Monster Energy, the energy drink company that puts artificially-flavored gloop in cans next to gaming setups worldwide, is pushing an indie studio to change the name of its game. Glowstick Entertainment’s 2020 horror title, Dark Deception: Monsters & Mortals is apparently “confusingly similar to their energy drink,” Glowstick CEO Vincent Livings said in a Twitter thread.
“Yep, that’s really their claim,” he continued.
1. It’s well known that @MonsterEnergy is a notorious trademark troll. Unfortunately, they’re at it again. For a company that likes to target their drinks at gamers, they also like to try to bully & bankrupt game studios with lengthy high dollar litigation. #indiegamedev #gamedev pic.twitter.com/8xvg7iWqQe
— Vincent Livings (@VincentLivings) March 29, 2023
Monster, which is partially owned by Coca-Cola and has a market cap of $US55.8 ($77) billion as of writing, is a known “trademark bully.” Over the years, it has sued a small Ohio restaurant for using “monster” in its signage, a Georgia welder for using an “M” similar to its logo, and once entered a legal battle over the name of a man’s aquarium hobby forum, MonsterFishKeepers. In 2020, Ubisoft changed the name of its game Gods & Monsters to Immortals: Fenyx Rising following Monster’s claim that the title would be too easily confused with its brand.
Read More: “Gods & Monsters Isn’t The First Time Monster Energy Has Been Annoying About Naming Rights”
All of that is finishing salt for Monster — it has pretzeled itself in many obscure legal battles with obscure little guys, and it will likely happily continue to do so. But Livings is projecting Mortals & Monsters and won’t go down easy.
According to another thread, Monster “demands that, in exchange for allowing us to use the name ‘Monsters & Mortals,’ we agree to never name any other game any variation of the word ‘Monster,’” Livings said.
Here are the overreaching settlement terms that #MonsterEnergy sent me. Basically, it demands that in exchange for allowing us to use the name “Monsters & Mortals”, we agree to never name any other game any variation of the word “Monster”. #indiegamedev #gamedev #ign #kotaku pic.twitter.com/YyXntK7PLn
— Vincent Livings (@VincentLivings) March 29, 2023
“It also forces us to agree to never use a green & white logo on a black background for any game we ever make,” he continued. “So they own the colours green & white too, apparently.”
Livings plans to push back on Monster in court, and is advocating for a boycott in the meantime.
“Dishonest companies like Monster Energy depend on doing their bullying in secret, while presenting a clean image to their base (athletes & gamers),” he said. “Showing their true face publicly is the only real way to stop them.”
Monster did not respond to Kotaku’s request for comment in time for publication.
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