It's been a little more than a year since Tencent and its Polaris Quest subsidiary announced Light of Motiram to the world. This open world game was targeting a launch on PC, PlayStation 5, Android, and iOS. Ever since we laid our eyes on it, though, we couldn't help but label it as a Horizon Zero Dawn clone.
There were some differences in the gameplay mechanics, such as base building, which is absent (so far, at least) in Guerrilla's acclaimed series. However, the backdrop of a destroyed world, animal-inspired machines, and a red-haired female character made it just too much of a blatant rip-off.
Surely enough, in late July 2025, Sony (the parent company of Horizon Zero Dawn creator Guerrilla Games) sued Tencent for copyright and trademark infringement, calling Light of Motiram a 'slavish clone' of its intellectual property. Just a few days later, Tencent began adjusting the game's description and images on Steam, including removing screenshots featuring the aforementioned Aloy-inspired character.
In September, the Chinese corporation fought back in court, filing a motion to dismiss with a series of counters, such as jurisdiction issues and, most interestingly, arguing that Guerrilla admitted its own game was originally discarded as an internal pitch because the developers felt it was too similar to another, Ninja Theory's Enslaved: Odyssey to the West, before returning to the pitch and going forward with it anyway. This was intended to demonstrate that Horizon was never truly original to begin with.
Predictably, Sony dismissed this rebuttal as nonsense and moved forward with the lawsuit. Two weeks ago, the PlayStation company succeeded in getting Tencent to stop promoting the game ahead of new court dates set for January 2026. However, it seems like that won't be necessary.
A quick search on Steam will show that Light of Motiram can no longer be found on Valve's platform. SteamDB reveals that the app 'has been retired and is no longer available on the Steam store'. The last piece of info comes from The Verge, which got a comment from Sony: the two companies reached a private resolution and won't share any further public comments on the topic, but they 'look forward to working together in the future'.
From the sound of it, then, Light of Motiram appears to have been canceled, with Tencent finally ceding to Sony's concerns without going into a prolonged legal battle it was likely to lose.
For all those players looking for an online version of Horizon, there's the new Steel Frontiers MMORPG in development by NCSOFT for PC and mobile (with a possible PlayStation 5 version under discussion). Guerrilla Games is also still developing its own online co-op game set within the franchise.
About the author: With over two decades of experience in gaming journalism, Alessio Palumbo has led the gaming vertical at Wccftech since August 2015. He started working at a young age for Italian websites like Everyeye.it, Gamestar.it, Nextgame.it, and Multiplayer.it before kickstarting the indie English-language publication Worlds Factory as its founder and Editor in Chief. In the last decade, he has coordinated the overall output of Wccftech's gaming section, managed PR relations, assigned reviews, produced daily news coverage, edited gaming content as needed, and delivered game reviews. Arguably, his trademark content is the long series of exclusive developer interviews that have been cited by Wikipedia and by the biggest news media and gaming publications. His passion for technology also makes him knowledgeable when it comes to gaming hardware and tech. His favorite genres include RPGs, MMORPGs, and action/adventure games.
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