Sony and Tencent settle lawsuit over “slavish clone” of Horizon: Zero Dawn

Japanese giant Sony and Chinese tech and entertainment firm Tencent have settled their legal dispute over the alleged similarities between the former’s Horizon franchise and the latter’s Light of Motiram.

As spotted by The Game Post, the two companies have reached a settlement, though the terms of this are confidential and have not been disclosed. As a result, Sony’s case against Tencent has been dismissed with prejudice, meaning the PlayStation giant cannot take the Chinese firm to court over the same matter.

Each side has to cover their own legal costs.

Sony initially sued Tencent in July 2025, claiming that Light of Motiram was a “slavish clone” of its own Horizon series. The PlayStation firm claimed that the Chinese company had pitched to make an entry in the Horizon series, only be turned down. Shortly after, Light of Motiram emerged.

“SIE is far from alone in recognising the striking similarities that Tencent’s new Light of Motiram game shares with Horizon,” Sony wrote in its initial lawsuit.

“Upon viewing the gameplay trailer, Internet users and gaming journalists agreed: Light of Motiram was a knock-off of Horizon Zero Dawn, Horizon Forbidden West, and other games in the Horizon Franchise—the similarities are glaringly and immediately obvious.”

In response, Tencent accused Sony of seeking a “monopoly on genre conventions” in September 2025, adding that the PlayStation firm was looking to “transform ubiquitous genre ingredients into proprietary assets.”

Sony dismissed this filing as “nonsense”.

‘Tencent remarkably contends SIE’s claims are unripe because – despite having announced and continuously promoted its game for months – Tencent (purportedly) delayed Light of Motiram’s release until 2027 after SIE sued. This is nonsense. The damage is done – and it continues,” the company wrote at the time.

Earlier in December, Tencent stopped marketing and testing work for Light of Motiram ahead of what was meant to be a January 2026 court date. At the time of writing, the game remains delisted on Steam and the Epic Games Store.