Microsoft’s Turn 10 Studios has removed two dance emotes from Forza Horizon 4 amid ongoing copyright lawsuits against Epic Games for including virtual versions of dances popularized in real life. The “Carlton” and “Floss” dance emotes are the ones that have been removed from Forza Horizon 4. Perhaps Turn 10 was trying to avoid a lawsuit as well.
The change was announced on Forza’s website and comes as part of the latest patch for the game. The studio doesn’t acknowledge the recent legal troubles surrounding these emots but does list the removal at the bottom of the release notes under the title “Other improvements.” It only says that both dance emotes are “no longer available.”
This appears to be the first time that a game studio has backed away from asserting the right to include a virtual version of a dance popularized in real life. Epic Games has been sued over including previously popularised dances like the Orange Justice in its game without giving due credit.
It also has the Carlton which many of you will be aware was made popular by actor Alfonso Ribeiro when he played the namesake character on The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. He has sued Epic over including his dance in the game as “Fresh.”
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