lol, EA taking the moral high ground. Good, after the Zynga and tiny tower I am glad someone is holding them to account.
Zynga countersues EA
By
Eddie Makuch, News Editor
Social gaming studio bites back at Battlefield publisher, calls copyright infringement lawsuit baseless; EA spokesperson describes countersuit as "predictable subterfuge."
Zynga has bitten back at Electronic Arts. The Los Angeles Times reports today that the social gaming giant has countersued EA, calling the publisher's August copyright infringement suit baseless and alleging "anticompetitive and unlawful business practices."
"Today we responded to EA’s claims, which we believe have no merit," the San Francisco studio said in a statement. "We also filed a counterclaim which addresses actions by EA we believe to be anticompetitive and unlawful business practices, including legal threats and demands for no-hire agreements."
In a statement to the site, EA senior director of corporate communications John Reseburg strongly denied Zynga's assertions. He also pointed to the exodus of top talent from the company of late, which included former Microsoft executive John Schappert.
"This is a predictable subterfuge aimed at diverting attention from Zynga’s persistent plagiarism of other artists and studios," Reseburg said. "Zynga would be better served trying to hold onto the shrinking number of employees they’ve got, rather than suing to acquire more."
The full text of the complaint can be found at Kotaku.
EA's suit against Zynga--which it calls a matter of principle--alleges that Zynga's The Ville is a ripoff of EA's Sims Social. EA Maxis general manager Lucy Bradshaw said EA was obligated to bring the suit because unlike many other operations that have alleged theft at Zynga's hands, her company "has the financial and corporate resources to stand up and do something about it."
By
Eddie Makuch, News Editor
Eddie Makuch (Mack-ooh) is a News Editor at GameSpot. He works out of the company's Boston office in Somerville, Mass., and loves extra chunky peanut butter.
237 comments
Oh well, just publishers being publishers. Can't we all just get along and ride into the sunset together?
No? Fine, bring in the machine guns and granades, let's settle this like real gentleman!!!
5 Like @Toplinkar lol for some reason this reminded me of that awesome Worms 2 Intro: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lxi8krxMdEo
2 Like It's about the lesser of two evils! I think it's the first time in my life that I am rooting for EA!
1 Like I Find it really funny how two days after releasing a Game which is an obvious Pokemon Ripoff Zynga refutes any claims of copying ideas. Not that I want o support EA though.
2 Like Just imagine the circus in the lawfirm's offices - multi billion dollar company vs. multi billion dollar company (on paper, that is) - oh, I wished I was there for the party.
What will this end up as ? Electronic Zynga Arts maybe ? Anyways, still won't buy anything from either of them, just enjoying the catfight.
Nothing to see here, move along ...
1 Like Yeah, well, you know what EA? Your MOM is predictable subterfuge! Wait... I don't know what that means. I think that was an insult?
1 Like Yeah and both games are basically a rip off of "The Realm" which most of the people from both companies wouldnt even be old enough to remember. Just sad old farts like me and their dads would be putting that in its true perspective. I wish they would both spend some money on developing decent games rather than developing lawyers bank accounts. Maybe they could make a game about copyright and law suits called Dicks vs Assholes.
4 Like I think this is a situation where the Aliens versus Predator tagline clearly applies:
Whoever wins we lose.
4 Like I hope this is a long drawn out court case that results in a dismissal. Then all both companies have to show for it is money wasted on lawyers.
1 Like Its funny because EA's simcity social is identical to the zynga's City Ville which came out years before EA's game yet EA is calling out Zynga's plagiarism when they are no better.
@stan_boyd uhh the ville came out a couple months ago not years and you only need to play it for 3 mins to see its a Sims rip off...Sims btw has been out for years not the FB game but the franchise itself
@BigDogLuke @stan_boyd Yes but Cityville came out a long time before Sim City Social and Sim City Social is a clone of City Ville. And cityville is nothing like the real Sim City.
@BigDogLuke Sure EA owns the Simcity franchise, but their SimCity Social on facebook is a blatant rip off of Zynga's CityVille which is not the same as the real Sim City games.
@stan_boyd yup you definitely have a point in that they both do it but the difference in my mind is that EA pays for the rights to copy stuff, they bought the Sims franchise and the Sim City franchise...Zynga just flat out copies stuff and claims its original cause of minor details
@BigDogLuke I know what the lawsuit is about, I am just saying its kinda stupid of EA to sue for plagiarism when they do it themselves and I hope Zynga throws the cityville/simcity social similarities in their face in court. This is the battle of two shit companies who both commit the same crimes but EA thinks they can use the law to support their crimes.
@stan_boyd but these lawsuits have nothing to do with Cityville or Sim City...its about the game that came out a few months ago called The Ville...which is a blatant rip off of the Sims...go try it man and you will see
2 Like @stan_boyd Did you see the Zynga pokemon ripoff? It's hard to deny that they plagarize, no matter how much you hate EA
@fightingfish18 @stan_boyd I think it was the CEO of Zynga who said copy the competition till you get it right.
1 Like @Sayed101 @fightingfish18 I never said Zynga doesn't plagiarize, but all of EA's facebook games are clones of other games themselves so you can't say they don't plagiarize either.
2 Like EA and Zynga are like two feral dogs... they should be put down, so that they won't cause any more harm to each other and everyone else. They have done enough damage to this world and our fragile little minds. If they don't go at each other's throats until they're both dead, then it is our duty as gamers to burn down their offices and free them from their expensive cars and other luxuries.
4 Like EA, shut your mouth, shut, shut, shut your, shut your mouth, shut your mouth, shut, shut your mouth...... now your just coming off as stupid.
1 Like For God's sake these Facebook game requests must be stopped !!!
I'm with EA on this one...except that both must perish in the end.
2 Like Apparently the patent trolling has spread from the mobile industry to the gaming industry LOL.
4 Like Let's hope that they destroy each other and get rid of the two worse companies in video game history!!
1 Like I will from now on stop buying any EA product. THats it i cant stand their arrogance any more!
Google "Zynga's lavish new headquarters"
Learn what you can build by selling $2.99 cheap knock-offs on Facebook.
1 Like even if zynga wins the lawsuit and avoids yet another lawsuit, what the hell makes them think that they're going to do any damage to EA? EA is made of money, just like activision.
1 Like Activison's market value is $12 billion
EA's market value is $4.5 billion
Zynga's is $2.5 billion
So really EA is not that much more powerful financially than Zynga, certainly not enough to buy it out. Activision could afford to buy them both out if they wanted but they instead want to be bought out themselves. In short EA just seems to be "all that" but inreality it's just hot air and EA just wants Zynga's 2.5 billion stake, they dont give a damn about anything else.
lol you do realize net worth is determined by stock price right?? higher the stock gets more the net worth will be. ea's stock has been tanking for past few years.
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