Firms End Court Battle Over War Toys

NEW YORK — Competing manufacturers of two of the hottest toys this season laid down their arms Monday in a court battle over advertising for a high-tech war toy.

The manufacturer of Lazer Tag filed a lawsuit against the maker of Photon in federal court last month saying that television commercials for Photon gave misleading impressions of both products and the way they worked. On Monday, LJN Toys agreed to change its Photon commercials to make them acceptable to Worlds of Wonder, the Fremont, Calif.-based manufacturer of Lazer Tag.

“We were in a subjective area,” said Murray L. Skala, general counsel for LJN. “Rather than going through the litigation, we thought that we would try to make accommodations,” he said. Worlds of Wonder also won expenses incurred in pursuing the lawsuit.

Lazer Tag and Photon are the two leaders among a handful of new games on the market featuring futuristic guns that shoot infrared rays at sensing devices that register when players have been hit by the invisible beam of light. A set of one trigger--never actually called a “gun” by the toy companies--and one target costs from $40 to $50.