Elden Ring Animations Allegedly Plagiarized By Another Similar Game
Archangel Studios, developer of Bleak Faith: Forsaken, is accused of stealing animations from Elden Ring.
Everyone wants a piece of success; it’s a story as old as time. Warner Bros launched its DCU after the company witnessed just how much money Disney’s making off Marvel, Nintendo just revealed Super Mario boots after Astro Boy boots became a fashion success, and now, a gaming company is accused of plagiarism for copying the animations from Elden Ring—the 2022 Game of the Year—for its own game, Bleak Faith: Forsaken.
As reported by Kotaku, Bleak Faith: Forsaken has been mired in controversy ever since the game launched on March 10, with fans suspecting that the indie developer, Archangel Studios, “repurposed” the animation seen in games such as Bloodborne and Elden Ring—both made by From Software. Admittedly, the games are so alike that we were honestly convinced that it’s early footage from an upcoming From Software game we haven’t heard of, which only goes as far as to show how much those animations look alike.
Archangel Studios hasn’t been without commentary, and after days of accusations, the studio has agreed to replace all the animation it claims were purchased in good faith on Epic Marketplace. In fact, ever since the start of development, the company has maintained transparency with the gaming community about its use of Epic Marketplace assets. This type of outsourcing has aided the game’s development process in terms of quicker release to market, especially since Archangel Studios is a three-person operation.
The studio reached out to Epic Games about the issue since the Elden Ring-looking animations were bought from the Marketplace, with the understanding that Epic goes through the proper vetting and review process before listing assets for sale. However, according to the team, the response they received from Epic Games states that Epic isn’t in the position to check the content for plagiarism or verify its originality. As such, Epic makes no guarantees to the Marketplace’s customers that the content is original and plagiarism-free.
Archangel Studios also noted that Epic did remove the questionable Elden Ring-looking animations from the Unreal Engine Marketplace. The team also began removing these animations from the game and replacing them with other assets via patches. How long the process will take remains to be seen.
Archangel Studios also added that they’re not satisfied with Epic’s response and that the incident has been a massive lesson for the studio, which they hope to share with other indie developers—assets on various storefronts and marketplaces can’t be bought in good faith.
Bleak Faith: Forsaken might be a Souls-clone, and we’re honestly fine with that. The Diablo franchise—whose fourth installment is pending release—gave birth to an entire genre, so brushing off against someone’s success to deliver an equally good or even better story isn’t actually a bad thing. Plagiarism is, but if Archangel Studios is to be believed, we’re discussing an honest mistake, the one which the studio intends to correct.
In the end, no one’s above making both mistakes and apologies. Also, has From Software responded to this?
