It seems that Activision-Blizzard isn’t quite done turning absolutely everyone against it yet, including its biggest fans, in their mission to usurp EA’s title of “Most Hated Company”.
They seem to have learned less than nothing from the blitzchung and Hong Kong situation.
What they certainly do seem to have learned from though is Dota. Dota 2, one of the world’s most popular free to play games, started out as a mod for Blizzard’s Warcraft III, as an optional fan-made game mode.
Eventually, Valve bought the rights to Dota from the fan who created it, and spun it into Dota 2 that they released for free as a way to entice users into the Steam ecosystem.
Additionally, Valve makes money off of cosmetic microtransactions in the game that don’t affect gameplay.
Since 2009, Dota 2 has held a worldwide e-sports tournament, named “The International”, competing for a trophy and a prize pool of $1.6 million.
Starting in 2013, Valve started crowdfunding the prize pool through the sale of battle passes. In 2019, the prize pool was over $34 million.
Clearly, Blizzard is gritting its teeth in regret. They launched a Dota 2 clone with their own characters from Warcraft and Diablo called “Heroes of the Storm” which struggled to garner appeal, being a very simplified and less fun take on Dota 2.
To ensure Blizzard doesn’t miss out on the next big Dota, they decided to claim full copyright ownership, going forward, of all custom game content, which would, of course, apply to Dota today.
They recently updated their Acceptable Use Policy as follows:
“Custom Games are and shall remain the sole and exclusive property of Blizzard. Without limiting the foregoing, you hereby assign to Blizzard all of your rights, title and interest in and to all Custom Games, including but not limited to any copyrights in the content of any Custom Games.”
Most early comments suggest this move will likely kill Blizzard’s creative modding community, making them think twice before submitting work and losing rights to it.
https://twitter.com/Grummz/status/1222546088436961280
https://twitter.com/Grummz/status/1222547624588238853
Others argue that Blizzard is too big for that to matter.
