With Toronto-based video-game developer Silicon Knights having lost its copyright-infringement lawsuit against US-based rival Epic games, an American court has ordered Silicon Knights to pay millions of dollars to Epic games.

In its recent decision in the case, a North Carolina court said that Silicon Knights had "willfully and maliciously misappropriated Epic Games' trade secrets;" and asked Silicon Knights to pay $4.5 million to its competitor.

In addition, the court also gave a December 10 deadline to Silicon Knights to destroy all its materials containing Epic Games' maliciously misappropriated computer code. The material which Silicon Knights has been asked to destroy include unsold copies of X-Men Destiny, Too Human, Siren In The Maelstrom, The Box/Ritualyst and The Sandman.

With the legal scuffle between Silicon Knights and Epic Games having begun five years back, just before of the 2007 launch of Silicon Knights' flagship title Too Human for the Xbox 360 system, the court said in its verdict that Silicon Knights created its own rival game engine by "repeatedly and deliberately" copying some of the crucial components of Epic Games' code from the Unreal Engine.

The court said in its ruling: "Conveniently, the trade secrets Silicon Knights misappropriated comprised the very code that Silicon Knights could not figure out how to write on its own."