Warner Bros. Interactive and Bethesda Softworks have finally reached to an agreement regarding the lawsuit over the former company’s mobile Westworld game.
Bethesda filed a lawsuit against Warner Bros. Interactive and developer Behaviour Interactive back in June 2018, claiming that Westworld was a blatant ripoff of the studio’s popular mobile game, Fallout Shelter. Behaviour Interactive helped co-develop Fallout Shelter, and Bethesda alleged that Westworld “has the same or highly similar game design, art style, animations, features and other gameplay elements” as Fallout Shelter.”
Warner Bros. Interactive issued a statement to Polygon at the time of the lawsuit saying:
As one of the world’s leading creators of intellectual property, including the ground-breaking television series Westworld, Warner Bros. has a deep respect for intellectual property rights. As such, the assertions by Bethesda Softworks that Warner’s Westworld mobile game improperly used source code from Bethesda’s Fallout Shelterare as surprising as they are unsubstantiated. Warner Bros. has been assured by the game developer, Behaviour Interactive, that Bethesda’s allegations are untrue and that none of Bethesda’s code was used in the Westworld game. Moreover, contrary to Bethesda’s baseless accusation, Warner Bros. at no time “induced” Behavior to use the Fallout Shelter code in Westworld.
A notice filed in a federal court on December 12th, 2018, however, stated that both Bethesda and Warner Bros. Interactive had come to an amicable agreement and settled the lawsuit. In addition, the filing states that Bethesda dismissed its claims with prejudice. This means Bethesda can’t bring forth the same allegations in the future. Although it’s unclear what the exact settlement between the two companies is, both companies will pay their own legal fees.
