In 2023, Mr. A and guild members hunted a boss monster in NCSOFT's mobile game "Lineage M" and obtained a rare item, "Eodin's Soul," worth about 1 billion won. But the joy of the legendary item soon turned into a dispute.
Mr. A left the guild without discussing item distribution, and NCSOFT suspended the account for violating its operating policy, retrieved the item, and returned it to the guild.
Mr. A filed a lawsuit, saying, "They took the item I obtained," but the Supreme Court did not accept it. The intent is that even a high-priced item obtained in a game is not automatically recognized as individual property like a real-world object.
According to legal sources on the 22nd, the Supreme Court's Third Division (Presiding Justice Lee Suk-yeon) ruled for the defendant on the 2nd in the final appeal of Mr. A's suit against NCSOFT seeking confirmation of the invalidity of the terms and conditions, among other claims.
◇What matters more than "first to loot" is the game rules
From a user's perspective, it is easy to feel that if you are the first to pick up a dropped item after defeating a monster, it is yours. But the court focused less on who obtained the item first and more on whether there was a distribution agreement within the guild and whether someone violated it to take unjust gains.
That is because the legal nature of game items differs from that of real-world objects. Rather than independent property like a car or a cell phone, they are data that exist on a company's servers and are closer to service outputs used by users within prescribed rules.
A game-specialist attorney who requested anonymity said, "For ownership to be recognized under the Civil Act, it must qualify as a thing, and there is debate from the outset over whether online game items fall within that concept," adding, "Most game companies specify in their terms that users are granted a license to use, not ownership, so courts often view items as subjects of a usage relationship rather than as owned property."
◇Abuse and fraud are crimes even if they occur in a game
Not all disputes in a game space are resolved solely by game rules. In 2014, the Incheon District Court recognized the crime of insult and fined a defendant 2 million won for repeatedly using profanity in an online game chat room while referring to the other party's ID.
Also, in 2020, in "MapleStory," the court recognized fraud and sentenced a defendant to eight months in prison in a case where the person deceived both a buyer and a seller by claiming to sell game money and items and then taking the money.
It means that even if it happened in a game, if someone infringed on another's dignity or property, they bear responsibility no differently than in the real world.
◇Item retrieval and account suspension are governed by the terms
By contrast, disputes tied directly to game operations, such as item retrieval or account suspension, are judged by different standards. In the real world, laws and contracts are central, but in game disputes, terms of service, operating policies, and the in-game economic order are the key standards.
Another game-specialist attorney said, "Law regulates primarily serious illegal acts, and detailed order within games is filled in by the terms and operating policies," adding, "If the terms delegate specifics to operating policies, those policies effectively function as contractual standards and become the first benchmark for dispute resolution."
In 2007, the Supreme Court found it lawful to restrict account use for users who engaged in so-called "auto-hunting" in Lineage. By contrast, in a 2020 case involving Nexon's game "Legend of Darkness," the court found it excessive to impose a 30-year restriction on a user who exploited a bug four times to obtain 9,907 high-priced items. The reasons were that the items were not transferred to another account and the impact on game balance was not significant.
Even with similar cheating allegations, the court did not mechanically look only at whether the terms were violated, but also weighed the game's structure, the impact on other users, and the proportionality of the sanction.
The way harm is remedied also differs from reality. In the real world, if an item is taken, the remedy is return or damages, but game items exist only on servers, so restoration occurs within the scope the operator can control.
In 2009, the Seoul High Court held in NHN's online game "R2" case that items remaining on the server that can be traced and retrieved may be subject to retrieval, but the operator is not automatically responsible for parts that have already been transferred to another user or disappeared and cannot be restored.