Yuga Labs wins court battle, Mandala Metaverse falls on Polkadot and more…

Bored Ape Yacht Club (BAYC) creators Yuga Labs have won a key victory in their long-running legal battle with Ryder Ripps, the co-creator of the copycat NFT project RR/BAYC.

Yuga Labs first filed a complaint against Ryder Ripps and co-founder Jeremy Cahen back in July 2022, alleging that the duo had engaged in trademark infringement, false advertising and unfair competition, among other things.

In a summary judgment on April 21, a US District Court in Central California found that Ripps and Cahen had infringed Yuga Lab’s trademarks with their RR/BAYC NFT collection.

The court further ruled that Yuga Labs is entitled to an injunction and damages, the latter of which will be determined at trial.

In a message shared with Cointelegraph, a Yuga Labs spokesperson said:

“In a landmark legal victory for web3, a federal judge found that Ryder Ripps and Jermey Cahen infringed Yuga Labs’ intellectual property. This is not just a win for us, it’s a win for the entire web3 industry to hold fraudsters and counterfeiters accountable.”

Ryder Ripps and Jeremy Cahen created the BAYC derivative NFT collection RR/BAYC back in May 2022 as a satire and protest against Yuga Labs. The project essentially uses all the same images from the BAYC NFTs.

Ripps in particular is behind a conspiracy theory in which he claims that Yuga Labs intentionally designed the BAYC NFT artwork to convey racist caricatures. In addition, Ripps also claims that the project’s logo and branding have several nods to certain Nazi symbolism and language.

Mandala Metaverse to drop on Polkadot

Upcoming cross-chain augmented reality (AR) game Mandala Metaverse has chosen Polkadot parachain Astar Network to host its first major NFT drop on April 28.

Mandala Metaverse is a story-based project that has content that spans television, graphic novels, games and AR. The game elements are developed in Epic Games Triple-A quality Unreal Engine.

The drop is called “Cryptonauts” and the NFTs show different avatars that will act as playable characters in the game. The artwork was illustrated by comic book artist Bruce Zick, who has worked on projects for giants such as Disney and Marvel.

1/ Mandala Metaverse (@enterthemandala), a cross-platform game and interoperable metaverse, has chosen @AstarNetwork for its NFT case, exploit functions that are available #OnlyOnPolkadot. pic.twitter.com/cnK3Zcf4AG

— Polkadot (@Polkadot) 21 April 2023

Polkadot isn’t necessarily a blockchain known for hosting gaming and NFT projects, and the network doesn’t even have recorded sales data on aggregators like Crypto Slam.

Regarding the decision to bring Cryptonauts NFTs to Polkadot, Mandala Metaverse CEO Jon Shanker noted:

“Polkadot has real future-proof NFT applications, like nesting, staking and the ability to send NFTs across bridges – plus many other innovative ways to use NFT resources. We can now do things we didn’t think possible.”

Square Enix partners with Elixir Games

Final Fantasy developers Square Enix has partnered with Web3 infrastructure firm Elixir Games to bring blockchain gaming to the mainstream.

The move was announced on April 19, but specific details about the partnership are scarce at this stage.

Elixir hosts both traditional and Web3 games on its platform, and also offers Web3 distribution capabilities for its partner games, such as NFT’s sales and marketplaces.

As such, Square Enix will likely take advantage of these features when launching games via Elixir, something the firm has become increasingly interested in doing over the past year or so.

Related: NFT.NYC: Gaming and tokenization are driving the maturation of the NFT industry

“This partnership brings us closer to Web3 game mass adoption. Our team is incredibly excited to bring our technology to work, and we envision Elixir users playing Web2 and Web3 games equally without distinction,” said Carlos Roldan, Elixir Games boss, as part of the announcement, adding:

“2023 has already seen more industry leaders enter the space with impactful projects, and we expect to see more as the year progresses. We’ve made every effort to ensure we’re ready for scalability.”

NFT cricket betting on Tezos

A free-to-play multiplayer NFT cricket strategy game called “Cricket Stars” has been launched on the Tezos blockchain.

The game is led by Tezos India – an organization focused on developing projects on Tezos – in partnership with esports game publisher GoLive Games. However, despite the name, no licensing deals with actual cricket stars appear to be in place.

Cricket Stars follows a similar model to other sports NFT games such as Sorare, by offering player cards that can be used that affect the game or traded on the market. The game also offers player-versus-player modes, knockout tournaments and esports tournaments.

“We understand the power of blockchain technology and its role in the gaming ecosystem. Our partnership with Tezos India is a stunning statement that blockchain technology is becoming an integral part of the gaming industry,” GoLive Games founder Ravi Kiran noted as part of the announcement.