Ex-Infinity Ward Heads Suing Activision

We pretty much saw this coming. Jason West and Vince Zampella, the now former Infinity Ward studio heads that were fired on Monday, have filed suit against Activision for terminating their employment before the date that they were scheduled to receive “substantial royalty payments as part of their existing contracts for Modern Warfare 2.”

“Instead of thanking, lauding, or just plain paying Jason and Vince for giving Activision the most successful entertainment product ever offered to the public, last month Activision hired lawyers to conduct a pretextual ‘investigation’ into unstated and unsubstantiated charges of ‘insubordination’ and ‘breach of fiduciary duty,’ which then became the grounds for their termination on Monday, March 1st,” said their attorney Robert Schwartz.

If you’re wondering why nobody at Infinity Ward has been paid their royalties for Modern Warfare 2 yet, it’s not that unusual according to EEDAR analyst Jesse Divnich. Divnich told Joystiq that, “If royalties haven’t been paid out yet, I wouldn’t consider that too alarming.” But getting back to the legal suit, West and Zampella had a few things to say:

“We were shocked by Activision’s decision to terminate our contract,” said West.  “We poured our heart and soul into that company, building not only a world class development studio, but assembling a team we’ve been proud to work with for nearly a decade.  We think the work we’ve done speaks for itself.” 

Zampella added, “After all we have given to Activision, we shouldn’t have to sue to get paid.”

The suit goes on to say that in addition to the unpaid royalties, Activision also seized control of the Infinity Ward studio, to which Activision had previously granted creative control over all Modern Warfare-branded games.  The suit was not only filed because of the lack of payment, but it also seeks to return the contractual rights Zampella and West previously had to the Modern Warfare brand.

Rest assured, we’ll be hearing more about this.