10 arts & entertainment

March 30, 2011 + Over the Edge

The Messy Legal Battle Over Modern Warfare

Popular Call of Duty game involved in a lawsuit

CLIFFORD T. HOFFERD
CONTRIBUTOR

By now practically everyone has played the immensely
popular, military style first person shooter Call of Duty:
Modern Warfare 2 as well as its immediate follow-up Call
of Duty: Black Opps. However, many people may not be
aware of a messy legal battle that is taking place between

the former heads of Modern Warfare 2’s development studio }

Infinity Ward and the games publisher Activision Blizzard.
At stake is a multi-million dollar gaming and entertainment
franchise. For those of you who aren’t versed in the finer
details of this battle let me give you some context for this.

For starters Modern Warfare 2 was an immense critical

and commercial success for Activision becoming the
highest selling first person shooter game at the time. The
game itself generated $550 million dollars in revenue

for the company in its first 5 days of release owing a lot

of its success to the games popular online multiplayer
component. However, the founders of Infinity Ward (Vince
Zampella and Jason West) were fired by the publisher

in March of Last year. According to Gamespot.com in

an annual report filed with the Securities and Exchange
Commission included the notice that the two would be fired.
The report states that Activision is “concluding an internal
human resources inquiry into breaches of contract and
insubordination by two senior members at Infinity Ward.” It
goes on to say that said matter would involve “the departure
of key personnel and litigation.” For their part West and
Zampella allege that Activision violated an exclusive royalty
agreement it had with them and was acting in bad faith by
attempting to wrestle control of the franchise from them. To

ONLINE SOURCE

If lawsuits keep COD MW3 from being released on time, there will
be hell to pay

For their part West and Zampella have launched a lawsuit
against Activision alleging that the publisher owes them and
the Infinity Ward employees “Substantial Royalty Payments”
the Activision failed to pay up until the pair’s firing. The pair
is asking for $36 million dollars in damages and for control
of The Modern Warfare franchise brand. West and Zampella
have also gone on to found a new development studio

a part of the Electronic Arts Partners Program. Although
earlier on they attempted to seek help from publisher THQ
with little success. According to Activision they weren’t
surprised at what West and Zampella did given the pair’s
“improper activities.” Activision also launched a countersuit
against West and Zampella for breach of contract and
improper activities. Their suit alleges that the pair met with
a “Hollywood Agent” and went to Activision’s biggest rival
while under contract with Activision. The suit goes on to say
that West and Zampella themselves hindered the rewarding
of royalty payments to employees in order to make it easier
for them to poach said employees for their new studio. For
their part West and Zampella say that the allegations are
false and outrageous and their lawyer is saying that it’s

just another attempt by the publisher to “drag out its heels
on paying out ‘millions of dollars’ owed to the developers
and their former co-workers at Infinity Ward”. Only recently
has Activision included Electronic Arts as a defendant in its
lawsuit against West and Zampella, another move that West
and Zampella say is a delaying tactic to force them to drop
their own suit against the publisher.

The key issue of this messy battle seems to be intellectual
property rights and who owns what and who should benefit
from the massive success of Modern Warfare. At this point
it isn’t clear if Activision is trying to bully West and Zampella
into giving up the rights to Modern Warfare or if West and
Zampella are acting selfishly to satisfy their own interests
at the expense of others. However this legal battle ends is
unknown. One thing is for certain though, this is only going

further complicate matters a good number of Infinity Ward
staffers have chosen to leave the studio along with West
and Zampella in support of the two.

Tiesto Cancels PG Show

called Respawn Entertainment with the former members of to get meaner and messier as this goes on.

Infinity Ward that left with them. They're seeking to become

Technical limitations are to blame

DARCY SMITH
ARTS EDITOR

Ql" Many fans of electronic music artist Tiesto have been sadly marching back to Ticketmaster to return their tickets after the Dutch musician
called off his upcoming show in Prince George. Tiesto, born Tijs Michiel Verwest, was scheduled to appear on April 27, 2011 at the CN
Center. Reasons given for the sudden cancellation are as a result of “unforeseen technical limitations” of the CN Center, though many
fans feel that the venue specifications should have been more thoroughly assessed before announcing the show. CN Center manager
Andy Beesley hopes to be able to reschedule the performance in the future, but this statement seems doubtful to many. Full refunds for
the show will be issued to all ticket holders.

Ticket holder and CFUR programmer Landon Reed expressed his disappointment and opinion over the cancellation. “I’m really
disappointed in seeing that he cancelled, especially due to the fact that Vancouver sold out within 6 minutes,” Reed stated. “I suspect

_ that even though it was blamed on unforeseen technical difficulties... when | spoke with [Marketing Supervisor for the CN Centre] Glen

_ Mikkelsen, he seemed really stressed out about ticket sales. They were at 1800 tickets, short of their 3500 break-even point for the show
when | last spoke with him, about a month before it cancelled. It seemed the rumour floating around was that it was sold out, [which]
possibly could have had to do with the low tickets sales. It’s really disappointing that a DJ of his calibre wouldn’t stick it out for his fans,
considering this is Prince George’s first chance at seeing him. | believe that if he would have come it would have done WONDERS for
the electronic scene here in Prince George, letting people realize that it isn’t as stereotypical as a “Rave”. It would have put us on the
map for any future shows of touring DJ’s. This was our shot at having a scene, and we blew it. “

Reed also commented that he felt the prospect of bringing a DJ to town “shouldn’t have gone from zero to hero. Testing the water with a
smaller DJ to play here in town would have warmed things up a bit, and let people have more of a taste of what could be.” He also felt
that the promotion was not executed as effectively as it could have been, as “the posters that they had up around town probably had a
lot to do with people not wanting to come. No one wants to go to a concert with what looks like an ego-centric tough guy’s face plastered
on the whole poster. It’s also a shame that they didn’t announce the openers for the event. The Kelowna show (happens to be the day
after the one scheduled here in PG) has Downlink, Excision, and Datsik all playing the opening set. That line up alone would have drawn
out a HUGE crowd here in Prince, as those three DJ’s are on the very fore-front of the dubstep scene not just here in PG, but the world.
With artists from the dubstep community such as Zeds Dead getting featured on Much Music, and Skrillex being under Maudtrap records
and selling out shows across the world, the dubstep genre is not one that you screen from the public as “Special Guests”.” He felt that
overall, the effort to promote the event on the CN Centre’s part was very minimal. “You can’t build a scene and excitement overnight by just announcing the event. It’s sad to think that
now the CN Centre will think twice before ever having another DJ to Prince George. Reed added, “Also, no one really knew about the light show that he was bringing; that it was going to
be more than just a DJ playing on the stage. Glen said it was the most money they’ve ever spent on having an artist come to PG, and he’s bringing the biggest light and sound we’ve ever
seen here.”

ONLINE SOURCE

DJ Tiesto cancels show. The DJ will no longer be mak-
ing an appearance due to the technical limitations of

the CN Center

Local volunteer programmers from CFUR Radio at the University of Northern British Columbia have been running weekly contests for ticket giveaways during Saturday evenings over the
past month. The “Beat.wav” on CFUR 88.7 FM runs every Saturday night from 6-9pm and features dubstep, electronic, trance and other such genre, to which Reed has been tirelessly
promoting. Beat.wav consists of three shows: “Dance To Trance from 6-7pm, hosted by Manny Grewal; “Databass” from 7-8pm, hosted by Myrin and Kai; and “Basshead” from 8-9pm,
hosted by Sonny Gomez. The programmers had been using the upcoming Tiesto show as an opportunity to promote the presence of an electronic music community. The Beat.wav will
still be continuing every Saturday, regardless of this disappointment, and the programmers hope that they won’t lose the interest of any listeners. The program has certainly jump started
a growing community of electronic music lovers, and hopefully that growth will continue throughout the summer months. It’s evident that this cancellation has had a large effect on many
fans in Prince George, and not just for reasons of simply seeing a popular DJ. With the continuing efforts and promotion of people like Reed, there’s hope that this will not be the last
chance for Prince George to be put on the map for tour stops.