Call of Duty chiefs sued ‘for making warlord look bad’
THE family of an Angolan warlord is suing the makers of the video game Call of Duty for portraying him as a ‘barbarian’.
They say guerilla leader Jonas Savimbi, who died in 2002, appears as a ‘halfwit who wants to kill everybody’.
Savimbi was the founder of the UNITA rebels, which fought a 27year civil war with government forces in which a million died.
But three of his children are seeking one million euros (£763,000) in damages from the French branch of game publisher Activision Blizzard in the first defamation case to involve a video character.
The group – who now live in Paris – are unhappy at scenes in Call of Duty: Black Ops II in which their father appears – saying it does not reflect his personality as a ‘political leader and strategist’. ‘A warlord, yes, [but] he was an important person in the Cold War,’ said lawyer Carole Enfert.
Lawyers for Activision said the game shows Savimbi in a ‘rather favourable light’. The complaint also alleges his son is often ‘recognised in the street as the character’ from the game.