"Those folks came to Bethesda and said, 'We're gonna have a fun lawsuit'": Fallout New Vegas devs "got in trouble" after forgetting about trademarks for some material, says Obsidian veteran
Fallout: New Vegas developer Obsidian Entertainment ran into a spot of legal trouble over some real-world material folded into the parody-heavy RPG, according to studio and RPG veteran Chris Avellone.
Speaking with YouTuber TKs-Mantis, Avellone recalls butting heads with Bethesda over trademarked material which Obsidian evidently didn’t fully account for at the time. This particular discussion begins with a mention of Wild Wasteland, a trait that introduces a range of content and encounters that generally reference other media, from films to older Fallout games.
“We got into trouble for some of those things because it wasn’t passed along what some of the jokes were,” Avellone says. “We had the Godzilla gecko that Bethesda didn’t realize was in there. Holy crap, when they found out. ‘Oh great, now we’ll get in trouble for this.'”
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This issue apparently began with the very beginning of the game, where you’re examined by Doc Mitchell.
“We already got in trouble for the Rorschach test because we didn’t get the trademark for that, so those folks came to Bethesda and said, ‘We’re gonna have a fun lawsuit on our hands, so pony up,'” Avellone recalls. “You could hear all the groans over at Bethesda. ‘Oh my god, I don’t think they realized they should check the trademark for that.’ We certainly didn’t realize it.”
Avellone’s comments, both here and elsewhere in the lengthy interview, frame a pretty clear pattern regarding Bethesda’s feedback to the New Vegas team, with the studio allegedly giving a lecture about 30 FPS issues and presenting a whole powerpoint about “all the things Obsidian did wrong”.
Fallout: New Vegas designer says don’t hold your breath for an Oblivion-style remaster: “I don’t think Bethesda has the engineering knowhow.”
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