![]() ![]() “Hypothetically, Blizzard could have the ability to take legal action against stand-alone games that are heavily inspired by, or derivative of, custom games on the grounds that those stand-alone games are infringing upon Blizzard’s copyright.” “Blizzard is making it extra clear that its ownership of custom games includes ownership of all of the copyrightable, creative elements contained in those custom games,” said Womack. Without limiting the foregoing, you hereby assign to Blizzard all of your rights, title, and interest in and to all Custom Games, including but not limited to any copyrights in the content of any Custom Games. The main difference between the old user agreement and the new one, is a passage at the very start of the document:Ĭustom Games are and shall remain the sole and exclusive property of Blizzard. “Blizzard may have made many of these changes in light of what happened with DOTA,” says Womack. Dota 2, released in 2013, went on to enjoy immense financial success. The matter was ultimately resolved, with Valve retaining rights to the Dota 2 name, even though it had been born from a game made by Blizzard. The company said that DOTA was heavily associated with its copyrights, after years of public use. Blizzard argued that its end-user licensing agreement stipulated that it owned DOTA’s assets, but did not make the argument that it owned the mod’s concept or design. And although Blizzard had certain rights over the game’s assets, it did not have ownership of the name or the game’s central design.Īnd so, its rival Valve snapped up the rights to the name and hired its most active modder (known as IceFrog) and began work on a new game called Dota 2, which did not use any of Blizzard’s technology, characters or intellectual copyrights, but followed its essential gameplay template.Ī legal fight ensued between Blizzard and Valve, based on which company owned the DOTA trademark. Blizzard scaled back development of its MOBA in 2018.Īs a free mod, DOTA enjoyed immense success, attracting a community of supporters who helped maintain and publicize the game. before becoming Blizzard All-Stars and ultimately Heroes of the Storm. Blizzard’s take on the MOBA genre went through multiple iterations, starting as Blizzard DOTA for StarCraft 2. It spawned a genre, called MOBA, or multiplayer online battle arena, which is now a staple of esports, with such hits as Riot’s League of Legends and Blizzard’s own Heroes of the Storm. “Blizzard wants to be sure that it’s getting as many rights to the content in custom games as possible,” said Womack in an email interview.īlizzard’s determination to lock down its legal rights has its historical roots in the modded game known as DOTA, or Defense of the Ancients, a mod built on Warcraft 3’s World Editor and released in 2003.Ī group of modders took the original real-time strategy game, stripped out its resource-gathering and building mechanics, leaving an exciting combat game. She specializes in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act, most especially as it impacts usage in video games, as well as “the intricacies of the video game industry … with matters related to copyright, trademarks, brand protection, and more,” according to her online bio. Caroline Womack is an associate at Morrison Rothman, a Los Angeles-based law firm that specializes in the field of digital entertainment, intellectual property, and brand protection, with a particular focus on video games. We asked a lawyer with experience of video game law to take a look at the changes and additions in the terms of service, and what they might mean for video game modders. But the company added some distinctive new restrictions, giving it almost total control over custom games. The company’s freshly painted legalese is much the same as it has been for years, in that it insists that modded versions of its games cannot be sold by third parties, but only released freely to the public. ![]() ![]() Earlier this year, alongside the release of Warcraft 3 Reforged, Blizzard changed the language used in its custom games policy for its community of modders that is, the people who use the company’s games to create their own spinoff games.
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