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I remember what the RPG Company "White-Wolf" tried to do with the movie "Underworld" since it's movie was quite similar to Vampire: the Masqurade. (and from my experience I didn't see any similarities other than the fact that they were VAMPIRES) If this movie is released, do you think White-Wolf might try the same thing with this film?

IMHO they shouldn't because they cannot copyright werewolves in general.

Actually we've all been making sure that isnt the case. When white wolf began working with LARP versions, the very first test werewolf they gave to a player was Silver Bloodmoon.. Yep, das right.. it was silver. She knows all those guys pretty well, and we have a lot of respect for their game, and their time. But, I don't honestly believe that we are infinging on anything. We've been very careful to make sure we don't.

Fun game that, I've not seen the new rules, nor played in forever.

Its good that the werewolves in Freeborn are not going to be like the ones in White-wolf. Some of the "gifts" they used in White-wolf is very strange. (Lambent flame.) I hate to say it, but I don't like what White-wolf did to thier werewolves.

Sure, you can't copyright/trademark the werewolf. But you can copyright/TM the way it looks, (Artist's style) and what it does. Correct me if I'm wrong.

You can't copyright a style or a concept.

At any rate I'm sure they wouldn't come screaming "you stole my bipedal wolfen beastie you pompus a**!" anyway.

What Mafia wrote:You can't copyright a style or a concept.

At any rate I'm sure they wouldn't come screaming "you stole my bipedal wolfen beastie you pompus a**!" anyway.

really? hmmmmm

White wolf's complaint wasn't anything to do with design. It was because the script they had read almost word for word like a story they published awhile back.

I really liked WW's werewolf concept, though some gifts were odd I admit. But you should see what a shaman werewolf could do, people used to flinch at the table everytime I grinned.....

Thank Lord and Lady! I've seen so many werewolf fans and therians complain about the game and then turn around and write fiction that rips off its ground-work. It's a great game, and it broke a lot of ground for its time. It popularized a lot of stuff we see in werewolf fandom today: packs organized in a tribal fashion, worshipping an Earth Goddess figure, battling against environmentally destructive forces, werewolf-vs-vampire conflicts, and a five-stage shapeshifting process that includes both a wolf form and an oversized Gestalt form. Granted, some of these ideas predate the game, but it popularized it.

Individually, some of these ideas have become pretty stock. (No small part because of the game's popularity.) But, things become a rip-off when they borrow too many of them.

Underworld actually ripped off more of Vampire: the Masquerade. I feel the lawsuit was excessive, though Underworld did imitate it an aweful lot. That's because it was originally written as an adaptation of the White Wolf games. When White Wolf withdrew their backing, rather than chunking the whole thing, the writers went back in and removed all the obviously copyrighted elements. It was still similar, but the lawsuit alleged that it was based specifically on a particular book in a series White Wolf published, set in their Vampire storyline. As usual, werewolves were a secondary matter.

Obviously, White Wolf has not sued all the creators of every other werewolf and vampire story that has come out since 1993, so it's safe to include werewolves and vampires.

Scott Gardener wrote: werewolf-vs-vampire conflicts

Ah, so THATS where that came from...

Aki wrote:

Scott Gardener wrote: werewolf-vs-vampire conflicts

Ah, so THATS where that came from...

Actually, no.
There have been werewolf vs vampire conflicts long before White Wolf, like in an episode of the Real Ghostbusters cartoon ("Nobody Comes To Lupusville"), some episodes of Tales From The Crypt, or The Howling: The Freaks.

I think one of Universal's films the Wolfman battled Dracula and Frankenstein. I've only seen the cover not the film so I'm not sure.

They seem natural enemies from my point of view though.

Its always been my personal view that supernatural creatures that lurk on the fringes of the world, existing out of the knowledge of human, didn't give themselves away by you know.

Regularly trying to kill each other.

'Cause like, that can get really noticable.

that happens to be one of the argument plot points in this film. While its important to keep things under wraps, It also has to be fun to walk up to random strangers and say "Um, Hello, me and my friends here are werewolves, would you like to be bitten and join our pack" ... and then laugh as they look at you like you're crazy..

Some people just don't want to believe.

ABrownrigg wrote:that happens to be one of the argument plot points in this film. While its important to keep things under wraps, It also has to be fun to walk up to random strangers and say "Um, Hello, me and my friends here are werewolves, would you like to be bitten and join our pack" ... and then laugh as they look at you like you're crazy..

Some people just don't want to believe.

Awesome post Anthony!

Yes, many elements incorporated into Werewolf: the Apocalypse predate the game. In fact, arguably, nearly all do. But, the game popularized it to the point of inspiring a wave of imitators, driving the notion from interesting concept into the mainstream, and even to cliche. This may be why so many of the game's former players have now become resentful of it, though it's certainly not White Wolf's fault.

Dracula vs. the Wolf Man was done more than once if I recall prior to Van Helsing. (I haven't yet seen House of Dracula or House of Frankenstein, but I think both do it.) But, the individual monsters pitted against each other is a little different than creating a background in which two whole races of beings are pitted against each other.

Underworld was the first major movie to portray large numbers of both werewolves and vampires at odds. (I haven't seen Howling VI, so I could be wrong. but, H6, being direct-to-video, is hardly a major piece.)

Wait, they sued Underworld?