Epic Games is surely not a stranger when it comes to lawsuits, and this time they are being sued over a dance emote. The emote is called “It’s complicated”. In recent years, many of the copyright lawsuits were stopped due to a change in legal procedures, as previously it was possible to sue someone after issuing a filing for copyright. Now the plaintiffs are obliged to have a copyright, not just a filing, so many lawsuits were dismissed for around four years. This allowed Epic Games to be more free on the copyright-based matters.
But the copyrights of this specific dance belongs to Hanagami. Hanagami’s dance originates from a 2017 video from his youtube channel, a choreographed cover of Charlie Puth’s song, “How Long”.
While it may look like there are some serious similarities between two dances, legal limits of “being identical” is pretty strict and this may prove quite difficult for Hanagami to actually win this one. We will have to wait and see if his claims will be found rightful.
