September 2, 2019 Sina Games has pulled Glorious Saga offline in the wake of Blizzard’s allegations.
Last month, Blizzard filed a lawsuit against Chinese developer Sina Games over what the World of Warcraft developer described as a “willful, deliberate, and brazen” copycat of its famous fantasy franchise. Over the weekend, the game, titled Glorious Saga, has been taken offline by its developers.
Sina Games posted on Glorious Saga’s Facebook page over the weekend (via Polygon). The update informs players that “due to some irresistible reasons, we decided to announce that the game will stop operating […] on 29th of Aug [sic], and all the servers will be closed. Players can’t login any longer.
“We are very sorry and we will do our best to guide and provide best service for all the players during the server closure process.” Servers were scheduled to go offline less than four hours after that update was posted to the page. New comments are met with an automated response offering to introduce players to other Sina Games titles.
In the lawsuit, which was filed on August 16 (via Polygon), Blizzard said that it “seeks to put a stop to, and obtain redress for, the massive infringement of Blizzard’s unique and valuable intellectual property in Defendants’ mobile and web-based game titled ‘Glorious Saga’.”
The developer went on to say that the game “did not just copy a few discrete elements from Blizzard’s Warcraft games,” but described the copyright infringement as “willful, deliberate, and brazen.” According to Blizzard, Glorious Saga copied everything from characters, to weapons, to monsters, and even sound effects. Particularly notable is the fact that Glorious Saga appears to have lifted important character names from WoW, with Jaina Proudmoore, Gul’dan, and Malfurion all appearing.
Blizzard also said that it’s seeking a court order to stop the infringement, and is also seeking significant damages – the developer is asking for “$150,000 per infringed work.” To back that up, the developer claimed that Sina Games’ actions have caused “serious and irreparable harm,” and that the Chinese developer has “profited handsomely from their infringement, attracting thousands of consumers […] through the use of Blizzard’s intellectual property.”