Legal

Apple and Epic Games will face another trial in court. A hearing will be held on May 8, during which Epic Games will try to prove that Apple violated the court order.

What you should pay attention to when licensing soundtracks for the game, — Svetlana Gordey and Daria Savko, specialists of the REVERA law firm, told in their column for App2Top.

The UK government-funded UK Games Fund has supported local gaming startups. He has allocated more than 3 million pounds for the development of 22 games.

After almost a year and a half after breaking up with NetEase, Blizzard has come to a new agreement with its Chinese partner. The deal will make the studio’s game available to local players again.

Russia continues to explore ways to control the market for in-game items. First Deputy chairman of the Federation Council Committee on Constitutional Legislation and state Construction Irina Rukavishnikova told TASS that in May, Russian senators will hold a public discussion on this issue.

User acquisition platform Gamelight and mobile game developer SuperPlay have joined forces to scale two of the studio’s titles and attract new players. Here is a breakdown of the campaign and the results achieved.

The question of how a developer can reserve the right to the game in case of receiving an investment is answered in their column by Irina Gushchina and Vadim Kocheshev, lawyers at Semenov &Pevzner.

Ross Scott, best known for his YouTube channel Accursed Farms and the Freeman’s Mind series, has launched a worldwide initiative called Stop Killing Games. Its main goal is to raise awareness and make publishers stop destroying video games after discontinuing their support.

The UK’s Advertising Standards Agency (ASA) has upheld three complaints for three gaming ads that violated the country’s advertising rules. The regulator ruled that Electronic Arts, Miniclip, and Jagex misled users by failing to disclose information about loot boxes in their products.

The UK Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) has ruled that Electronic Arts (EA), Miniclip and Jagex misled users by not telling their game ads about the presence of loot boxes in those games. Companies have been banned from using this advertisement in the country.

Roblox has been accused more than once of aggressively making money from young users. In February 2024, the company received a new class action lawsuit.

The young Russian Case studio decided to develop its own game engine. She plans to make its use free for indie teams, but without access to the source code.

Nintendo has filed a lawsuit against Tropic Haze. She accused the developers of the Yuzu emulator of copyright infringement and complicity in piracy.

Edinburgh-based Rockstar North regularly enjoys the right to tax benefits in the UK. The Scotsman claims that between April 2015 and March 2023, the company requested a tax deduction from the country's authorities in the amount of £360.3 million ($453.7 million).

What were the biggest trends in VC investment deals across the games industry in 2023 and which ones will remain relevant this year? This is an overview by legal experts Anna Solovei and Viktoryia Semianitskaya, representing REVERA law group.

At the end of January, Apple announced a number of innovations in iOS. These include support for third—party stores and payment systems. However, those who want to use the new functionality will have to pay for each installation. We talked about the innovation with experts from Skich and INFUSION GAMES.

During the recent WN Conference in Belgrade, we had a chance to speak with Raphaël Colantonio, creative director of WolfEye Studios and founder of Arkane. Check out our interview with one of the industry’s most prominent creative minds for a quick dive into the immersive sim genre and Raphaël’s approach to game development.

Microsoft has responded to a US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) complaint about the recent layoffs in its video game division. The company argued that Activision itself had planned to make the cuts long before the acquisition.

The US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has asked the appeals court to look into the situation with mass layoffs at Microsoft. On January 25, the corporation announced its decision to lay off 1,900 people from Xbox, Activision Blizzard and ZeniMax Media.

Hasbro has decided to sell the IP rights to Dungeons & Dragons due to financial problems, the Chinese edition of Speed Daily reports, citing its sources. One of the potential buyers is Tencent.

New details have emerged in the long-running legal fight between Nexon and Dark and Darker developer Ironmace. It appears that the South Korean publisher’s preliminary injunction against the studio was dismissed.

Ironmace can continue to distribute the PvPvE action game Dark and Darker. Studio managing director Choi Ju-hyun told Discord that the court rejected Nexon's request for an injunction against the game.

The Paris Court of Appeal has cleared the French mobile publisher Homa of all charges brought by Voodoo. The latter claimed that the hyper—casual Craft Island game developed by Ducky Games studio — the "daughter" of Homa - copies its Lumbercraft.

Neither Epic Games nor Apple have been able to challenge the lower court's decision in their multi—year dispute over the App Store monopoly - the U.S. Supreme Court rejected new appeals from both companies without explanation.

SAG-AFTRA has entered into an agreement with AI company Replica Studios to allow game companies to use digital voice replicas of real-life actors. However, the move caused sharp criticism in the professional community.

Next year, the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism of South Korea will spend 67.9 billion rubles, or about $52.5 million, on subsidies to Korean gaming companies. This is reported by the GameMeca portal.

The morning of December 27th began for Chinese gaming giants Tencent and NetEase with an increase in the value of shares. This is due to the promise of the Chinese authorities to review restrictions affecting the local industry and the issuance of a new batch of licenses for games.

There are more and more initiatives related to video games in Russia every day. We also got to the discussion of in-game content.

Russian MPs want to limit the duration and frequency of advertising in video games. The draft amendments to the federal law "On Advertising" have already been submitted to the State Duma for consideration.

On December 19, Russian President Vladimir Putin approved a number of instructions to the government related to video games. They are tightening regulation in the Russian gaming market.

Epic Games has been fighting Google since 2020, and now the jury has reached a verdict in the case. The Fortnite maker has managed to prove a violation of antitrust laws by Google.

Fntastic, a studio behind the controversial shooter The Day Before, has suddenly announced its closure. This comes just days after the launch of the game, which many players labeled a scam.

Another sad news in a series of reports of mass layoffs. The Danish indie team Triple Topping is closing four years after its founding.

Three years later, CD PROJEKT closed the issue of a lawsuit from the company's investors, who were not satisfied with the state of the release version of Cyberpunk 2077. The District Court of California finally approved the settlement agreement between the parties.

The seventh episode of Games and Names, a  games industry podcast launched by AppMagic in partnership with WN Media Group, is here. It is dedicated to a really complex yet important topic — the legal side of the games industry and how developers can protect the results of their creative work.

Sony failed to annul a class action lawsuit filed by British gamers in August 2022. The UK Competition Court of Appeal ruled that the company must justify its position at the hearing.

This was told by the head of Epic Games, Tim Sweeney, during a hearing in the case of Epic Games and Google due to the removal of Fortnite from Google Play.

On Thursday, November 9, the Government of the Russian Federation held a meeting with representatives of the Russian gaming industry. According to Kommersant, it discussed a bill on the mandatory transfer of servers of popular games in the country to Russia.

In the USA, a lawsuit was filed against Microsoft, Ubisoft, Electronic Arts, Epic Games and some of their affiliated studios. The companies were accused of making games too exciting and aggressively monetizing them in order to earn as much as possible.

Epic Games Store is still running at a huge loss for the company. New details have emerged as part of its antitrust court battle with Google.

Journalists dev.by We have studied the latest data of the State Tax Inspectorate under the Ministry of Finance of Lithuania. They found that in the first nine months of 2023, Wargaming paid taxes in Lithuania in the amount of €11.8 million.

The Tokyo Tax Bureau found that in 2018-2020, the Luxembourg division of Epic Games did not declare income from microtransactions in Fortnite in Japan. The company was obliged to pay off the tax arrears and pay a fine.

FNTASTIC studio has announced that The Day Before survival will retain its name. She won a lawsuit over the trademark rights of the game with a Korean company that developed a calendar application called TheDayBefore.

A group of Russian senators and deputies proposed to streamline the work of creative industries in the country. The relevant bill was submitted to the State Duma for consideration.

French police have arrested several former Ubisoft executives to question them about workplace harassment allegations. This is part of an investigation that has been running for more than a year.

The police detained several former Ubisoft managers, according to the French trade union Solidaires Informatique. They were interrogated in the case of harassment.

Epic Games continues to develop the Fortnite ecosystem. The company announced that since the game has content for different ages, then everyone should be assigned an appropriate age rating.

Seven BioWare veterans have appealed to a Canadian court. They accused the company of "unreasonably mistreatment" during the dismissal.

A group of Russian deputies appealed to the government with a proposal to create an analogue of The Sims, which will correspond to the values important for Russia. This is reported by "TASS", who got acquainted with the materials of the initiative.

The owners of the Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic II — The Sith Lords version for Nintendo Switch sued Aspyr Media and Saber Interactive. Gamers are unhappy that companies have changed their minds about releasing DLC with cut content.