Snail Games Files Copyright Infringement Countersuit Against Angela Game And Tencent
Last month, Angela Games filed a lawsuit against Snail Games and Studio Wildcard for declaratory judgement and to recover damages caused by the studios’ copyright claims and the DMCA takedown of Myth of Empires.
In response, Snail Games has filed a countersuit against Angela Games and Imperium Interactive Entertainment, the company that facilitated the distribution agreement between Angela and Valve. Imperium was allegedly aware that the source code was stolen when they made the deal.
“Imperium knew or should have known that Angela was engaged in direct copyright infringement when Angela created the Infringing Game using stolen source code from Ark. Imperium then materially contributed to Angela’s infringing activity by publishing and helping distribute copies of the Infringing Game. Imperium is therefore also liable for contributory copyright infringement.”
The countersuit further claims that Angela has been modifying the Myth of Empires source code to remove potentially incriminating lines, including the copied elements that Snail Games presented in their DMCA takedown request.
“Angela’s recent conduct further confirms that Angela has acted unlawfully and that Angela knows that. In the two weeks following Snail’s December 1 DMCA notice, Angela has scrambled to cover its theft. Angela has repeatedly revised its Myth of Empires code, removing or revising code headers and other copied elements. And in many cases, Angela has modified the same copied code elements Snail USA had discovered and included in its DMCA notice to Valve, Tencent, and, of course, Angela. Angela had no reason to do this, other than to erase evidence of its misconduct.”
Snail Games also filed a separate copyright infringement lawsuit against Tencent for allegedly ignoring a DMCA notice to shut down their Myth of Empires servers. Snail Games claims that Tencent’s non-compliance may be due to a major financial investment in Angela Games and that they deliberately ignored the request for their own financial gain.
“On information and belief, Tencent’s ultimate parent, Tencent Holdings, Ltd., directly or indirectly owns a substantial interest in Angela. Tencent has allowed its servers to host the Infringing Game while refusing to abide by Snail USA’s DMCA takedown notice.”
For the countersuit, Snail Games is seeking damages from misappropriation and theft of the ARK code as well as a royalty payment for using the said code. The company also included a long list of demands, including all profits from Myth of Empires, the forfeiture of any hardware with the allegedly stolen code, a comprehensive report on opportunities and gains that resulted from the unauthorized code, a permanent injunction from further copyright infringement on Snail Games IPs for employees and affiliates of both companies, statutory damages, further damages, and legal expenses among others.
The same demands apply for the separate Tencent lawsuit. The full legal documentation can be found here if you want to get into the details.
