Lik-Sang changes hands, preps mod-chip court case

Blimey

Lik-Sang, the Hong Kong based online retailer of videogames "accessories", is to hand over the running of its business to a company called Pacific Game Technology Limited, in a move designed to allow the current management of the company to focus on fighting its forthcoming court case against Microsoft, Sony and Nintendo.

The move comes as something of a surprise, as most people had expected the company to capitulate to demands from the platform holders, who have won an injunction preventing the retailer from selling mod chips, flash linkers or any other devices which can be used to circumvent game copy protection.

"Just a few days after having received High Court Orders not allowing us to sell Mod Chip products for the Playstation 2 and Flash Linker products for the Nintendo Gameboy Advance, Lik Sang realized that the powers of those three multi-billion dollar corporations are simply infinite compared to the budgets and resources businesses like Lik Sang have available," commented Lik Sang director Alex Kampl. "Their legal actions have been hurting our customers and our business a lot in the last couple of weeks, so that we have finally decided to let somebody else take over Lik-Sang.com and solely concentrate on the lawsuit."

The decision to fight the lawsuit is an interesting one - with the potential ramifications for the platform holders if they lose the case being severe. This is certainly not an open and shut case for them; although under American laws like the DMCA, mod-chips are entirely illegal, this is unproven under Chinese law.

Lik-Sang may have been emboldened by a widely reported case in Australia recently, in which a court ruled that a man selling mod chips for PS2 consoles had not broken any laws - and accused the platform holders of artificially denying Australian consumers the right to purchase goods from abroad by enforcing the software regions system.

© gamesindustry.biz