Monsters Energy Forces Ubisoft to change the title for "Gods and Monsters"

CriticalGaming

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Normally I would be annoyed at this because it's just a company trying to over reach their stupid fucking copyright and trademark to something that doesn't even fucking apply.

But in this case. Fuck Ubisoft.
 
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happyninja42

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I mean, it says in the article 'Monster Energy has been a staple in the gaming scene for a while now.' If they're involved in the scene they could have valid concerns if, say, they've got a promo planned with another developer that might seem watered down by or conflict with Ubisoft's offers.

Or maybe they want to make sure people don't think there's an association with Ubisoft, given the recent bad press regarding Ubisoft protecting abusers.

I don't know, I'm not a wizard.
Except there's no actual way this makes any sense. One is a video game, one is a drink. There is no way that someone would think "Gosh, I'm thirsty, let me go download a video game from the internet to quinch my thirst!" Or "Gee, I really want to play a video game, let me go to the drink section of this gas station and check the fridge!"

And given how monster likes to spray it's logo feces over all game promotions, it seems like it would be free advertising for them, not the contrary. In fact it baffles me they didn't decide to just make a promotional deal, like have them make some promo materials, with the M in Monsters be the shape of the drink logo.

I mean, this is just so dumb.
 
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Baffle

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And given how monster likes to spray it's logo feces over all game promotions, it seems like it would be free advertising for them, not the contrary.
I would assume that's a large part of it. Monster seems very ... erm ... brand-heavy (I don't know if any other energy drinks have a fashion line?) and I guess they want to control that space (their presence in gaming I mean, not hoodies).
 

Agema

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I find it incredibly hard to believe that Monster Energy could have won this in a court case: it is clearly ridiculous that a common English language word could be eliminated from use in an entire creative field this way.

However, they could certainly throw so much shit at the wall that Ubisoft got fed up with the legal costs.
 

CriticalGaming

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It is kind of the problem you face when your brand is just a generic everyday word. You can trademark the word when used for other things very closely related to your original trademark. In this case other drinks.

But your trademark would not be applicable to other forms of media, unless you could prove infringement. And a game with the word Monster in the title simple does not infringe on the energy drink's brand. Especially when this title in clearly using multiple words. The game itself is not called "monster" but "Gods and Monsters" which in no way shows a comparable relationship to the drink.

It's an unwinable case and I have to wonder what the fuck Monster is thinking.

The same thing happened when Apple tried to get Fruit of the Loom to remove the apples from their logo because they felt like they owned fucking fruit.
 
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Dalisclock

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It is kind of the problem you face when your brand is just a generic everyday word. You can trademark the word when used for other things very closely related to your original trademark. In this case other drinks.

But your trademark would not be applicable to other forms of media, unless you could prove infringement. And a game with the word Monster in the title simple does not infringe on the energy drink's brand. Especially when this title in clearly using multiple words. The game itself is not called "monster" but "Gods and Monsters" which in no way shows a comparable relationship to the drink.

It's an unwinable case and I have to wonder what the fuck Monster is thinking.

The same thing happened when Apple tried to get Fruit of the Loom to remove the apples from their logo because they felt like they owned fucking fruit.
There's also the Candy Crush Saga suing the Banner Saga over the word "SAGA" because somehow that's not a word that's been used for thousands of years. Also the fact the Banner Saga and Candy Crush would never be mistaken for each other in a million years.

That's like Konami suing Twisted Metal, Metal Marines, Metal Wolf Chaos or Guilty Gear because each of those shares one incredibly common word with Metal Gear.
 
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Drathnoxis

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Come to think of it, why don't they sue Capcom as well for using the name "Monster Hunter"?
Wait, is that a game? All these years I thought it was a promotional energy drink featuring the characters of Hunter X Hunter!
Really shouldn't be allowed to name a game with words that appear in the titles of other things.
 
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sXeth

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Monster does have their own games, for what its worth (I think the couple I've seen are just genericy BMX, Dirtbike, etc sports things).


That said, yeah, you'd never confuse it with some fantasy-based game
 

Dalisclock

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Monster does have their own games, for what its worth (I think the couple I've seen are just genericy BMX, Dirtbike, etc sports things).


That said, yeah, you'd never confuse it with some fantasy-based game
Apparently they have some game called....Call of Duty. I don't know, never heard of it. Must be some niche Indie that appeals to fancylads.
 
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immortalfrieza

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I find it incredibly hard to believe that Monster Energy could have won this in a court case: it is clearly ridiculous that a common English language word could be eliminated from use in an entire creative field this way.

However, they could certainly throw so much shit at the wall that Ubisoft got fed up with the legal costs.
Which is precisely why Monster was doing it. They were hoping to trademark troll Ubisoft into just giving them a bunch of money to shut up and go away, which has been the actual goal of trademark lawsuits for decades.

Just a reminder to everyone that US trademark law is super-bonkers. It basically boils down to that you have to contest every use of something that might be related to/infringe on your trademark (like Mohjang's Scrolls being contested by Bethesda because they had a trademark on Elder Scrolls) or you lose the right to the trademark. This is intended to ensure that companies just don't trademark a gazillion things and then sit on the trademarks to spite competitors, but it also creates situations like this when Monster has to push their right to the word Monster in gaming related trademarks (and Monster is gaming adjacent due to their marketing and profiling) or they'd lose control over the trademark.
Which was pushed by these very same companies so they would have an excuse to throw frivolous lawsuits at each other and more importantly to kill off the little guy before they have a chance of becoming the big guys. If this was actually something detremental to these companies they could easily lobby to get it taken out of trademark law.
 
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