It happened again. Copyright law generally favors large corporate bodies over smaller outfits, and Zenimax has gone after another small dev for use of a common English word. This time, rather than “Scrolls,” the issue is over the word “Prey.” A crowdfunded, indie game made by a team of three people has been forced to change its name.
Previously “ Prey for the Gods ,” No Matter Studios has opted to change its title to “ Praey for the Gods ” rather than spend money it doesn’t really have to dispute a copyright claim from Zenimax/Bethesda that is dubious at best. The developers explained in a blog post that at one point this was an earlier consideration for the game’s title in the first place, citing thematic reasons. Ultimately, a word that doesn’t exist doesn’t search well, so the dev went for the normal spelling.
Bethesda’s Prey is about to launch and has a trademark associated with the word “Prey” for media use, and so on and so forth. When No Matter applied for a “ Prey for the Gods ” trademark, the Zenimax legal team went on the offensive. To their credit, they ostensibly worked something out with No Matter and there doesn’t seem to be bad feelings going forward.
Still, this is another example of a really rough precedent in the world of intellectual property. Common words being trademarked by big companies, then smaller companies facing legal issues for using these words in very different contexts, is scary. These are common words, it’s not like “Prey” is some kind of pseudoscientific jargon Bethesda made up by itself. Limiting the use of the English language because of flimsy trademark strikes backed by inflated coffers for other creative works is just nuts, right? Am I alone here? Let us know what you think in the comments.
Source: No Matter Studios