BT Games stands by BioShock competition winner

Business

May 9, 2013

A MyGaming reader has raised concerns about the validity of the winning entry in BT Games’ recent BioShock Infinite competition. The competition promised a prize of the PS3 Bioshock Infinite: Ultimate Songbird edition, a T-shirt, and 2 character figurines.

To stand a chance of winning, entrants had to supply their “own drawing of one of the 3 characters from the Bioshock Infinite game, being either Elizabeth, Songbird, or Booker DeWitt.”

One of the competition rules sated:

Only original work (must be drawn or designed in its entirety by the entrant – 3rd party material may not be used at all) will be considered – any non-original work will result in your entry being disqualified.

The winning entries are pictured below:

BT Games BioShock Infinite competition winning entries

The concerned MyGaming reader submitted that the winning entry by Dominick Mortier bore striking resemblance to three pieces of BioShock Infinite promotional art. The concerned reader alleged:

The winner merely used [those] images and applied a few filters on them (anyone can do this). And there is no way you can say that it was done on his own entirely after the proof I have shown. Second place and third place showed talent and actually drew the pictures. This is unfair [to] all other entrants, and [the] winner needs to be disqualified.

BT Games defends winner and decision

BT Games’ Karl Klopfer has responded to this issue.

“BT Games paid specific attention to the winner’s entry as we needed to be sure ourselves that his work (entry) was indeed original work,” said Klopfer. “The winner provided us with ample proof, enough for us to confidently know his work was original and that we could therefore safely pick his entry as the winning one.”

Klopfer added that they have all this evidence at hand, and invited MyGaming to come and look at the evidence ourselves should we wish to verify further.

Answering questions posed, Klopfer said: “Yes, we consider his work legitimate and therefore see no need to review the chosen winner. The complainant … is not subject to the proof we have on hand from the winner.”

“Also it may be worth noting that the winner is aware of the negative comments going around regarding his winning,” said Klopfer.

“He has reiterated that he is an artist by profession and calls out that he would never risk his career by ‘stealing artwork’. He has also gladly offered to create any new drawing from scratch should this be necessary to prove his skills in creating original artwork to anyone.”