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Activision Hit With $500m Suit From Modern Warfare 2 Devs

Posted by Soulskill on from the pow-right-in-the-kisser dept.

Dragoniz3r writes "Activision has been served a lawsuit from 38 plaintiffs, including present and former Infinity Ward employees, demanding up to half a billion dollars. The plaintiffs are seeking compensation for 'unpaid bonuses, royalties, profit-sharing, and future profits from games such as Modern Warfare 3, and punitive damages.'"

10 of 77 comments (clear)

  1. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  2. Res ipsa loquitur by Rollgunner · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Bringing a lawsuit against a huge corporation for half a billion dollars... That *is* Modern Warfare.

  3. Re:MW3 money? by Lance+Dearnis · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Their contract specifies (Unsurprisingly) that they have some rights to the Modern Warfare series as a whole. Go back and look at the old papers - the first lawsuit - to see that contract. In other words: What they want, I would expect, is that Activision doesn't get to make more Modern Warfare at all. It's not like Activision came up with it, they're firing the people who did. They might not be able legally to take the Modern Warfare name with them, but if they can't, they'll take the money from it at least. Either way, Activision's actions here are pretty patently and obviously illegal. IANAL, but the California Legal Code in terms of 'you must pay people all owed money within 72 hours of their departure' doesn't require one to interpret. The other stuff may be up in the air, but Activision's definitely ripping them off here.

  4. Not to beat a dead horse, but... by J-1000 · · Score: 4, Interesting

    ...anyone know how the developers themselves feel about the "no servers/mods" policy with PC Modern Warfare 2? I'm hoping *maybe* that was an Activision decision and *maybe* Respawn's future stuff will have a less lame implementation.

    1. Re:Not to beat a dead horse, but... by Tukz · · Score: 4, Insightful

      No, if we give up, we loose the fight.
      This trend with no dedicated servers, has got to stop.

      What happens now if IW gets shut down? What if they shut down the IWnet servers too?
      MW2 is dead then.

      But if we had control over our own server systems, we could still play on dedicated servers.
      Like, you know, they've done for decades.

      I am not willing to give up on this issue, as old as it may get.
      I own pretty much all consoles and a high-end PC for gaming, so I'm not taking sides per se (no PC fanboi, nor a console fanboi)

      But I feel screwed over as a PC gamer. They remove features we've been accustomed to for YEARS.

      And before anyone scream piracy, I spend at least an average of $300 on games each month, so keep me out of that endless loop.

      So no, we won't give up already.

      --
      - Don't do what I do, it's probably not healthy nor safe. -
  5. Re:Brain Drain by beakerMeep · · Score: 4, Funny

    So 12 of the people suing them are still working there?

    Awkward...

    --
    meep
  6. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 4, Funny

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  7. Re:Brain Drain by T+Murphy · · Score: 4, Funny

    ...So replace those lost programmers with liberal arts majors and start an offshoot "Post-Modern Warfare" series.

    --
    My webcomic
  8. Re:Brain Drain by increment1 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    What's far more likely is that Activision treated their devs like crap (surprise surprise) and for most of them, having the heads of IW fired was the final straw.

    This is ironic because Activision (the original Activision) was founded expressly to treat developers better. To quote from Wikipedia:

    "Before the formation of Activision, software for video game consoles were published exclusively by makers of the systems for which the games were designed. For example, Atari was the only publisher of games for the Atari 2600. This was particularly galling to the developers of the games, as they received no financial rewards for games that sold well, and did not receive credit for their games. This caused several programmers to resign from their jobs. Activision became the first third-party game publisher for game consoles."

  9. So skilled with the lash... by Valgar · · Score: 4, Funny

    The fact that they can screw with and abuse people so hard that they actually WANT to go work for EA, speaks volumes about how dedicated Activision must be to sucking every last cent of work out of their employees.