Uh oh. PUBG Corporation, the developer of PlayerUnknown's Battlegrounds, has filed a copyright infringement lawsuit against Epic Games for the similarities between its game and the explosively popular Fortnite. This can only end well.
PUBG Corp. is a subsidiary of the Korean games company Bluehole Studio. A representative from the studio said, "We filed the suit to protect our copyright in January," so it seems it's been seeking legal action against Fortnite for some time. It'll take Epic Games Korea to Seoul Central District Court, alleging copyright violation. PUBG Corp. also released a few files backing up its claim that Fortnite bears major similarities to Battlegrounds. These include similar weapon types and user interface elements, such as the shrinking blue circle, the compass and minimap, and health regeneration system.
The wrinkles in this story are certainly interesting; Battlegrounds runs on Unreal Engine 4, which was of course created by Epic, and Chinese conglomerate Tencent is invested in both games companies, holding nearly half the shares of the Fortnite creator and planning to increase its stake in PUBG Corp. to 10%.
While we may not hear much more about the court case for a while, depending on how quickly it wraps up, it'll be fascinating to see how this progresses.
[source koreatimes.co.kr, via invenglobal.com, invenglobal.com, resetera.com]
Comments 34
Are they going to take everyone to court who makes Battle Royale games then or do they just have a bee in their bonnet because Fortnite is far and away the more successful popular version of a game in the same style as theirs?
Perhaps if they released PUBG on PS4 first they might not be feeling so fragile right now
OK so now is Nintendo going to sue every company because they have a character that jumps on things
OH i know how about Square sues every JRPG that came out after Final Fantasy because it has characters and menus
OH EVEN BETTER will the creators of Dungeons and Dragons sue every person who used Magic in their games
what a load of crap, all they are doing this for is because Fortnite is more popular that PUBG's right now and because it's acyually fun (unlike PUNG) and it's not like PUBG was the first either, pretty sure there was one based on ARMA 2 before it so how about they sue PUBG for ripping off THEIR game? or even H1Z1 which came out the year before
IT VIDEO GAMES everyone borrows something from everyone else, it's how the industry works
@SlimDrizzyLamar not to mention they are using Epics Unreal Engine for PUBG so of course there will be some degree of shared assets, that's the whole point in a game engine, i'm pretty sure any game using UE4 will have similar things in them such as user interface elements which is one of the things they are suing for
My money is on the team that has Specter and Litt.
Uh-oh! Seems like someone is mad for not making as much money
Can't wait for FIFA to sue PES because they have a ball!
COD to sue BF cause they have the same guns this year as WW2 last year!
Dark Souls to sue God of War cause you press R1 and R2 to attack!
They pretty much have no chance of winning this.
Seems like they're looking to hold even more Ls regarding PUBG.
I can understand PUBG's stance on this. It isn't just the fact it is a Battle Royale, its the ever-decreasing circle, the way you drop into the battlezone and the loot element of the game. Same with H1Z1, its literally a skin. If it was a driving game or sports game, I understand how it cant be protected, but this is a lot more niche.
Pretty sure you can't copyright a game mechanic, only names and likenesses. The Street Fighter/Fighter's History case pretty much wrote the rulebook on this.
Bit rich they are claiming identity theft when they made a game with store bought assets...
Maybe they should have put their game on ps4, that would have helped them. But nope. Not fortnite is making tons of money with no direct competition.
Why not sue DayZ as well, for copying their idea before PUBG even existed?
Pathetic, they are jealous that Fortnite is bigger now.
Even more pathetic is the gaming journalists that nominated PUBG as game of the year. We should sue these journalists instead.
Talk about unoriginal.. They've got some cheek when they use Unreal Store assets throughout the game. A huge chunk of assets in the game are unoriginal, paid for work. Atleast Epic's work is totally original.
They're not the first to do battle royale. They're certainly not going to be the last.
Instead of raising frivolous court cases maybe they should concentrate on fixing their game and getting it out on all platforms.
This is really interesting. I guess I’m not surprised in this litigious world we live in where everyone wants to sue everyone all the time. If I was Tencent though, I’d be pretty ticked off that my companies are at each other’s throats and now having to pour profits into lawyer fees instead of growing the brand.
Surely Valve can sue Bluehole for using the frying pan they had in Left For Dead...
This is in jest but perfectly sums up the cobblers involved
Hmmm... Smells like tax avoidance to me. If PUBG win, their gain offsets their losses. And if Fortnite lose they pay less corporation tax. Only suckers are us average Joe's who actually think their news belongs to us! Next...
This court case is doomed to failure there are enough distinct differences between the two games to throw this out of court.
@FullbringIchigo
Brendan Greene (PlayerUnknown) created the Arma mod that had Battle Royal. He also served as an adviser for H1Z1.
I still don't see them winning this lawsuit; how is anyone going to claim ownership over a genre? They might settle it, though. It'll be interesting for sure.
What the heck? Not cool pubg corp, not cool
They'll probably sue CoD's developer next, but they'll wait until a month or so after release so they can go after all that sale money.
Let's count the similarities between Fortnite and PUBG:
1. They're both Battle Royale games
Yeah that's pretty much it.
Seriously, this would be like if Nintendo took Sega to court for making Sonic. Sure, both Mario and Sonic are platforms, but the similarities end there.
And now the desperation sets in.
Like others have already said if they had brought PUBG to PS4 first instead of Xbox they wouldn't be in this predicament but they didn't. Now H1Z1 has filled the tactical gameplay role nicely.
They'll be trying to sue God of War next because everyone is playing that instead of their badly built game.
Any Xbone users must have felt so disappointed in that terrible port they made of it.
@KingdomHeartsFan Said nobody ever.
Meh, I'm still waiting for a Battle Royale game that really nails the concept. I feel like PUBG and Fortnite are both primitive and will be far surpassed and forgotten.
lol what utter slime, they tried this with some mobile games claiming they were the first game to use a frying pan as a weapon/shield. GTFO
@Rygar1976 switch your setting to Thailand. F that noise.
Bomberman should go after PUBG corp. Cheeky gits. Everyone stop playing PUBG now they are trying to turn the industry into none stop court action.
LOL PUBG should just accept the fact that Fortnite sold it out lmao I don’t play any of those BR games but it must be really tough for PUBG now these days when they have to desperately go to court - Fortnite is unstoppable and way more popular - nothing will change that any more - simple as that
just lol
just everyone stfu and make good games
sales will come
has anyone ever been sued about TEAM DEATHMATCH oder KING OF THE HILL Gametypes?
PUBG is the MySpace of these games, with Fortnite being the Facebook. It's never the FIRST person to do something that's a success, it's always the one who takes the original idea and makes it better. Always happens.
Fortnite is a game too! Just like PUBG is! All the things they copy.... Shame!
Pubg - “id”called they say they will see you in court along with all other FPS games since 1992 - ridiculous
I know there’s probs older FPS but you get my point
Tap here to load 34 comments
Leave A Comment
Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...