Zynga has been sued by Electronic Arts for copyright infringement. Electronic Arts filed its complaint in U.S. District Court of California and it says that the new Facebook game from Zynga called The Ville is an “unmistakable copy” of The Sims Social.
“The similarities go well beyond any superficial resemblance,” Lucy Bradshaw, said. Bradshaw is the general manager of Electronic Arts’ Maxis label, which created The Sims Social. “Zynga’s design choices, animations, visual arrangements and character motions and actions have been directly lifted from The Sims Social. The copying was so comprehensive that the two games are, to an uninitiated observer, largely indistinguishable.”
Reggie Davis, the general counsel for Zynga, said that the company is going to “defend our rights to the fullest extent possible. It’s unfortunate that EA thought that this was an appropriate response to our game, and clearly demonstrates a lack of understanding of basic copyright principles. It’s also ironic that EA brings this suit shortly after launching SimCity Social which bears an uncanny resemblance to Zynga’s CityVille game.”
Zynga has been accused in the past of ripping off other company’s games. For example, NimbleBit, the creators of Tiny Tower, made insinuations towards Zynga for its game called Dream Heights.
“Good luck with your game, we are looking forward to inspiring you with our future games,” said NimbleBit.
“By calling Zynga out on this illegal practice, we hope to have a secondary effect of protecting the rights of other creative studios who don’t have the resources to protect themselves,” Bradshaw said.