Seven years ago, a 15-year-old started a YouTube channel called rabbidluigi. He had no way of knowing that in 2017 that would be a real character in a real video game.
Rabbidluigi is a gaming channel that does top 10 videos and Let’s Plays. “In anticipation of making my YouTube I planned everything out,” rabbidluigi told me over Skype chat. “It only occurred to me when signing up and registering my YouTube channel that I completely overlooked what I’d like to call it. … I threw the names of two video game characters I kind of liked together and ended up with ‘rabbidluigi’.” He said part of the reason why he picked this name all those years ago was because, at the time, the two franchises weren’t connected at all.
Shortly before E3, when Mario + Rabbids: Kingdom Battle was leaked to the public, rabbidluigi’s social media became “just an endless supply of jokes,” he said. “I don’t think I received a comment on a YouTube video or a mention on Twitter that didn’t bring it up. This avalanche only got more intense when Ubisoft demonstrated the game on stage at E3 and referred to the character as ‘Rabbid Luigi’.” Regardless of the kind of video he made, the comments would inevitably mention the unexpected upcoming game.
To rabbidluigi’s surprise, he says that he was also contacted by Nintendo and Ubisoft about the coincidence. He was even invited by Ubisoft to come to their studio in Paris to play Mario + Rabbids at a marketing event. “I remember some commenters saying that I should be worried about Ubisoft suing me or sending a cease-and-desist,” he said. “The fact that Ubisoft found it hilarious as well is maybe my favourite part of this whole saga.” I reached out to Ubisoft for comment but they didn’t respond in time for publication.
In Paris today to do this madness. pic.twitter.com/b76UXuAy8h
— rabbidluigi (@rabbidluigi) July 20, 2017
He’s since reviewed Mario + Rabbids, cheekily addressing the coincidence, but by this point, he’s ready for the joke of his username to fade away. “While the increased engagement on my channel has helped me a lot, I’m partly grateful that this story will come to an end once everyone has gotten used to it,” he said. “I suppose it’s a fun feature to mention when meeting new people in the industry, but I still don’t want my channel to be defined by it.” At the moment he’s gearing up to launch a second channel that will host all his Let’s Play videos. Even if he’s ready to move on, he still finds the whole situation funny.
“I feel like it’s one of those coincidences that you couldn’t write into a movie or a TV show because viewers would say that it’s too unrealistic,” rabbidluigi said. “To be living in a world where Nintendo and Ubisoft have come together to make a game where there exists a character with the same name is a ridiculous coincidence, but at the moment I’m just rolling with it. There’s nothing I can do but laugh and enjoy it while it’s relevant.”
Comments
12 responses to “When He Picked The Name ‘RabbidLuigi’ Seven Years Ago, YouTuber Had No Idea What Was Coming”
Oh wow, I expected Ubisoft to go and do something stupid there too.
Mobilising the marketing department before the lawyers, good job.
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You could argue that this is the case with pretty much all fan art, mods and similar, and rightly so. Still doesn’t stop lawyers spamming take down notices as if the sky is going to fall in by the mere mention of their ip. Go figure.
My WoW character has been Groot (Dutch for big) since day 1 vanilla yet I wasn’t asked to attend Marvel studios…
Groots first appearance was in the 60 though….
Groot was created in 1960- so maybe a little before your name in WoW haha
True enough but it has been Dutch for much longer!
But that’s just them taking a dutch word for a name, if you had called yourself “RedSkullGroot” then goot became red skull it’d fit this kind of situation.
Stop bringing logic into this. Feel sorry for me. Listen and believe.
Ubisoft would do something like this.
Nintendo would just send him a Cease and Desist letter.
Nintendo would be totally unaware of the situation because Youtube is on the internet and Nintendo doesn’t know what that is yet.
Hahaha right on