From the Tech-Report.
As I stumbled through the caffeine & sleep deprivation-induced haze at Quakecon, a tortured soul clandestinely whispered to me that Creative is actively working to exploit its patent on the "Carmack's reverse" rending technique used in DOOM 3. Word has it Creative has sent letters to at least 8 other game developers about the issue. More may be on the way, because id Software has already licensed DOOM 3 technology to loads more development teams.
Our informant didn't indicate whether Creative was seeking monetary damage or would use the threat of patent enforcement as leverage to get its EAX Advanced HD tech integrated into more games, as it did with DOOM 3. If we find out more, we'll let you know.
It's hard to have imagined how Creative could have handled something any worse than they did as regards Doom 3 shadows, but looks like I imagined wrong. You'd have to wonder how many developers will (Or should) be reconsidering EAX support in their games over asinine behaviour like this - more learned posters elsewhere have indicated Creative's patent doesn't apply for several reasons.