Leaving for another day the question of whether consumers have the right to modify video-game software they've legally purchased, a federal judge last week dismissed a lawsuit by California game maker Tecmo against the proprietors and users of a game-hacking website, after the company quietly settled with the two main defendants.

Federal Judge Charles Kocoras dismissed the case last Thursday with leave to reinstate it if the settlement is not finalized within 30 days. Glynn confirmed in a telephone interview this week that he'd reached a settlement with Tecmo, but neither he nor his lawyer would elaborate on the details. "I can tell you that my client would not have been inclined to reach any agreement that would have required him to pay money to Tecmo," said attorney Charles Mudd.

The lawsuit also targeted up to 100 anonymous users of the website, whose identities Tecmo vowed to unmask earlier this year. Those users were the focus of the settlement talks, said Jason Schultz, an attorney with the nonprofit Electronic Frontier Foundation, which had been tracking the case. According to Schultz, Tecmo insisted that Greiling and Glynn hand over NinjaHacker's user database to the company as part of any deal. "Tecmo wanted to get the personal identifying information of people who were uploading and downloading skins," said Schultz. "I don't know if that was in the final settlement."