Blizzard’s IP rights ”should be respected” says CEO Mike Morhaime, so now they’re looking ”for a new partner” in South Korea. Scandal related?
”We’ve tried to talk”, said Morhaime, referring to the Korean e-Sports Association (KeSPA), ”for three years, but we can’t get them to recognize our IP rights.”
”Of course we think our IP rights should be respected. StarCraft II will be released soon, so we will have to look for a new partner,” he added, reports 1UP of a rough translation.
KeSPA is one of the largest groups in South Korea supporting professional StarCraft teams and their celebrity players. Blizzard and KeSPA have been going at it for some time now with Blizz backing broadcaster GOMtv to exclude KeSPA and its partners.
Recently the South Korean StarCraft leagues have been rocked by a betting scandal that involved top players and their coaches fixing games to earn mega bucks.
Time will tell how things pan out but one thing is for sure, Blizzard has much tighter control over StarCraft II thanks to Battle.net. The revelation of the major scandal is likely to have further convinced Blizz to cut ties with the troubled Korean e-Sports Association.
