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Small Costa Rican indie studio bullied by unnamed developer over "RAGE" trademark.

F

Fireblend

Banned
Full disclosure: I'm Costa Rican but not employed by Green Lava. I do know the developer though :p

Anyway, I remember this game getting decent coverage, so it kinda sucks to see them getting set back by legal bs like this on top of the usual struggles of being a small indie studio in a country where it's difficult to make it as one.

http://greenlavastudios.com/2015/11/rage-trademark/

as you may noticed, Fenix Rage got an significant delay. This is not because of our team or any technical issues: on January 12 of 2015, a huge game company registered the trademark RAGE in Costa Rica. Then, their Costa Rican lawyers sent us a cease and desist letter, forcing us to change the name for console launch (PS4/Vita and Xbox One). We could go to a legal battle on this, but unfortunately we don’t have the resources or the army of lawyers they have. But they are letting us keep the name “Fenix Rage” on Steam. So we got that going for us… which is nice.

We sincerely apologize for the situation, but as you can see, this is all out of our hands. We will do our best to have our game out and into your hands.
Click to expand...

Seems pretty dumb to me. I do wonder what videogame company would bother to register the RAGE trademark here though.
 
De-mon

De-mon

Member
I do wonder what videogame company would bother to register the RAGE trademark here though.
Click to expand...

This?

OgPlyRU.jpg
 
D

DrArchon

Member
Rage is such a common word though. I can't imagine who would do such a thing. It's not like any big publisher out there has a pattern of this kind of thing.

Seriously though, fuck Zenimax and every lawyer that works for them. Holy shit these guys are awful when it comes to this.
 
E

Eusis

Member
Almost wish SE had done this against King over the word Saga given the fuss they made there.

Frustrating though, but at least it was a major release named simply Rage rather than a series of puzzle games all tacking Saga on for some arbitrary reason then acting as if no other game may use that word. Nevermind that Scrolls nonsense, though I guess this shows they may have expected the inverse.
 
Whompa02

Whompa02

Member
Guys it's OBVIOUSLY Sega because they're rebooting my favorite franchise ever for next gen consoles right?

T_T
 
S

serversurfer

Member
Wait, so no games in Costa Rica are allowed to use the word "rage" in their titles at all? I don't think that's how trademarks are supposed to work… =/
 
W

wiibomb

Member
serversurfer said:
Wait, so no games in Costa Rica are allowed to use the word "rage" in their titles at all? I don't think that's how trademarks are supposed to work… =/
Click to expand...

that's a trademark for you...

kinda like a game is not allowed to use the word "pokemon" in their title, King also had the brilliant idea of trademarking the word "Saga" too
 
T

Triggerhappytel

Member
Anyone know when their trademark for RAGE expires? I wonder if there's a need to defend a trademark when you're obviously not going to do anything with it.

EDIT - seems to be going until 2020 according to the UK IPO.
 
S

serversurfer

Member
wiibomb said:
that's a trademark for you...

kinda like a game is not allowed to use the word "pokemon" in their title, King also had the brilliant idea of trademarking the word "Saga" too
Click to expand...
Well, Pokémon is a unique name, not just a random word like Rage. I couldn't call my game The, and then sue everyone who tries to use that word in their title.


Triggerhappytel said:
Anyone know when their trademark for RAGE expires? I wonder if there's a need to defend a trademark when you're obviously not going to do anything with it.

EDIT - seems to be going until 2020 according to the UK IPO.
Click to expand...
Actually, trademarks last indefinitely, as long as you're active about using it and ensuring that nobody else does. They're considered brand-identifying marks, and you can maintain the association for as long as you care to. That's why McD's is still the only restaurant with the Golden Arches or the name McDonald's.

Design patents, which protect the look of a specific product, expire after 14 years. That's what Apple sued Samsung over; the appearance of the device. You need to wait 14 years before you can make something that looks like an iPhone, but you'll "never" be able to call your computer company Apple.
/me knocks wood

Edit: Could be different in the UK, but it seems odd to let trademarks expire. Y'all don't have a bunch of different outfits calling themselves W.H. Smith's, do you?
 
M

Malreyn

Member
Is this some sort of variation of patent trolling? Just make a game with a title using a common word from the dictionary and then sue anyone that tries to use the same word in their title?
 
CNCOMICS

CNCOMICS

Member
Knock it off ZeniMax/Bethesda. First Scrolls and now Rage. Nobody associated Rage and Fenix Rage until now, just like Scrolls and Elder Scrolls.

To be honest, when I first heard of Fenix Rage, I thought it was a parody game about Marcus Fenix as he explores his emotions.
 
R

Rymuth

Member
After doing some digging around, the culprit would have their mask pulled off...and it turned out to be old man Zeniethesda all along.
 
Q

Qwark

Member
Pretty scummy. Rebellion Studios pulled (or tried to?) a similar stunt trying to prevent anybody from using the word Rebellion in their games, I think Stardock was affected by it with Sins of a Solar Empire.

Edit: Looks like Stardock withstood the litigation and their Rebellion expansion was released. Good on them.
 
M

Mr. Tibbs

Member
That's awful. I guess if there's a silver lining, it's that since Bethesda/Zenimax did such a dreadful job overseeing the last two years of Rage's development, we won't ever see a sequel to Rage.
 
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