Copyright protection of video games in China

Relevance. In recent years, the video game industry has emerged as one of the fastest-growing sectors of the modern digital economy. There is also a lack of up-to-date judicial practice in Russia related to the copyright protection of video games. In the context of an ongoing academic debate over the copyright regime applicable to video games, comparative legal analysis of foreign approaches - particularly that of China, which currently forms the world’s largest video game market - becomes increasingly significant.

The purpose of this study is to identify the legal nature of video games and the specific features of their copyright protection under Chinese law.

Objective: the research aims to analyze the existing approaches in Chinese legal and judicial practice to the qualification of video games and their constituent creative components as copyrightable subject matter, and to examine the specificities of copyright protection applied to video games in China.

Methodology. The article employs the methods of analysis, synthesis, induction and deduction, description, as well as the systemic, formal-legal, and comparative-legal methods.

Results. The research demonstrates that Chinese copyright law does not explicitly define video games as a separate category of protected works. Traditionally, they have been treated as a form of computer program. As a result, Chinese courts have developed alternative approaches to determining the legal nature of video games and their components. These include: (1) the “component-based” approach, under which a game is treated as a compilation of independently protected works; and (2) the qualification of video games as “quasi-cinematographic” or “audiovisual works.” Each of these approaches has its strengths and weaknesses. In this regard, some Chinese legal scholars advocate for treating video games as “other works” deserving copyright protection under a residual clause in Article 3 of the PRC Copyright Law.

Conclusion. The Chinese legal experience examined in this article may be considered in the further theoretical understanding of the legal nature of video games and their copyright protection in Russian legal scholarship. It may also serve as a basis for adapting Russian legislation to more effectively regulate intellectual property in the video game industry.

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