Epic wins Unreal lawsuit against Silicon Knights

Unreal developer Epic Games has been awarded damages of $4.45m as it defeated a lawsuit from Silicon Knights.

The latter studio claimed Epic has supplied a botched version of Unreal Engine 3, which was used to develop 2008 Xbox 360 RPG Too Human. Silicon Knights claimed as far back as 2007 that Epic was "sabotaging efforts by Silicon Knights and others to develop their own video games".

However, Gamasutra reports that a North Carolina judge has ruled in favour of Epic Games. He also upheld Epic Games’ countercliams, which claimed Silicon Knights breached the Unreal Engine’s licence agreement, infringed on copyrights in the engine’s code and misappropriated Epic’s trade secrets.

Epic’s general council Jay Andrews said: "We are delighted with the jury’s verdict and all of the hard work done by the Hunton & Williams legal team."