EA sue Zynga for blatantly copying the Sims Social

Video game giant EA is suing Zynga for allegedly plagiarized from The Sims Social, Facebook based game on the hit series. According to EA, Zynga recently launched The Ville, with which they intentionally copied and misappropriated original and distinctive elements of The Sims Social, which is a clear violation of copyright laws of  in the U.S.

Lucy Bradshaw of Maxis (the official home of  all the Sim Games) raised the following queries in his message:

As outlined in our complaint, when The Ville was introduced in June 2012, the infringement of The Sims Social was unmistakable to those of us at Maxis as well as to players and the industry at large. The similarities go well beyond any superficial resemblance. Zynga’s design choices, animations, visual arrangements and character motions and actions have been directly lifted from The Sims Social. The copying was so comprehensive that the two games are, to an uninitiated observer, largely indistinguishable. Scores of media and bloggers commented on the blatant mimicry.

This is a case of principle. Maxis isn’t the first studio to claim that Zynga copied its creative product. But we are the studio that has the financial and corporate resources to stand up and do something about it. Infringing a developer’s copyright is not an acceptable practice in game development. By calling Zynga out on this illegal practice, we hope to have a secondary effect of protecting the rights of other creative studios who don’t have the resources to protect themselves.

Today, we hope to be taking a stand that helps the industry protect the value of original creative works and those that work tirelessly to create them.

Reply from Zynga’s General Counsel Reggie Davis eluded the allegations,  deflecting the questions raised against them while sharing that the game builds on their innovations-

We are committed to creating the most fun, innovative, social and engaging games in every major genre that our players enjoy. The Ville is the newest game in our ‘ville’ franchise – it builds on every major innovation from our existing invest-and-express games dating back to YoVille and continuing through CityVille and CastleVille, and introduces a number of new social features and game mechanics not seen in social games today. It’s unfortunate that EA thought that this was an appropriate response to our game, and clearly demonstrates a lack of understanding of basic copyright principles. It’s also ironic that EA brings this suit shortly after launching SimCity Social which bears an uncanny resemblance to Zynga’s CityVille game. Nonetheless, we plan to defend our rights to the fullest extent possible and intend to win with players.

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Posted by Awais Khan on Aug 9 2012. Filed under Gaming. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.