The International Game Developers Association has issued a statement opposing King’s recent Candy Crush Saga trademark filing — in which the game developer claimed ownership of the words “candy” and “saga” across all gaming platforms.
Calling the move “predatory,” the group plans to use its Business and Legal Special Interest Group to investigate the filing, which was recently approved by the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office.
It will be interesting to hear what the IGDA’s legal team come back with. While King has so far been successful in having its trademark claims agreed to, any trademark allows 30 days for it to be opposed before being officially published.
While it does seem that King is being unreasonable by claiming such generic terms as “candy” and “saga” for its exclusive usage, it’s equally a massive problem for App Store developers (and users) to see the arrival of potentially thousands of derivative titles using misleadingly-close names whenever a hot new game appears.
Recently, Cult of Mac reported that both Apple and Google were refusing new apps featuring the word “flappy” designed to cash in on the Flappy Bird phenomenon.
Source: Joystiq
