What is Sigma Battle Royale?
One of the most popular formats of the Indian mobile gaming scene is battle royale. Brought into the limelight through BGMI, the genre was expanded further by Garena Free Fire, Free Fire MAX, and now includes the likes of Call of Duty Mobile as well. However, quite a few of these games have been banned by the Indian government, citing security concerns. Most notably, BGMI (formerly PUBG) and Garena Free Fire have suffered losses due to the game’s ban. These games, with a vast community, multiple tournaments, and lakhs of players countrywide, lost a large sum of revenue thanks to the ban and uncertain conditions of the mobile gaming scenario in India.
Recently, Sigma Battle Royale emerged as a new contender for the top spot in battle royale games. As stated earlier, it garnered thousands of downloads in just a few days. Sigma is considered to be a survival shooter online game with stylised visuals. The game offered two modes right off the bat – the classic Battle Royale mode with 50 players, and a 4v4 Fight Out mode. While the game was still in “early access”, the game offered these two well-worked modes, new weapons, slightly unique gameplay, and graphics that combined aspects from Fortnite and Garena Free Fire.
Why did Google remove the game?
As stated previously, the game’s graphics and general gameplay resembled that of Garena Free Fire. So, when it was removed from the Play Store, there were concerns that it was due to a complaint made by the management at Garena, claiming the game to be a Free Fire clone. Other rumours circulating the removal also believed that Garena had acquired Studio Arm Private Limited, the development studio behind the game. However, as it turns out, neither of these speculations seems to be true.
According to multiple sources, the game was removed by Google itself. The reports state that Studio Arm and Sigma Battle Royale APK have been identified as high-risk profiles. Apparently, Studio Arm didn’t comply with Google’s Developer Program Policy. Google states that the game has assets which contribute to Intellectual Property violations. These assets also contain several references to Garena Free Fire. This gives Google enough reason to believe that some of these assets were directly ported to Sigma Battle Royale from Garena Free Fire.
Basically, there’s a decent chance that the developers at Studio Arm imported various assets or took inspiration from Garena Free Fire. However, they did not change the assets enough to make them their own.
Will Sigma Battle Royale return to Play Store?
Although the chances of Sigma Battle Royale returning to the Google Play Store seem bleak, it is possible. If the developers at Studio Arm can change their assets to not resemble that of Garena Free Fire, Google might review the APK. In other words, Studio Arm must look through its assets carefully and remove any resemblance to Garena Free Fire’s icons, textures, characters, or images. Only then will it be able to return to the Google Play Store.
Summing up
The battle royale genre is a highly popular one in the Indian mobile gaming market. These games have plenty of content throughout the year. Moreover, multiple players can simultaneously engage in the game, pairing up with random players or friends for hours. Due to their popularity, plenty of new games, such as Sigma Battle Royale, will continue popping up online. Regardless of whichever game you choose to play, ensure that you download them from verified sources. For those of us who missed the chance to play Sigma Battle Royale, we hope that the development studio fixes the relevant issues and gets it back into the App Stores
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