Square Enix has successfully taken legal action against a Final Fantasy 14 content creator it claims harassed its executives and employees. Again.
In March, the developer triggered Japanese fan blog Netoge Sokuho's apologetic shut down after claiming one of its posts harmed its staff's reputation, and the blog's administrator was made to pay Square Enix an unspecified sum. This new situation is similar – Square Enix's official statement, translated both by Automaton and DeepL, reveals another apparently cooperative agreement where the unnamed content creator pays Square Enix a mysterious fee and promises not to offend the developer again.
In its announcement posted April 20, Square Enix says it was "pleased" to report it had found a user on an unnamed site was posting videos that were potentially damaging to Final Fantasy 14 developers' reputations.
The user has now had both their videos and account removed, paid a settlement fee, and apologized. Square Enix asserts its March 9 policy against "Acts of Harassment Against Our Employees" and reminds Final Fantasy 14 players that they are allowed to express their sometimes unsavory opinions, but "threats of harm" lobbed at employees will not be tolerated.
Square Enix reiterates it will continue to pursue legal action against those it deems harassers when necessary, while developers will keep trying to make quality games.
That's all there is to it – while Square Enix prepares Final Fantasy 14's promising 7.5 update for its April 28 launch, the company's legal team is clearly doing a good job of training its detractors to walk with their tails between their trembling legs.
For example: A day after Netoge Sokuho went down in March, the blog Umadori Sokuho voluntarily pulled its own oxygen cord after "having reconsidered the weight of responsibility involved in disseminating information online," it said, issuing an apology "to all the FF14 development and operations staff whom I have inconvenienced." Unprompted!
It's very different to how people react to notoriously litigious Nintendo, which one expert called "so wrong" in smooshing people with its copyright infringement trigger fingers that "it hurts." But, unlike Nintendo, Square Enix isn't pestering an unofficial Pokemon TCG store that was robbed at gunpoint for $100,000. Instead, the company seems to simply be protecting its hardworking MMO staffers.
