Take Two have done lost their minds!

 Somebody stop me.

It must be difficult existing as an incredibly profitable and powerful corporate entity, what with managing the finances, organising teams, juggling lobbyists, circumventing tax laws, all the daily comings and goings of the average corporate lifestyle. I can imagine that each company has to handle their challenges with their own unique methods, balancing their own wellbeing with that of their investors, ideally to the best ends for all. And if the pressure should ever get too much, if you should lose the careful cool you've tried to maintain for years in order to perpetrate the false image of intellectual serenity you've erected around yourself like a fort? Well, then you might just slip from the fragile perch of sanity and tumble into an unhinged spree of abusing your power every which-way like a badly written fantasy villain in the last act of his storyline. ("If I can't have the world be under my grasp, then no-one can have the world!")

So Take Two might not be the most familiar to people out there in the gaming space, especially if you base your knowledge of the more corporate angles of the gaming beast by the logos plastered on the front of your games. But Take Two is essentially the big demon behind the curtains that puppets the likes of 2K and Rockstar, basically meaning they're juggling billion-dollar revenue generators under their brand names, so they aren't any slackers in this space by any stretch of the imagination. Take Two covets the sort of power and influence to potentially step on the throats of pretty much anyone they want to, as does any company within the upper echelons of the video game industry, because this is the most profitable entertainment medium in the world right now. (And money obviously breeds power) But whereas we acknowledge the godlike power that these companies dandily wave over our necks like loose-swinging guillotine blades, never actually expecting to feel the sharp cold of the metal's drop, Take Two must have recently become possessed by the spirit of Robespierre because they're dropping heads left right and centre.

They've never actually been the most 'community friendly' over in the corporate equivalent of Mount Doom. In fact, very recently fans of Rockstar games have been tearing out their hair over that fact that Take Two have been mounting a scorched earth campaign on anything online that so much as references a property they own. I'm talking mods, ENBs and even shared save files. All whilst Rockstar bury their heads and pretend that none of this is happening because it's better not to stir the sleeping beast sleeping above them I guess, although the fact that Take Two took down a bunch of superior graphical enhancement mods in the months leading up to Grand Theft Auto's inferior definitive update is certainly curious. I'm not saying that Rockstar specifically put them up to it, I'm just saying that I wouldn't be surprised if some of the leading Rockstar staff let slip the existence of these sorts of mods during a meeting at some point.

Still, as pathetically desperate as that sort of conduct invariably is, it is technically within Take Two's legal rights. (Whenever you are forced to bring 'technical legality' into the conversation you're pretty much just circling the drainage pipe to hell.) Take Two are in no way legally obliged to support the endeavours of their own community in their attempts to, you know, provide extra value to their property free of charge. (Might as well punish the fans for being fans, afterall.) Another thing they have no legal obligation to do is to overreach in trademark filings against any and everyone they can find with a name that sounds anything like something that they own. I'm not talking about direct ripoffs, and most of the time not even competitors, I'm talking anyone. If your birth name just happens to be something along the lines of 'Maximillian Paine', you can expect to be getting a subpoena through your letter box anytime now, things are that crazy!

Eurogamer has been putting in the legwork to document all of this, which is incredibly helpful because the extent of these claims are simply baffling, and it has stretched back to all across this year. The US patent office has filings against a clothing brand called Max Fayne, a Bejing company called 'Starrocks' (hah, goodluck on that lawsuit Take Two) and a Florida axe throwing company called "Rockstar Axe throwing". These, of course, dredges up that most tedious of queries, does naming your company after an incredibly common term warrant your ownership over that word across the world for as long as you want? Of course, usually the answer for this is 'no', but occasionally the right (or wrong, as the case my be) courts have held up such queer rulings, and perhaps Take Two are just looking for a few victories on the smaller scale that they can use to set a precedent.

But if there's one example here that simply screamed to get my attention, one victim which it makes my blood boil to see attacked by all this; it's the videogame 'It Takes Two'. This adorable little couples game (not a 'family' game- a 'couples' game) is the latest title from Hazelight and, incidentally, a 'Game of the Year' contender; but they've been forced to relinquish their trademark over their own game's name because of Take Two's recent bout of insanity. Just to be clear, this does not mean that they have to change their name at this immediate time, and Geoff Keighley won't be forbidden from speaking their name during the awards next Friday, (although that would be surrealist as heck if that was the case) but it does mean that for the moment Hazelight can't defend themselves from anyone who might attempt to profit off of their game's name; which is crap.

It Takes Two is, obviously, an incredibly common expression that has been used in countless songs throughout the year, but Take Two want to act as it's soul proprietor because it kind-of sounds like their company name. This isn't defence of their brand- this is an attack against others in what some more familiar with these sorts of legal proceedings are predicting are preliminary measures, essentially future-proofing any renaming efforts that Take Two might consider at some point. But is all of that worth attacking a small studio with the likes of Josef Fares in there, the man who famously disparaged the Oscars in an apparently-sober rant during the Game Awards some years back? Sure, the guy may have defended EA once or twice, but his company has literally only managed to put out their games thanks to help from EA, it would be more damning if he wasn't thankful towards them. The man is a treasure, his games are said to be really good, and he deserves better. (Oh, on the topic of his games, the only one I've played is Brothers; and that was great!)

Take Two are currently setting themselves as evil puppetmasters hiding behind an antiquated US trademark office to amplify threats at everyone and anyone and it's pathetic. Is this the purpose of trademark law then? To allow grotesque slugs like Take Two to lazily terrorise small business owners with numerous tinfoil claims? It would seem so, given that most effected are being forced to give up their own protections or face an inevitably costly lawsuit against Take-Two's likely stacked legal team, it's a lose lose. There's no real silver lining to take away from this, no 'well at least this might make things better eventually', it's just a real shame for all involved and a deserved mark of shame on Take Two's already spotty reputation. Justice for Josef!