International Promo Contest Rules for a Game Studio

An international gamedev company was preparing to launch a global promo contest around its game launch. The campaign spanned multiple jurisdictions, each with its own rules on prize promotions, consumer protection, and personal income tax on winnings. The client needed contest terms that were legally watertight across every market, written in language players would actually read, and a clear position on how prize taxes would be handled. Drafting in-house carried real exposure — unclear rules invite disputes, and mishandled tax obligations on cross-border payouts can stall a campaign mid-flight before any capital is recovered.

We delivered an end-to-end legal package covering both the player-facing rules and the studio's tax obligations:

1. Contest rules drafting — wrote a complete set of terms covering participation eligibility, deadlines, reward structure, and restrictions, in plain language calibrated for a gaming audience rather than legal counsel.
2. Multi-jurisdiction tax review — analysed how prize payouts would be treated in each target market and mapped the studio's exposure on personal income tax tied to winners across those jurisdictions.
3. Tax-on-behalf structuring — built the mechanism for the company to absorb and remit personal income tax on behalf of winners, with the corresponding language baked into the rules and internal payout workflow.
4. Compliance pass — aligned the final terms with promotional-campaign requirements in each jurisdiction so the document could ship as a single global instrument.