legal
SEC and Wells Fargo settle a suit over 38 Studios
The seemingly never-ending saga of 38 Studios and Project Copernicus has another coda this week in its sad history. Gamasutra is reporting that the Securities...
Revisions to Japanese law make console and save data modding illegal
Japan's Association of Copyright for Computer Software is going after console modders in some recent revisions to the country's Unfair Competition Prevention Law. According...
A look back at the MMO industry’s law dramas of 2018
Last year, we started a new end-of-the-year tradition: a recap of all the legal and political dramas that have affected the MMO genre over...
An EVE Online corporation has been hit with a GDPR request from an ex-member
We often talk about how EVE Online can sometimes mirror the real world in startling detail, with its complex politics, global power struggles, and player-run...
Bethsoft and Behaviour resolve their lawsuit over Westworld and Fallout Shelter
One of the key gaming legal disputes of 2018 was the lawsuit lodged by Bethsoft against Behaviour Interactive, specifically focused on the release of...
China is approving games again, but none of them is from Tencent or Netease
After nearly a year of being frozen, China's approval process for games lurched into life once more in December, with 80 titles approved in...
Fallout 76 asks banned players to submit a 500-word essay on why cheating is wrong
So we all know that Fallout 76 is a buggy mess by this point, which means that until it becomes not a buggy mess,...
FBI seizes 15 different websites hiring out DDoS services
Isn't it awesome that you can go to a website, pay some money (or Bitcoin, of course this would take Bitcoin), and then have...
Escape From Tarkov devs lodge DMCA strikes over YouTuber’s ‘misinformation’ and ‘negative hype’
It's been a couple of years since we had one of these stories about a game studio filing DMCA complaints in an attempt to...
Netmarble’s appeal over deceptive lockbox practices has been dismissed
Even South Korea is getting mighty tired of lockboxes... or at least, tired of scuzzy business practices associated with them. Netmarble had been fined...
ZeniMax and Oculus have finally settled their multi-year lawsuit – out of court
When John Carmack and ZeniMax settled their long-running legal dispute earlier this fall, we noted that the companies were continuing to appeal how much...
UK parliament committee will investigate addictive tech, lootboxes, and harmful gamification
Given that UK researchers this year found a "relationship between problem gambling and the use of loot boxes" as well as determined that problem...
South Korea now has a law criminalizing the act of boosting in online games
Let's say you really care about your competitive rank in a video game, but you don't have the time to actually practice and get...
A judge has dismissed another chunk of Crytek’s Star Citizen engine lawsuit
Happy Christmas, Cloud Imperium.
MOP readers will recall that almost exactly a year ago, Crytek sued Star Citizen developer CIG, alleging that CIG infringed its...
Rapper 2 Milly files lawsuit against Epic Games over Fortnite dance emote
Epic Games is under fire from rapper 2 Milly, who has filed a lawsuit against the Fortnite developer that alleges that one of the...
Niantic agrees to settle the property trespass class action lawsuit over Pokemon Go
Way back in 2016, at the height of the new-news-every-day-on-Pokemon-Go, we covered a lawsuit lodged against Nintendo and Niantic by one Jeffrey Marder of...
LOTRO composer Chance Thomas loses sound company over ponzi scheme
Many Lord of the Rings Online fans are well acquainted with Chance Thomas. While not the only composer for the MMO, his work on...
The FTC commits to investigating video game lootboxes following US Senate subcommittee hearing
Readers following the long-running lootbox/lockbox debate will recall that back in February of this year, New Hampshire Senator Maggie Hassan, who sits on the...
There might just be a class action lawsuit over Fallout 76 refunds
If you're having fun in Fallout 76, awesome - our own Fallout fanboy certainly found some positives in the game - but other folks...
Another e-thug responsible for DDOSing SOE years back is brought to justice
Hey, remember a few years ago when there was a new Lizard Squad article like every month, thanks to the fact that the e-thug...
