Briefly: Hello Games’ Sean Murray celebrated via Twitter yesterday over the news that he won’t have to change his game’s name to No Man’s One or something.
Yay! We finally settled with Sky (they own the word “Sky”). We can call our game No Man’s Sky. 3 years of secret stupid legal nonsense over
— Sean Murray (@NoMansSky) June 17, 2016
Comments
28 responses to “No Man’s Sky Can Now Legally Be Called ‘No Man’s Sky’”
What.
Sky TV made a ridiculous claim on the word “sky”. All in the name of money.
Thanks for that. You’d have thought that would be useful information to include in the actual article, I had no idea what this was about.
I just noticed the original title of the article (see: URL). So it actually could have been worse :/
That is the dumbest shit I’ve ever heard. Although Sky is owned by Newscorp so I shouldn’t be surprised.
Apparently Sky TV need to keep up appearances on anything that might threaten trademark, no matter how unrelated the use of “sky” might be. They also challenged SkyDrive, so it became OneDrive.
It’s as absurd and at the same time relatively legit as The Banner Saga being challenged by Candy Crush Saga. It’s as stupid as Cadbury and that particular shade of purple. It’s nearly as stupid China and the flagrant disregard for actual copyright breach and plagiarism that occurs over there (just look at the Overwatch clone).
There may well be a financial element to the settlement but I find that highly objectionable if that is the case (no comment on that detail last I heard) The overall result is that Sky TV look like a bunch of petty wankers, so good job asshats. Good PR work there. It’s a videogame. You’re a broadcaster. Get over yourselves.
But as you say, it’s legit.
They go after anything that could potentially erode their rights to the trademark.
As ridiculous as it sounds, going after no mans sky stops someone else from using no mans sky as an example to despute Sky’s trademark.
Bloody well glad they didn’t give Skyrim the once over. But seriously, the trademark laws really need to be addressed so no one has to go through this crap and spend an unnecessary fortune…on…the lawyers. Damn.
You’re absolutely right, the only thing at fault here is copyright law. Sky had no legal choice but to pursue this, otherwise they lose in the long run (not that I care if they do, but I’m sure all those people they employ do) and well No Man’s Sky had no choice but to battle or change their name.
What would Sky have lost in the long run?
Precedence that the word can be used without challenge, if they hadn’t challenged the naming and let it go without legal action it would set precedence for next time, and next time it could be a legit infringement case, and if there is precedence that someone else got away with it without challenge it weakens their case. Even if it was stupid as a video game, it would makes it harder for Sky to make legitimate claims.
TL;DR copyright law is bullshit and this is the circus they have to go through.
My next game shall be called Edge of the Sky Saga.
And make it purple to piss the world companies off
That actually sounds like a cool game!
10/10 would pre-order!
what’s the edge part referencing?
U2?
Look up a guy named Tim Langdell.
Oh yeah, I remember that! There was an article here a couple of years ago.
With a sequel: “Edge of the Sky Saga II: The Sky Saga Scrolls”
dont you mean “Edge of the Sky Saga II: The Dota Sky Saga Scrolls”
Don’t forget to include “scrolls” in the title too.
no mans sky, where nobody owns it?
Is this why it was delayed
Either this or trying to get PlayStationVR working on it…
That… makes unfortunate sense.
Bloody hell this kinda thing needs to get fixed.
“Mom, love and screen door are registered trademarks of MomCorp.”
Just remember that when it comes to naming your game, the “Sky”s the limit!
A game I backed on KS is going through this. It’s called Fabulous Beasts. It’s about stacking plastic animals on top of each other and upgrading them with special artefacts to make them “fabulous”. It’s colourful and abstract. And now it has to change its name because Warner Bros is bringing out some Harry Potter movie…
i though that WB movie was called Fantasic Beasts and Where to Find Them