Tag: Lawsuit

IPE Update: Epic Games v. Sperry Ends


Another Epic Games lawsuit has come to a close.

Plaintiff Epic Games and defendant Joseph Sperry, a.k.a “Spoezy” in a lawsuit related to the creation and distribution of cheat software for the video game Fortnite. According to the lawsuit filed by Epic, Sperry promoted, marketed, and sold the cheats to third parties for financial gain, and engaged in acts of contributory copyright infringement as well as contributing substantially to infringement by others through the sale of his software.

Sperry was hit with a DMCA violation, and has been permanently enjoined and restrained from infringement of any Epic product, current or future, as well as having any relation to infringing software of any of Epic’s copyrights, cheating at any Epic’s games, interfering with their contracts or contractual relations, unfairly competing with Epic, or assisting in any way another party in infringing on Epic’s copyrights.

Both parties have accepted the terms of the judgment and neither party may appeal this ruling. If Sperry violates the terms of the ruling, the court holds the right to award Epic liquidated damages of five thousand dollars without regard to proof of actual damages, as well as possibly other relief including attorneys’ fees, costs, as determined by the court.

Epic filed suit in the North Carolina Eastern District Court, Western Division. Epic Games has filed ten lawsuits since October 10, 2017 against cheat creators/distributors for Fortnite with most of the cases ending in simple court-ordered injunctions. All but one of those lawsuits has since been closed.

As always, MMO Fallout has provided the documents on our Google Drive. The file is listed as “Sperry-Judgment”.

Source: Google Drive

IPE Update: When Riot Sued Over A League of Legends Ripoff


Way back in the distant year of 2017 I reported on the case of Riot Games v. Shanghai Moonton Technology Co., and due to a case of poor diligence on my part, I never actually followed up on that case. The gist of the lawsuit is simple; Riot filed lawsuit in California court alleging copyright infringement by a mobile League of Legends ripoff Mobile Legends. What actually brought the lawsuit to my scope of coverage wasn’t so much that the lawsuit existed but the fact that Shanghai Moonton Tech Co. doesn’t seem to understand the concept of the free press and decided to threaten lawsuits against anyone even covering the case. To that I welcome their lawyers with open arms and an ethics complaint with the state bar association.

Well the lawsuit didn’t go far. As you might expect, Moonton answered Riot’s lawsuit with a motion for dismissal as well as a motion for forum non conveniens. For those who don’t want to hit the Google machine, this is a power that the courts in the States have to exercise their authority to simply not take a case if another court is more convenient. In this case, the court determined that Moonton is a very, very Chinese company that does its principle business in China which begs the question of what this case is doing in California.

“Moonton is a video game company based in China with approximately 215 employees (including the employees of its subsidiaries) located in Shanghai, Beijing, and Hefei. It conducts all of its engineering operations in China. All of Moonton’s employees communicate with one another in Mandarin, and documents and emails are drafted in Mandarin.”

As the court points out, having the case in the states would just be a gigantic pain when it could so much more easily be held in China. Moonton successfully convinced the court that while a trial in California would require witness testimony and mean that Moonton would need to bring employees from China to California at great expense, that courts in China do not operate the same way and that Riot would be unlikely to have to transport any employees as witnesses.

“For the reasons set forth below, the FNC Motion is GRANTED. The courts of China provide an adequate alternative forum for this litigation. Though Riot’s choice to sue here would ordinarily be entitled to substantial deference, the unique circumstances of this case and relevant private interest factors – most notably the risk of inconsistent judgments and overlapping damages awards, and Moonton’s inability to depose Tencent and likely difficulty obtaining documents from Tencent if the case proceeds here – outweigh that deference and militate in favor of dismissal on forum non conveniens grounds.”

The court also took issue with an apparent coordination between Riot Games and its parent company Tencent, with Riot suing Moonton in the US while Tencent sues them in China as being unfair as Riot/Tencent would have access to each others documents while Moonton would likely have more issues.

“Simply put, if Riot is going to sue Moonton here for Bang Bang’s infringement of LoL’s allegedly original game map while Tencent, its Chinese parent company with which it coordinates enforcement efforts, simultaneously sues Moonton in China for Bang Bang’s infringement of King’s Glory’s allegedly original game map, it would be unfair in the extreme if Moonton could not depose any Tencent representatives or compel them to testify at trial. But that is precisely what will happen if the case proceeds here.”

Riot naturally is not happy with this decision, and responded by noting that the odds of U.S. Copyright being adequately provided protection in a Chinese court is slim. Unfortunately the court did not see it their way and granted the motion for forum non conveniens. In January 2018, Riot Games filed an appeal with the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals. The case was assigned a docket number, both parties named their council, and…nothing happened.

After seven months of silence, Riot quietly dropped the appeal.

Unfortunately for Moonton and their League of Legends ripoff, the Shanghai Courts were not so lenient on the company. The lawsuit by Tencent continued and in July of last year the court handed over a $2.9 million verdict in Tencent’s favor. Incidentally the lawsuit targeted not Moonton as a company, but its CEO Xu Zhenhua.

Moral of the story: Don’t steal from Tencent, they will destroy you. As always, the files sourced in the above article have been uploaded to the MMO Fallout Google Drive for your reading pleasure.

US Copyright Office: No, the Carlton Is Not Copyrightable


Alfonso Ribeiro is best known for his character Carlton from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. Ribeiro came back into the public spotlight after launching lawsuits against Epic Games and Take-Two Interactive over copyright claims that he owns the famous dance popularized by the TV Show, informally known as The Carlton. The lawsuit alleges that both developers used The Carlton without permission, that Ribeiro is the sole owner, and that he deserves compensation for use of his creation.

Unfortunately for Ribeiro the Copyright office has been rather explicit regarding the copyright status for simple dance routines: They can’t be copyrighted. The Carlton as it turns out is no different.

In a response to his copyright application, the US Copyright Office officially refused registration for The Dance by Alfonso Ribeiro – Variation B, and noted in no uncertain terms that the dance qualified as a simple dance routine and could not be classified as a choreographic work. Choreography is legally defined as a composition and arrangement of a related series of dance movements and patterns organized into an integrated, coherent, and expressive whole. Choreographic works do not include social dance steps and simple routines, and must contain a sufficient amount of choreographic authorship.

As The Carlton is a routine consisting of three dance steps, it is not registrable as a choreographic work. The Copyright office went further in questioning whether or not Ribeiro was even the sole author of the work.

Epic and Take Two are currently fighting legal battles against a growing number of performers and internet celebrities over the use of popular dance moves in Fortnite and NBA 2K. Now that the copyright office has spoken on Ribeiro’s ownership status, it seems likely that Epic’s next move will be a motion to dismiss.

Source: U.S. Copyright Office

IPE (Minor) Update: Trion Worlds Lawsuit As Of January 30, 2019


I’ve been holding off on the Trion Worlds lawsuit coverage for the simple fact that not a whole lot has been happening over the past couple of months, at least nothing of major significance. Right now the case is getting to the end of discovery, this is the portion of the lawsuit where the parties finish up requesting and handing over documents that will be used in the coming trial. To spare you the reader from boredom, I have kindly summarized the last few case management conferences into one sentence: “Information was requested, other information may be requested, we will let you know at the next conference, and class action status is still pending.”

You’re welcome. Now on with the meat of the latest filings:

The Asset Transfer, Or, A New Defendant

If you’ve been keeping up with the ongoing story of Trion Worlds, you’ll know that the company is virtually nonexistent at this point. Last October, Trion transferred its assets and property to Trion Worlds LLC, which subsequently sold said assets to Gamigo. Trion Worlds LLC was issued a subpoena to produce information regarding the transaction and has since turned over an Asset Purchase Agreement and related documents.

The documents have shined light on another entity that may currently possess Trion assets: Golden Gate Games Inc. The plaintiffs not only intend to serve Golden Gate Games with documents and deposition subpoenas, but also have noted their intent to investigate whether individual officers/owners of Trion may be liable to plaintiffs and the proposed class action lawsuit as part of the asset transfer. The document also notes that plaintiffs have been unable to serve Gamigo with subpoenas.

As far as Trion Worlds is concerned, all non-privileged responsive documents have been produced. Trion has not sought any discovery information from the Plaintiffs according to court filings.

What Are We Waiting For?

For the moment, we are waiting to see whether the plaintiffs in the case will be adding an additional party or parties to the defense which will be known within the next two months. The next case management conference is not set until March 15, during which the parties will discuss the ongoing motion to certify the lawsuit for class action status. A request to compel documents pertaining to ArcheAge’s financial information has been deferred for the time being as unnecessary for class certification, however there is the possibility that we will be made privy to the details of Trion’s asset sale to Gamigo at some point in this lawsuit.

Again, there hasn’t been much development over the past two months, and there won’t be for another couple of months to come.

As always, the documents related to the case have been made available on the MMO Fallout Google Drive folder for your use.

IPE: Former Gearbox Counsel Accuses Randy Pitchford of Possessing Underage Pornography (Updates)


(Editor’s Note: It should be noted that any accusations made in this lawsuit are alleged and no presumption of guilt for accusations against either party should be presumed, either implied or otherwise. MMO Fallout makes no conclusion of guilt or innocence on either party.)

(Update Jan 11 6:40p.m.) Gearbox has released a statement to Kotaku that they will be filing a grievance with the STate Bar of Texas against Wade Callender for knowingly filing documents containing false accusations.

(Update Jan 11 6:25p.m.) Randy Pitchford has responded to the allegations in a series of messages on his Twitter account. Pitchford denies the allegations, classifying them as a “shake down” and part of a “greedy pursuit for money.” Randy is confident that he will prevail in the ongoing litigation between both parties.

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Ars Technica has found a podcast in which Randy Pitchford describes that the material left on the USB stick was not “underage” as claimed in the lawsuit. Viewers are only recommended to follow the above link if you really want to know what Randy Pitchford is into.

(Original Story) A former general counsel for Gearbox and Randy Pitchford are currently embroiled in a rather nasty string of lawsuits against one another for a multitude of charges, however a recent court filing has accused the Gearbox CEO of possessing underage pornography.

Both lawsuits detail a myriad of claims regarding breach of duty towards Gearbox as a developer, with Pitchford himself being accused of siphoning a $12 million bonus payment from the company into his personal account, as well as various claims of breach of contract revolving around the developer as well as a separate real estate company. Pitchford is suing, and being sued by, a man named Wade Callender. Callender is a former Navy Lieutenant Commander who worked as General Counsel to Gearbox from 2010 to 2018.

Callender is himself the target of a lawsuit by Gearbox, who accuse him in turn of owing money loaned for a home loan and tuition as well as abusing a company credit card for personal purchases.

 

But a part of this lawsuit comes in the form of a claim against Pitchford that the CEO in 2014 lost a USB drive at a Medieval Times restaurant containing sensitive Gearbox corporate material, which was found by a good samaritan who contacted Gearbox via email to return the device. Pitchford intervened before the data on the drive could be copied, however Callender is claiming that the device contained Pitchford’s personal collection of underage pornography.

“On information and belief, Randy Pitchford’s USB drive contained much more than the sensitive corporate documents of Gearbox and business partners like Take-Two Interactive, 2K Games, Sega, Microsoft, Sony, etc. Upon information and belief, Randy Pitchford’s USB drive also contained Randy Pitchford’s personal collection of “underage” pornography.”

Callender goes on to claim that Pitchford syphoned Gearbox profits to fund parties thrown by himself and his wife. The parties, termed “peacock parties,” in which adult men allegedly exposed themseves to minors, to the amusement of Pitchford himself. Links to both lawsuit filings are below.

Source: Scribd, Scribd

IPE Update: Brandon Lucas Files Motion to Dismiss Epic Lawsuit


Brandon Lucas has filed a motion to dismiss in North Carolina court this week. Lucas is currently being sued by Epic Games over causes of copyright infringement, breach of contract, interference with contractual relations, and unfair/deceptive trade & unfair competition in relation to alleged cheating and promotion of cheats in Fortnite.

The Defendant Brandon Lucas hereby files a motion to dismiss the complaint. The motion date will be scheduled by the Court after proper notice to the Plaintiff, Epic Games, Inc. The Defendant, Brandon Lucas, will rely on the affidavit submitted.

In his motion to dismiss, Lucas claims that he does not own the Youtube channel in question, that the videos posted are not his, that he does not own or advertise any cheats, and that generally Epic has the wrong guy.

Epic filed the lawsuit back in October against Lucas and another defendant. Epic is alleging that Lucas owns, operates, and profits from a website selling cheats and buying accounts for Fortnite. MMO Fallout will update once the court reaches a decision.

The adventurous among you can check out the link below for both the original filing and motion to dismiss. Be aware that the original filing contains all evidence and runs over 160 pages.

(Source: Google Drive)

Trion Worlds Tells Court: Company Disbanded, All Employees Terminated


(Update 10/31/18): Files from a case management conference held on 10/26 have been published. It looks like the council will continue discussing a plan of action moving forward. A CMC has been scheduled for November 19, and we will post an updated piece should anything important be confirmed.

The new document has been uploaded to the Google Drive folder linked at the end of the article.

“The situation was discussed in general among counsel and the Court, and it was agreed that counsel would continue to discuss the situation to keep up to date and formulate plan of action for this case under the circumstances. Defense counsel agreed to seek approval of the Defendant client to provide information about the subject transactions to Plaintiffs’ counsel under confidentiality order. It was agreed to defer setting of class certification, and discovery plan until the next CMC.”

Original Story: One week ago, we learned that Trion Worlds had been acquired by Gamigo with at least 75% of the staff laid off. MMO Fallout has come across a document filed with the San Mateo County Court on October 26 describing that Trion Worlds has disbanded, all of its employees have been terminated, and its directors are gone.

Defendant’s counsel reporter that Trion Worlds has suddenly disbanded this week. All assets and
property were assigned to Trion Worlds (ABC) LLC, and they proceeded to sell the assets and intellectual
property to others, particularly Gamigo, a Germany-based game publisher. All of the employees of Trion
have been terminated effective October 22, 2018, i.e. immediately upon the announcement, and its
directors and officers are gone and the company will be dissolved.

In another case management conference statement filed October 25, Trion’s lawyers noted that they themselves were not aware of the transfer or dissolution until October 18.

Defense counsel first became aware on October 18, 2018 of the transfer of assets of TWI to take place on October 22, 2018 and the corporate dissolution of TWI to follow shortly thereafter. Defense counsel has been actively investigating and assessing since that time the status of TWI-ABC with respect to the claims presented in this action.

Lawyers for the former Trion Worlds have requested a 14 day continuance in order to allow the defense to advise the court and plaintiffs on the impact of the dissolution.

As always, MMO Fallout has made the dockets available via Google Drive at the link below.

(Source: Google Drive)

Epic Games Wins Default Judgement As Defendant Fails to Respond


It’s been a while since MMO Fallout followed up on Epic Games v. C.R., the lawsuit where Epic brought complaint against a defendant who turned out to be a minor. C.R. was being accused of continuing to cheat in Fortnite, and promote said cheats through Youtube videos/streaming, in spite of over a dozen account bans by Epic. Epic filed a copyright claim against his video, defendant counterclaimed, and Epic filed suit as required by copyright law.

Most of the updates on this case have revolved around sealing and redacting documents to remove C.R.’s name from the record, so I’ve taken the liberty of skipping their coverage as to not bore all of you. The last couple of months have brought some small updates, ultimately leading to a decision within the past couple of days. Those of you who have followed the case know that C.R.’s mother wrote a letter to the court asking for them to dismiss the case, and I pointed out at the time that this may be damaging as it could be construed by the court as an official response and a motion to dismiss. I wasn’t wrong, and the court accepted the letter and interpreted it as an official motion to dismiss.

The motion was denied because it didn’t properly address the plaintiff’s claims, a premise that shouldn’t be surprising when you consider that it wasn’t written by a lawyer, or intended to be an actual legal filing. Following the court’s denial of the motion to dismiss in July, Epic Games once again filed a motion for entry of default, as outside of the initial letter from C.R.’s mother, they have not actually responded to Epic’s complaint.

After continuing to miss deadlines for response, the court this week granted Epic’s motion for default judgement, meaning Epic will likely get what it wants. And what does Epic want? Let’s go back to the prayer for relief in Epic’s initial complaint.

Epic wants the court to enter judgement in their favor and adjudge the defendant to have infringed on Epic’s copyright, to have contributory infringement, to have breached the terms of service, to have interfered in contracts between Epic and its other players through their cheating, and for the court to declare that the infringements were willing in nature. As punishment, Epic has demanded that the defendant be permanently barred from infringing or contributing to infringement, ie; cheating in their games and distributing/promoting said cheats, as well as deleting any videos showing said cheats and copies of said software off of his computer.

Now let’s talk money. Epic has demanded the maximum statutory damages under 17 U.S.C. § 504, which allows up to $30,000 (as the court considers just) with an exception for cases where the copyright owner sustains the burden of proving willful infringement, in which case the maximum damage shoots up to $150,000 (again, as the court considers just). Alternately, Epic may ask for the “actual damages,” which were not specified. In addition, Epic has asked for attorneys’ fees, costs, and expenditures, as well as any further relief the court may deem proper.

Will Epic get paid? In my humble opinion, we’re more likely to see this end in a bankruptcy filing by the family.

IPE Update: Trion Worlds Overruled, Receives Warning Over Procedural Violations


Who would have thought we’d be talking about Trion Worlds using incorrect font sizes?

It’s Thursday, and that means it’s time for an update on the case of Van Fleet v Trion Worlds, an active lawsuit in San Mateo County Court that seeks class action status regarding two major offenses: That Trion Worlds misled customers by offering a 10% discount and then did not follow through, and the question on whether or not lockboxes in ArcheAge constitute an illegal lottery.

If you need more backstory, go here. For the rest, let’s move on.

You may recall in the last episode of In Plain English, Trion Worlds had filed a demurrer (that’s a motion to dismiss) against the claims of illegal lottery and notably not the claims of misleading advertising, with a court hearing scheduled for August 23. The notes from the hearing have just become available, so let’s go through them.

To keep the story short, both demurrers filed by Trion Worlds on the basis of standing and failing to allege facts have been overruled by the court. The real meat and potatoes of this story resides in the fact that Judge Weiner had some comments regarding improper procedure by Trion Worlds lawyers.

The judge accuses Trion’s lawyers of skirting statutory page limitations via over-use of footnotes, and that the footnotes were not in 12-point font as required by law. It may seem like a small error from the outside looking in, but the courts take these procedures seriously enough that Judge Weiner threatened to strike down future briefs that do not adhere to procedural statutory laws.

Judge Weiner went even further by striking Trion’s evidence as being improperly submitted. Trion Worlds submitted with its demurrer screenshots and information from ArcheAge, and did not formally request judicial notice. Trion’s request for judicial notice regarding its End User License Agreement was denied.

“Judicial notice is a rule in the law of evidence that allows a fact to be introduced into evidence if the truth of that fact is so notorious or well known, or so authoritatively attested, that it cannot reasonably be doubted. This is done upon the request of the party seeking to rely on the fact at issue.”

In its pleadings, Trion also attempted to convert the demurrer (motion to dismiss) into a summary adjudication, essentially asking the judge to make a ruling without going to trial. The court declined to do so.

So where do we stand now? Trion Worlds has until September 17 to file its answer to the First Amended Complaint, after which a Case Management Conference will be held on October 26 where the parties will discuss status of discovery, status of settlement or mediation, any other possible motions, as well as the date of the following CMC, plus any other matters pertinent to the case.

Parties will also discuss the status of the lawsuit class action certification, including any further research needed to support or deny such a claim.

I have uploaded a copy of the Case Management Order to the MMO Fallout Google Drive, linked below.

(Source: Docket)

IPE Update: Court Issues Ruling On Star Citizen Motion To Dismiss


Here at MMO Fallout we try to avoid saturating our coverage of lawsuits for two reasons: The first being that unless the court is making a judgement or one of the parties introduces some profound claim or evidence, the court filings in between are about as interesting and productive as this. Thankfully we’re finally getting somewhere in the case of Crytek v. Roberts Space Industries and Cloud Imperium Games.

For those of you who need it, a quick summary: In the far flung past of December 2017, Crytek officially launched a lawsuit against CIG and RSI containing accusations of breach of contract over Star Citizen and Squadron 42. The major points of contention in the lawsuit come down to RSI/CIG no longer using the engine, and whether that constituted a breach with regards to royalties, obligations to collaborate, use trademarks in advertising, paid royalties, etc. In my previous coverage, I noted that CIG’s successful dismissal of the case was highly unlikely due to the nature of the allegations.

1. Terms of Contract, or, The Prevailing Document

In its motion to dismiss, Roberts Space Industries motioned to dismiss its part in the lawsuit, claiming that it did not sign the GLA and thus is not a party to the GLA. In its decision, the court noted that the ToC and GLA contain conflicting information, as both attempt to define the term “licensee” with the GLA only involving Cloud Imperium Games and the ToC including both parties. Since the terms of the contract state that any case of conflicts between the documents would lead to the ToC being the prevailing document, the court ruled that Roberts Space Industries is a signatory to the contract.

Motion to dismiss has been denied with the court refusing to consider plaintiff’s other arguments.

On a side note: We actually discussed something similar to this just recently. In regards to prevailing documents, you may recall that this same ruling was handed down against Trion Worlds, as conflicting documents between their End User License Agreement and Terms of Service in regards to where legal disputes could be held led the company to losing its attempt to pull the lawsuit into arbitration, as well as its appeal on the same matter.

2. The Defendant’s Conduct, or, Breach of Contract

The second issue that the courts ruled on this week is the question of the definition of exclusive. I gave a lot of attention to this in my prior coverage because this is an important distinction with the potential to go very, very wrong depending on the understanding of the judge.

In its lawsuit, Crytek made the claim that when it gave CIG/RSI exclusive rights to use the CryEngine on Star Citizen, this meant that both parties were obligated to use the engine and nothing else for Star Citizen. In plain English, this isn’t how the term “exclusive” is used when it comes to contracts like this, and a license is a grant of permission, generally not something used to restrict the licensee. The court agreed with RSI/CIG that the terms of the contract did not legally bind the defendants into using the CryEngine in their product, and as such the motion to dismiss on this count was approved.

The court was less forgiving on the second part of this claim, however. The second part of this claim has to do with the defendants removing Crytek’s logos from their website in breach of contract. As part of their contractual obligations, CIG was required to display Crytek logos on their website and in game. Crytek’s complaint alleges that the defendants had begun removing their logos as of September 2016 when CIG claims that they had moved away from the CryEngine by December 2016.

Due to uncertainty and an obligation by the court to favor the plaintiff’s first amended complaint, this motion was denied.

The third part of this section has to do with whether or not Squadron 42 being spun off into its own property is considered a breach of contract. In the initial lawsuit coverage, we noted that the terms of contract explicitly allowed CIG to use the CryEngine in one game and one game only, that being Star Citizen. However, we also noted that there was some wiggle room for the defendants to fight this claim, as the contract also defines “the game” as including Star Citizen and Squadron 42. HOWEVER, in defining Squadron 42 as part of “the game,” it was merely a feature of Star Citizen and was not being sold as a standalone product.

RSI/CIG may have breached contract by announcing in late 2015 that Squadron 42 would be sold as a standalone title, as it wasn’t until December 2016 that the public was informed of Squadron 42 switching to the Lumberyard engine. As a result, the court has denied the motion to dismiss on this claim.

3. Claim for Damages, or, Torts for Two

This is an interesting one. In their motion to dismiss, CIG pointed to section 6.1.4 of the contract, noting that its language precludes both parties from recovering damages for intentional or grossly negligent conduct. The defendant attempted to cite the clause, claiming that it would only allow for exceptions in claims of tort (common law) over contract (terms between the parties). The court disagreed, threw out the cases that CIG used to support its claim, and summarily denied their motion to dismiss.

4. Copyright Infringement, or, Squadron 42

Squadron 42 has been a big source of contention between Crytek and CIG and could make or break certain parts of this lawsuit. Just to go over the facts again, Crytek’s contract for the CryEngine allowed CIG/RSI to create one game, Star Citizen, with Squadron 42 being just a feature of the main game. The contract expressly does not allow CIG to use the CryEngine to separately market or sell a second game, which they proceeded to do by marketing Squadron 42 as a standalone title.

In their defense, CIG noted that Squadron 42 is being developed with the Amazon Lumberyard engine and thus did not breach the terms of the license. In their lawsuit, Crytek states that the announcement that CIG would be using the Lumberyard engine came in December 2016, while the announcement that Squadron 42 would be its own standalone game came a year prior. Presumably this would imply that Squadron 42 was in development, with the plans to sell it as a standalone product, using CryEngine at some point, thus being a breach of contract.

This allegation will need to be settled in court with discovery to figure out when Squadron 42 was split off into a standalone game and when CIG stopped development on said title using the CryEngine, so the court has denied this motion to dismiss.

5. Prayer for Relief, or, Show Me the Money

This may be a short section.

We already discussed in this piece that CIG’s use of section 6.1.4 to preclude recovery has been denied. In addition, the court ruled that Crytek had sufficiently plead facts that support entitlement to injunctive relief, alleging that defendants released videos containing confidential CryEngine information as well as entering into a partnership with a third party studio and giving them access to confidential Crytek technology in violation of their license. As a result, the court has denied CIG’s motion to dismiss Crytek’s claim for injunctive relief.

In regards to statutory damages and attorney’s fees, defendants argued that the Copyright Act does not allow recover of damages and attorney’s fees because Crytek registered its copyrights after the infringements took place. The court agreed with this interpretation, however the game license states that the prevailing party will be entitled to recover attorney’s fees in the case of litigation. The court notes that Crytek is unlikely to recover any statutory damages, that they are not willing to make a decision at the pleading stage of the lawsuit and has thus denied this motion.

As to Crytek’s demands for punitive damages, the court ruled that California law does not permit punitive damages in cases of a breach of contract, nor does the Copyright Act. As such, the motion to dismiss Crytek’s claim for punitive damages has been granted.

And finally, the court ruled on Crytek’s claims regarding potential conflicts of interest regarding the parties involved in the contract negotiations. While the defendants argued that the claims were not necessary or important to Crytek’s lawsuit, the court disagreed, concluding that the relationship between the parties and their executives may prove relevant, and that the allegations were not derogatory in nature. As such, this motion to dismiss was denied.

6. Conclusion, or, Fire Up That Injunction

Of the six motions to dismiss, the court has granted one in full and one in part. Crytek has been granted a leave to file an amended complaint addressing some of the deficiencies within 21 days, to which the defendants will have 21 days to file a response. After that, we’re going to trial.

(Source: Court Docket)