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PUBG takes aim at Fortnite over alleged copyright violations (Update: Lawsuit dropped)
Update (06/27/2018): Bloomberg reported that PUBG Corp. sent a letter of withdrawal to Fortnite developer Epic Games’ attorneys that effectively ends the legal battle between the two studios.
PUBG Corp. did not say why it dropped its lawsuit against Epic Games. Even though PUBG developer Bluehole could argue that Fortnite copied PUBG’s ideas, the developer might have had a difficult time arguing that Fortnite stole PUBG’s content.
Original article: PUBG Corp, the developer of super popular battle royale game PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds (PUBG), has taken Fortnite developer Epic Games to court over alleged copyright violations. According to The Korea Times, the suit was originally filed in January with the Seoul Central District Court in Korea. A spokesperson for PUBG Corp said the company filed the suit in order to “protect its copyright.”
Both PUBG and Fortnite are hugely successful battle royale games with similar gameplay. In each game, players have to fight to become the sole surVivor after being dropped off on an island with dozens of other players. PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds was released in March 2017, a full six months before Fortnite Battle Royale was released as a free-to-play title in September 2017.
As well as in court, both games will also soon be fighting it out on Android too. PUPG Mobile was released on Android earlier this year, while Fortnite is already available on iOS and should be coming to Android this summer. You can check out our comparison article of the biggest differences between the two games here.
This isn’t the only lawsuit that PUBG Corp has filed recently. Just last month, it filed against the developer of two Android games, Rules of Survival and Knives Out, that it accused of being PUBG clones. While Fortnite Battle Royale and the others were clearly influenced by PUBG, many people point out that PUBG was not the first game to introduce the concept of battle royale gameplay.
We’ll keep you posted on how this develops.