A rather secretive legal battle has been keeping lawyers busy for the past three years as it has been revealed that Sky, the television company, went after Hello Games because they called their game No Man’s Sky. Sky are rather protective of their name and actually won a case against Microsoft which forced them to change the name of their Skydrive service to OneDrive.
Hello Games top dog Sean Murray tweeted the news of the settlement late on Friday.
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
Details of the settlement have not been revealed but it may explain why Sean vanished from the public eye for a year or so, the stress from the legal battle would have been huge. However, he can still see the funny side of the whole thing.
On the plus side perhaps this is the real reason Skynet never happened…
— Sean Murray (@NoMansSky) June 18, 2016
Source: Twitter
Avenger
I’m going to register a company for £10 and then bollock everyone who uses the company name. I’m thinking I’ll call the company ‘Star’, and then sue every bastard from George Lucas to Samuel Johnson’s releatives.
coruscant
This is moronic.
hornet1990
Jokes on Sean, Skynet already exists (UK military communications network), although I can’t see them suing over that…
But what about Normans Sky (https://nothke.itch.io/normans-sky) – are they suing him too? Skyscanner.net? Pink Floyd? (10pts if you get the bit I’m thinking of)
Quite frankly fraking ridiculous if you ask me. But then it is from the company that won’t let you legitimately use another router other than their PoS; and charges you £2.50 a month surcharge for the privilege of not having 500 channels of shite to watch, most of which is adverts anyway. Oh and stole full F1 coverage from free to air – f**k you Murdoch!
If anyone should be getting death threats though it should be him. I do hope the wastes-of-space that threatened the devs over the delay feel like complete t**ts now and appropriately redirect their anger at the real culprit…
gazzagb
3 years seems a hell of a long time to be fighting it. I’d have just given up, and changed it to No Man’s Space or something. It’s only a name, would easily be worth the saved legal fees and stress.
ron_mcphatty
Trouble is, the game was building identity even during the first few months of those three years, during which time Shaun was probably just warming up to the first legal meeting but still talking excitedly about his game. I think he and his mates have done incredibly to fight off a big corporation and retain what they wanted to, even if a name seems a petty thing. Sky should be ashamed to be taking on such fights, sure protect your trademark but when brand confusion will be limited or almost none existent then don’t behave like such fucking bullies. Corporate arrogance is driving me up the fucking wall, back to work tomorrow aaaargh!!
I fought (admittedly not very hard) to get some A level coursework regraded from U to A, that was 18 months of bureaucratic balls but the apology I got and confidence I gained at the end was worth it.
beeje13
Has this influenced the release date?
I hope they didn’t have to pay any money to that greedy company.
hornet1990
Seems a little too coincidental that they announce a delay, and then a short time later that a long running legal dispute has been resolved… on the up side at least they have gotten extra time out of it to polish things up and do extra testing so hopefully the inevitable day one patch will be a bit smaller.
The Lone Steven
Oh fuck off, Sky.
What a greedy bunch of arseholes. I mean, i seriously doubt outside of gaming, anyone will get Skydrive confused with Sky. In fact, why not sue them again because it is called no man’s sky? Go ahead. We all know you want to. It’s a game. You’re a tv broadcaster.
Did they really feel threatened by someone calling their game something with sky in?
Go ahead. Sue Activision. They have SKYlanders. What’s that? Activision would curb stomp you in court?
They are big enough to rival your lawyers?
So pick on a small developer instead?
Seriously, stuff like this is petty. What’s next? suing people called sky?
Or take it on step future and sue everyone that uses the term?
SamBeThyName
They are literally trying to say that they own the sky. That sentence is worth reading twice.
duff_em_up_dave
Are you kidding me?
Did Sky invent the word sky?
I just look it up in multiple online English dictionaries and not once does it mention a satellite television company.
Am I gonna get sued now for mentioning it twice above?
Sod it.
Sky. Sky. Sky. Sky.
Sky. Sky. Sky. Sky.
Twats!
SamBeThyName
I am now going to officially claim the word Ground. It’s mine now. mine.
Tuffcub
You win.
SamBeThyName
I’m having Sea too. If you say the word ‘Sea’ you will be hearing from my legal team.
Steelhead
I sea……