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Wang Yiwen, reporter of Overview News

Since the official launch of Black Myth: Wukong on August 20, it has been very popular and frequently appeared on hot searches. On August 22, many bloggers posted that the game screen of Black Myth: Wukong was similar to their own works, questioning plagiarism. Zonglan News reporter contacted Ma Baigang, an intellectual property lawyer at Beijing Hongmeng Law Firm. He believes that the current difficulty lies in proving the originality of the content of the blogger's work. If it is determined that the game party has infringed, it may lead to the removal of the game.

As the first domestically produced 3A game, "Black Myth: Wukong" contains the core of Chinese traditional culture from the game graphics to the music. Most players highly recognize the game's fusion of traditional culture and modern games, and it has received rave reviews.

Blogger "Sai Shang Li Yunzhong" posted a comparison of the works, the top one is the work of the person concerned, and the bottom one is the original game picture. (Source/Internet)

On the afternoon of August 22, blogger "Nanshan Zen" posted a message saying that his photography work was used in the game "Black Myth: Wukong", and compared it with the original game pictures while @ing the game producer Feng Ji and the official account of "Black Myth: Wukong". On the same day, blogger "Xuan 鏐108", who was certified as a third-level craftsman on Weibo, also posted a message saying that he was plagiarized and demanded that the rights of craftsmen be protected.

In the early morning of August 23, a Weibo user named "Sai Shang Li Yunzhong" who was certified as a Chinese painting blogger posted a Weibo post saying, "It seems that the Monkey King I drew has changed his equipment." He also attached two pictures, one from "Black Myth: Wukong" and the "Atlas of Journey to the West Characters" published in 2012. On that day, the topic of "Black Myth: Wukong" suspected of plagiarism ranked first in the hot search. Zonglan News reporters noticed that there is a great controversy among netizens on whether the game is plagiarized. Some netizens even suspected that the blogger who posted the post was trying to gain attention and deliberately hype it up to take advantage of the popularity of the game. Some netizens also pointed out that since the game is based on the Chinese classical literary masterpiece "Journey to the West", the game creation team went to many places of interest for 3D scanning and reproduced traditional scenes in the game. The work of the blogger who posted the post is also based on the architecture, costumes and paintings in traditional culture, so it is inevitable that there will be similarities.

Blogger "Xuan鏐108" posted a comparison picture with the original game painting. (Source/Internet)

Screenshot of the Weibo post by "Nanshan Zen". (Source/Internet)

In response to the online controversy over the suspected plagiarism of "Black Myth: Wukong", a reporter from Zonglan News interviewed Ma Baigang, an intellectual property lawyer at Beijing Hongmeng Law Firm.

Based on the content posted by the three bloggers, Ma Baigang pointed out that to implement infringement, the originality and creativity of the blogger's work must be determined first. There is a lot of content related to "Journey to the West" on the market, and there are many existing related character models and costume designs. The works displayed by the two bloggers and the game creators have borrowed and recreated the previous "Journey to the West" and its derivative works. He personally tends to believe that it does not constitute plagiarism. As for the photographs posted by the blogger "Nanshan Zen", although they meet the legal requirements, the relevant Buddha statues are currently intact, and it is not easy to determine whether the photos are directly used in the game for reproduction.

"Once the court determines that it is plagiarism, the impact on the game company is huge." Ma Baigang told reporters that the public often pays more attention to compensation for the infringed party, but ignores that after being identified as copyright infringement, the first item of the judgment is to stop the infringement. If the infringement is confirmed, the game company will also face the requirement to stop operating the game or rectify the relevant elements that constitute infringement. If the personal rights of the author are violated, it may also be necessary to make a public apology and eliminate the impact.

He believes that although the current online discussion on this matter has had some negative impact on the game developer, based on the content of the articles posted by the three bloggers, even if they are not identified as infringement, they are still within the scope of public and legal commentary and analysis of works, and it is difficult to judge that they infringe on the game developer's right to reputation and other rights.

At around 22:00 on August 23, the official Weibo account of the game and the game producer Feng Ji posted a message on Weibo to celebrate that the sales of "Black Myth: Wukong" on all platforms have exceeded 10 million copies. As of press time, the game company has not responded to the suspected plagiarism incident.