As reported by Polygon and TorrentFreak, Mob Leisure, the studio behind standard 5 Nights at Freddy’s-alike Poppy Playtime, has filed a lawsuit towards Google for failing to take away fraudulent Poppy Playtime apps from its Android Play Retailer.
At first blush, I assumed this needed to do with these bizarre faux video games whose adverts you see throughout YouTube and Twitter, however it’s someway even worse than that: The outfit in query, Daigo Sport 2020, has merchandise on the Play Retailer actually titled “Poppy Playtime Chapter 4” and “Poppy Playtime: Chapter 3.” On the time of writing, these apps are nonetheless out there for obtain. Daigo Sport 2020’s earlier works, together with “Minecraft 2020” and a sampling of equally unlicensed Skibidi Bathroom video games, have unsurprisingly been faraway from the shop.
The false Poppies have a staggering 1.1 million downloads between the 2 of them. The apps are free, a kind of “too good to be true” temptation seemingly focusing on Poppy Playtime’s youthful and fewer savvy followers. Like FNAF earlier than it, Poppy Playtime strikes me as a kind of little cousin/nephew phenomena, and Mob Leisure boasts a mind-boggling 40 million gamers of its video games throughout all platforms. After downloading the faux apps, customers are prompted to pay between $30 and $95 to entry the “recreation,” with the cost netting you nothing greater than a “hyperlink to a useless webpage” in accordance with the lawsuit.
Mob Leisure says Google took the imposter apps down after inquiries and a DMCA request, solely to bafflingly reinstate them days later. Mob Leisure is asking for the apps to be taken down for actual this time, in addition to $150,000 in damages for every one.
I do know that Google is a gigantic firm, with YouTube and the Play Retailer seemingly current in their very own silos, however this totally confounding unforced error is just extra absurd when you think about how aggressive Google is about copyright takedowns within the firm’s different initiatives. Tales of YouTubers dinged with fraudulent or frivolous copyright claims are fairly frequent, and Nintendo has even used this method to focus on channels that showcase emulators. The Daigo Sport 2020 scenario is decidedly not that, and it is a surprise the outfit was even allowed to proceed importing to the app retailer after its Minecraft and Skibidi-related ventures.
