Author ORCID Identifier

0000-0002-5120-5378

Date of Award

17-8-2025

Document Type

Thesis

School

School of Law

Programme

Ph.D.-Doctoral of Philosophy

First Advisor

Dr.R.Madhavan

Second Advisor

Dr.Aradhana Satish Nair

Keywords

Electronic Games, Personality Rights, Video Games, Publicity Rights

Abstract

In India and globally, the electronic gaming business is a rapidly growing and evolving sector both in terms of revenue as well as technological creativity. Over the last 20 years, the video game business has seen significant change. It has transcended borders and is no longer limited to a single or a few players played within a room. Modern video games, unlike their predecessors, include many distinctive visuals and other components are and closely compared to motion pictures.

Electronic games and their complexities present unique challenges to copyright law. In this research, the researcher explores and examines issues in the existing copyright jurisprudence in relation to these games. Electronic games provide a number of legal concerns and challenges for copyright, mostly because of their intricacy and segmentation. Copyright protection may be applied to the various components found in these games. Copyright covers all original creative elements like literary work, artistic work, musical work, sound recording and cinematograph film.

When it comes to electronic games, on one hand, there is the computer program (literary work) that serves as the game's foundation and on the other hand, there is the other creative aspects like the graphics (artistic work), music , sound and some games even have story line which projects like a film that show up on the screen as the game is being played, giving it a distinctive and original appearance. The copyrightability of electronic games and the protection that copyright laws may provide to these games and the stakeholders involved are examined in this research.

The study, which uses the doctrinal methodology of research, is restricted to the protection of video games under the copyright laws and employs a comparative analysis with nations like the USA, Canada, China, South Africa, Japan, Germany and Singapore. The study examines India's legal framework on personality rights and how they are likely to be violated in electronic games.

Personality rights, which are sometimes seen as the core of an individual's identity, and they are also known as publicity rights which provides an individual the authority to govern the commercial use of one's own personal identity / attributes, as the Delhi High Court noted in the historic Titan Industries Case1. These attributes of an individual are likely to be utilised in certain electronic games.

This is the point of contention since the use of some elements of the individual's personal identity may impact and violate personality rights, including those related to privacy and publicity. The researcher evaluates whether personality rights in electronic games are attributed only to celebrities or can it also extend to any individual whose likeness is monetized without their consent. The research highlights the evolving nature of electronic games and the scope of personality rights in these games due to the fact that in today’s modern digital world, with the use of social media, any individual can attain fame.

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