Film production company Stellarblade is suing the makers of PlayStation 5 action game Stellar Blade over its name.
A film production company in the US is suing the makers of action-adventure videogame Stellar Blade, alleging that its name amounts to trademark infringement. The company’s owner, Griffith Chambers Mehaffey, argues that his Louisiana-based firm, called Stellarblade LLC, has been damaged by the similarly-named game, which has “effectively monopolised online search results.”
Developed by South Korean developer Shift Up and released on the PlayStation 5 in April 2024, Stellar Blade was a sizeable hit, selling over a million copies in its first month on sale. Since then, Mehaffey’s lawsuit alleges, Stellarblade (the production company) as been pushed “into digital obscurity […] threatening the livelihood he’s built over more than a decade.”
The lawsuit came to light thanks to IGN, which reports that Mehaffey has owned the stellarblade.com domain name since 2006, before setting the production company itself up in 2010. The founder’s lawyers argue that the Stellar Blade game logo is “confusingly similar” to the US firm’s, and has demanded that Sony and Shift Up not only cease using it, but also “hand over all materials” to Stellarblade (the production company) so that they can be destroyed.
Stellar Blade (the game) was initially announced as Project Eve in 2019, and was rechristened Stellar Blade in 2022. IGN reports that Mehaffey then registered the Stellarblade trademark in June 2023, before issuing a cease and desist letter to Shift Up. In a statement provided to IGN, Mehaffey’s lawyer writes, “Given this long-standing and public use, it’s difficult to imagine that Shift Up and Sony were unaware of Mr Mehaffey’s established rights before adopting their identical mark.”
Whether the two trademarks are truly identical, and the merits of the suit in general, will be up to a Louisiana court to decide.
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