Activision have come under scrutiny for their presentation of Angolan rebel Jonas Savimbi in 2012’s Call Of Duty: Black Ops II. Three of Savimbi’s children are leading the case against the publisher as they claim that the chief’s personality within the game was defamatory and presented him as nothing more than a “barbarian.”
The members of the family, who are now based in France, have targeted Activision Blizzard’s French branch and are seeking €1 Million be paid out in damages for the depiction of their father. Savimbi was a guerrilla leader responsible for leading opposition against the Angolan government’s then dominant party. He was touted as a freedom fighter by Ronald Reagan after being killed in 2002, but was still considered a fairly controversial figure in the conflict at the time.
His children state that their father’s depiction in the game is defamatory, and that he was a political leader and strategist as opposed to being the “big halfwit who wants to kill everybody” he appears to be in Call Of Duty: Black Ops II.
A lawyer representing Activision Blizzard has rejected the claim and stated that the game presents Savimbi as a “good guy” – and that he is portrayed fairly, “for who he was … a character of Angolan history, a guerrilla chief who fought the MPLA”
Activision was previously threatened with legal action over the depiction of Manuel Noriega in Call Of Duty: Black Ops II back in 2014.
