Last week we covered the news that an accusation of plagiarism had been levelled at publisher Activision over the Loyal Samoyed skin, an anthropomorphic dog that was to be included in both Call of Duty: Vanguard and Call of Duty: Warzone as a part of the premium Floof Fury Tracer Pack.
In a statement to Polygon, the publisher had the following to say on the matter:
“We have the utmost respect for creativity and content creation. We love the Loyal Samoyed, but regrettably we erred in our process and have removed this imagery from the game. We apologize for the misstep.”
The original design was created by artist Sail Lin, entitled 'Samoye Medical', and was uploaded to the online art portfolio Artstation several years ago.
Lin, however, was not impressed with this general statement, and expects a direct and personal apology for the incident, and an explanation:
An apology is the very least that Lin is owed, considering the blatant nature of the entire affair. We will have to wait and see how and if Activision responds.
[source polygon.com]
Comments 45
Well they thought they would get away with it and they got caught out trying to steal another artists work and profit from it..fair play to the original artist for standing up for his rights 👍
Apologies for stealing. Very polite solution. Activision should accept it, because this theft is easily sueable.
Would have been great if they kept the skin in, gave him credit and gave him a little something for the trouble. Of course they would sooner delete the game entirely then have to give him a single cent.
hilarious when the mob calls it stealing etc in their little simple dumb black and white world.
noone walked in and said "oh, nice art, I'll steal it and put it in a multimillion game and noone will notice hahaha, and tomorrow world domination muahaha"
in the real world things happen that jobless kids in their basement just don't get
Wouldn't expect any less from Activision
@Grimwood What do you think happened?
One of the rare times the other side wins
Reading the comments above. Do any of you actually think Activision boss’ knew about this before hand?
Of course they didn’t. They’d never open themselves up to this sort of potential litigation knowingly.
Clearly the work of one or two artists who copied another’s work and thought they had changed enough to get away with it. Not even close. I would be scrutinising all their previous work right now.
Though as Picasso allegedly said, and many others from T.S. Elliott to Steve Jobs have confirmed “good artists borrow, great artists steal” even more so in this artform than others… but this was far too blatant and well over the line.
@Grimwood @themightyant Glad to see that at least some people here have common sense.
@Juanalf Yeah like all the money her skin made they stole the work.
@naruball What sense is that? They clearly ripped off the work pay up the money you made of it and give a formal excuse. You are always over the place clearly ripped off content there is only one thing to do and thats a personal excuse and pay the money made of the content.
@themightyant One artist of a big company who stole the work this is not borrowing or giving a hommage this is a rippoff and they knew it.
@Grimwood A big company that tries to get away with it. If you make money of it better check it out the only reason they pulled it is because the artist made it know it was stolen.
@Flaming_Kaiser read my comment again.
Yes the artist knew it, yes it’s a rip-off, exceedingly unlikely any other Activision staff knew it. That’s just not how this sort of plagiarism happens in the real world. First they would have known about it was when the original artists complaints went viral.
@Flaming_Kaiser " You are always over the place"
what are you even on about?
@naruball a lot of delusion in this thread. I get it’s popular to bash the big-corp, I like that sport too at times, but in a case like this it’s almost always a rogue creative. Look at Filip Miucin for ign or other similar cases. I’ve had to deal with this too IRL someone lifting ideas a little too closely. As the corp it’s both highly embarrassing and potentially litigious and you have to be VERY careful about what you say.
Glad they didn't give him a dime for it, and removed it instead. Mounting a dogs head on a uniform is not exactly clever or original..
We're sorry for getting caught
@themightyant The artist knew it who is he working for? It still makes them liable you cant cherry pick for only the good things.
If you go through their lawyers they will try to get away with it. Through the public you are certain they will have to act.
They almost dont pay taxes the public pays them money through refunds. That the boss does not know personally does not excuse it. They already do enough criminal stuff besides this.
@Humaniac Yeah you rather have them make money of the work of another? Big corp needs it gate keepers.
Call of sleepy makes a gazillion dollars every year. Keep it in the game and give the guy some cash and credit and call it a day.
Funny when someone makes a mod or unofficial version of a game, using assets they did not create “it great” “amazing work”. When a company makes something similar “it’s a clear rip off”. The creation in question looks a lot like the character from Altered Beast and one from Elden Ring.
@Flaming_Kaiser Obviously the idividual artist copied the work to present to his bosses, and the bosses had no idea where it came from. Then the bosses approved the work and the company published it.
The individual artist and the work they produce still respresents Activision. Therefore, Activision stole the art work.
I don't know if the guys above see Acti has a separate entity as its workers or what.
If they made money off the design then the original artist’s work was of some value. I’d say the original artist is entitled to at least a portion of the money made from the skin. Since they apologized they admitted guilt so this would be a 100% win in court for the artist, as long as the value he sued for was reasonable, but unless he sues and wins more than ~$500k it’s probably not worth it to get into a legal battle with a giant corp.
@Flaming_Kaiser 100% Activision could be liable, albeit unwillingly. THAT is precisely why they have to be careful what they say. I'm not cherry picking anything just pointing out exactly how this would have happened.
Of course they are going to pull it as soon as they knew. What other option do they have? As it is they will just be thankful that it was pointed out BEFORE they actually sold anything, as it stands they didn't sell anything of anyone else's work.
This is actually more damaging to Activision than it is to the original artist who has had a lot of free publicity of his excellent work over this. I hope that stands him in good stead. That doesn't make it right, it never was right, but Activision have done everything you would expect a large company to do in this position. They took the work out and apologised unreservedly. What do you actually expect them to do?
@Shstrick They didn't sell anything. They pulled it before that happened. As it stands Activision haven't made any money directly off his work, but they did use a copy of his artwork in some promotional material.
This whole ordeal is pretty weird. Like, why would they completely copy the design like this? You could easily change a few clothing items and colours here and there so it would be similar but not a total clone.
Gutted cause i’ve never been interested in any skins for Cod but this was one I was going to buy.
Glad they aren’t going ahead with it though cause they did the artist dirty and he deserves some compensation for sure.
@TeapotBuddha He has a right to ask for answers, but the way he phrased it could have been better. Much better.
Hope all you guys show the same level of understanding when a company doesn't want their art plagiarized in a fan project 😜
@themightyant ah, in that case they may have done the artist a favor 😅
I remember some art director, I think it was Grassetti from God of War, saying that the job of an art director also consists in researching what the team is using for reference and making sure it isn't a 1/1 copy.
@CielloArc That's true but it's an almost impossible task, and in part relies on the staff being honest about their research and inspiration. You simply can't check millions of bits of artwork on tens of thousands profiles across many websites.
Usually when this happens the plagiarising artists think they can get away with lifting someone else's work and take credit for the idea. What will be of most concern to Activision is if the guilty artists have done it before in products they have already sold. Usually plagiarists have done it before.
Helpful observation: Plagiarised is spelt with an 's'
The artist is spot on. An apology doesn't really cut it. Wtf happened? How did they manage to so blatantly rip off an independent artist? That's not an accident.
Dude should have waited until it was on sale before he raised the alarm...
@riceNpea It's also spelled with a "z" depending on where you are in the world so not that helpful tbh. Even less helpful if you already knew...
@MetalGear_Yoshi you're right, it does depend on where in the world you are. Australian man writing on a UK-based publication, so 's' is the appropriate spelling. I'm here to help 😊
Or have Australians succombed to writing in American English now? Any Australians in the chat who can answer that please?
He is not getting a direct apology. Activision took it down to spare the PR backlash from taking the artist to court, a preceeding this guy would not be able to afford, but there's no way they'd EVER open the corporation up to litigation by admitting fault so specifically to one party.
The skin is not going to be in the game. No damages were made to the person that made the skin. It's over. The artist got some publicity for this though, so not a waste of time.
If they wanted a settlement and a apology they should have gotten a lawyer AFTER the skin was in the game. You'd have a better chance then, but that's legal battle with a MASSIVE corporation. Huge headache. Not sure it worth it tbh.
As a professional artist myself I’d generally want to side with the artist in this situation, but there are a few grey areas that don’t seem to add up.
I doubt a big company would be stupid enough to make artwork that could be accused of direct plagiarism. It’s far easier to make something just different enough that it’s an original creation. Which leads me to how this kind of artwork is created. Reference plays a big role here and it’s not impossible that both the independent artist and one of the company’s studio artists used similar if not the same reference. As an earlier comment said, it’s just a dog’s head on a soldiers body. So if the idea is a winter soldier.. look for a dog breed that comes from cold snowy regions, then find an appropriate snow military outfit.. put those two together and you probably only have so many combinations. People have the same idea all the time.
Had the image been a direct copy I would have said that it’s more likely that they plagiarised the artist, but it’s a different angle completely so I think it’s more than likely just an unfortunate coincidence (more unfortunate for Activision since they now can’t use the content they created because of the similarities… more fortunate for the artist since he’s gotten a lot of exposure)
Apologies to the artist if I’m wrong and there is some shmuck at Activision that stole your idea. I have had my work blatantly stolen and used but I know that because it was the actual image, not a similar one.
@Richnj Thats what i mean they didnt find out so its their fault.
@Breekhead Its a blatant copy and if they are so fast to remove it they damn well know it.
@Flaming_Kaiser There’s no proof of plagiarism, but because people on the internet have decided to grab their pitchforks it makes sense to just cut their losses.
Removed - disrespecting others
@Flaming_Kaiser No need to be rude. Do you think the artist made up that breed of dog… no… and the military outfit… no… the gun… also exists. So he just combined 2 things, it’s not something completely made up out of his head, if it was then I’d have no doubt it was ripped off.
I do this for a living so I’m providing some perspective as to how this might have happened. You’re entitled to your opinion.
@Breekhead Well whats was so rude about it? If you put them together its so easy to see its a blatant copy.
I guess you need to safe the poor multinational no problem. But somehow they removed it so fast because it was nonsense.
No its not because even their lawyers knew it was so blatant and a waste to do something against it. With your reasoning everything is fair game.
You are "entitled" to your opinion have a good day.
Tap here to load 45 comments
Leave A Comment
Hold on there, you need to login to post a comment...