A US judge has thrown out a case brought by the MKR Group - owners of the rights to George Romero’s classic zombie movie Dawn of the Dead - claiming that Capcom’s grisly shooter Dead Rising was rather more than a mere tribute.

We can certainly see where they’re coming from too, especially given the list of principle similarities between the two products highlighted in the proceedings:

- Both works are set in a bi-level shopping mall.
- The mall has a gun shop, in which action takes place.
- The mall is located in a rural area with the National Guard patrolling its environs.
- Both works are set in motion by a helicopter that takes the lead characters to a mall besieged by zombies.
- Many of the zombies wear plaid shirts.
- Both works feature a subtext critique of sensationalistic journalism through their use of tough, cynical journalists with short brown hair and leather jackets as a lead male character.
- Both works feature the creative use of items such as propane tanks, chainsaws, and vehicles to kill zombies.
- Both works are a parody of rampant consumerism.
- Both works use music in the mall for comedic effect.
- Dead Rising's use of the word "hell" references the tagline for Dawn of the Dead's release ("When there's no more room in hell, the dead will walk the earth.").

Plaid shirts? Tough journalists with short brown hair? They might have been clutching at straws on those two (as this chestnut-maned writer nervously checks his attire). Even so the MKR Group must have thought they were onto an easy winner.

Alas, that wasn’t how Judge Richard Seeborg saw things. Somewhat improbably, he found in Capcom’s favour, throwing out the case stating that the MKR Group had not identified any similarities between Dead Rising and, crucially, any protected element of Romero’s horror classic. Furthermore the few similarities that do exist are based on the unprotectable concept of humans fighting zombies in a shopping mall.

Get the drift? Dawn of the Dead - one of horror cinema’s most iconic movies - was not properly protected, as incredible as that may seem in such litigious days as these.

Chalk one up to Capcom, then - Dead Rising survives the legal assault by the putrid skin of its mostly missing teeth. Meantime, it looks like we can wear our plaid shirts and make shopping mall-set zombie games with total impunity too. Hooray!