,

~spot

The one who will find the number of the patent will have a sugar.