The producers claim Bandai Namco is not behind the notices

Being a fighting game content creator on platforms like YouTube can be a tricky situation where perceived violent imagery or even just uploading lots of match footage could result in loss of monetization.

Tekken content creators on YouTube are now speaking out about receiving copyright claims on their Tekken 7 — and even other games like Tekken Revolution — gameplay due to the in-game music tracks from matches.

Content creator and streamer King Jae posted an email he received from the YouTube team telling him that one of his Tekken 7 videos had been claimed using the automated Content ID system.

"It has an impact on every Tekken creator because we do not get much financially out of this, and we do it for the love of the game," said King Jae in an email to EventHubs. "Anything that comes from it is appreciated."

Others like Maximilian, LooneyLili and TheMainManSWE have also reported similar claims all reportedly coming from one company in particular, iMusician Digital.

"Bandai Namco is not involved in this at all. I’ll Investigate what is happening. But don't complain to me" - Katsuhiro Harada

iMusician Digital is a music distribution service based in Europe with part of their business model centering around monetization of tracks on YouTube. It is unclear why they are the ones sending out copyright claims instead of the Tekken rights holder, Bandai Namco. EventHubs has reached out to iMusician Digital for comment with the company responding that they are in contact with Bandai Namco now.

Tekken's longtime director Katsuhiro Harada acknowledged the issue on Twitter stating that it is not Bandai Namco behind the claims, and that they are investigating it.

Michael Murray, Tekken's current producer, also addressed the situation and appears to have been informed that a resolution will be coming soon for those affected.

"I am aware that multiple people are experiencing a claim on their videos from a third party," said Murray on Twitter. "I am looking into it, but in the meantime, try appealing the claim on YouTube until it gets sorted out. I’m still not sure what happened, but I was informed by iMusician that the claims will be released shortly."



Click images for larger versions

These claims are not the same as copyright strikes which put a channel's entire monetization and existence at risk, but it does remove the option to make money from those affected videos even if they are just playing in the background of matches and regular gameplay.

This news comes days after YouTube announced plans to protect creators more from manual claims on short music clips and unintended audio though that would not apply in this case since these claims were from the automated Content ID system.

Mortal Kombat content creators have also faced demonetization issues on YouTube in recent months many times age restricting or limiting ads on videos for blood splatter or even just their titles. This has forced people like Maximilian to further edit their gameplay with filters to obscure the blood though that doesn't always work.

Bandai Namco Nordics has also taken to Twitter to state that they are also looking into the issue and making progress. Hopefully, all of these claims are sorted out quickly, and things can get back to a more relative normal space for fighting game creators. You can check out a video from LooneyLili talking about her experience with the Tekken music claims below.