Blizzard Pursues Legal Action Against Chinese Overwatch Knockoff

Ever since the release of Overwatch last year, some developers have been trying to find a way to copy that success, while at the same time trying to put an original spin on the formula. That said, one particular company in China chose not to take that route, and instead just modified the original game to look like their own.

That game is Heroes of Warfare, a competitive first-person shooter with characters that look awfully familiar to those featured in Overwatch – and it appears that Blizzard has noticed.

The company's Chinese game division, in conjunction with operator NetEase, has officially filed a lawsuit against the creators of Heroes of Warfare for copyright infringement. The company is seeking an apology, along with restitution from copying characters and maps, and has also asked Apple to remove it from the Chinese app store.

And before you go, "Well, it can't be that blatant a copy, can it?" Well, if you take a look at the screenshots below, you can kind of see where Blizzard is coming from.

First, let's look at the title image for Heroes of Warfare. It's easy to see the copies of Torbjorn and Mercy, amongst other characters, and they're almost in the exact same poses as the original characters.

Next up is an image of a hero that resembles a younger anime-style version of the knight Reinhardt. Even with his slimmer build, it's too easy to see the comparisons between this character and the shield-carrying warrior.

And finally, here's a soldier that carries a sniper rifle. Strangely enough, it looks like some sort of hybrid between Widowmaker and Mercy. It's almost eerie how much it looks like they had a kid together.

So it's easy to see that the team behind Heroes of Warfare pulled a fast one here, and it probably won't be long before the game is no longer available to purchase. Sometimes you just need to go with something original that stands out from the usual Overwatch crowd. Maybe Paladins should serve as an example of how to do a spin-off properly, without taking away from Blizzard's source material. Just saying.

Overwatch is available now for Xbox One, PlayStation 4 and PC.