GW legal threat forces War Banner into a name change

[panzerkaput 34066xp 4]

Al that matters is everyone still supports War Banner or rather Dark Peak Game. They have two amazing games in Gangs of Rome and Mortal Gods and are supporting Test of Honour 2 and other games too.

Whether or not GW have the right is not important, they have the will and the backing and have done it.

I feel for Andy Hobday and Mark Farr the owners but I sure that they will rise as they always have and forge on again.

 

[huscarle 4559xp 6]

Well that’s brought clarity to a very confusing situation I found myself in. I now know why my local GW despite my frequent requests refuses to stock Dark age ranges let alone Ancient Greeks and Samurai.

I strongly suspect I am the one and only Wargamer on the planet who confused the two companies but now thanks to the boys in the legal dept I will be saved from any further embarrassment while out shopping.

I can still call myself a Wargamer ? as it sounds like a cross between Warhammer and Games workshop.

[zoidpinhead 12717xp 2]

@huscarle  Bravo!  That is quite literally all the LOLs. 😀

[elessar2590 18221xp 5]

This is why I have zero issue with people who sell recast GW. They want to be the big bad Lawyer wielding jerks of the industry have  taste of your own medicine and go root them out of China. You can’t act like a Jerk then expect people to deal with you like you were just some company getting their IP stolen by evil recasters.

This is Law-Fare 101. They could win this case but it would destroy them to fight it so GW gets to be a Jackbooted Tyrant and bully everyone.

In the Digital Age where most of the time we’ll see a Companies name Written or abbreviated does “It sounds the same” even matter? Especially with all the accents and languages out there. The only thing Copyright should protect is direct copies and things that are essentially direct copies (Note SHOULD not does).

eg/ Warhanner, Beasts on War, Bookface, FMail.

On the plus side I did find these when I Googled this so Warbanner is going to get some Cash from me. Apparently there’s a Game coming out as well which will go straight on the “To buy” list.

https://www.kingshobbiesandgames.com/28mm-Timstarter-Rogers-Rangers-p/28mtirr.htm

[theamazingmrg 2853xp 0]

I was already in the “GW wasn’t getting any of my money except for the occasional paint pot” camp and always thought people were a bit too quick to get behind the “new, customer-friendly” GW.  This news just convinces me I made the right choice.

[wesadie1969 2729xp 0]

They are customer friendly, just watch out if you are a wargames company.

[limburger 22092xp 4]

GW does what any other business of sufficient size has to do : sent in the lawyers to clear out anyone and anything infringing on their IP. War banner would be doing the exact same thing if they were the big dog and GW was the annoying pest that was entering their turf.

I seriously doubt this would be winnable for War banner even if they had the resources to compete against GW.

Apple Corps vs Apple Computer :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_Corps_v_Apple_Computer

Different fields of industry and they still managed to cause legal trouble the moment Apple decided to publish music …

Then there’s this :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Confusing_similarity

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Counteraction_principle

Jumping on the ‘I hate GW’ train is easy, but we still don’t know the exact wording of the letter that GW sent to these guys.

Dark peak Games is a heck of an improvement over war hammer *eh* banner.

The law is the law. Whether or not that ‘sounds alike’ matters in the digital era is not relevant, because the law says it matters.
You want things changed ?
Then vote for the people who do want to change these types of aspects of current laws.
Sad news is that with the exception of the Pirate party the vast majority will vote in favour of big business.
(as was recently proven by the Article 13 in the EU)

[frankelee 1475xp 0]

Don’t live in the UK, so I don’t know how the law sides there, in America War Banner would have been fine ignoring the C&D. Personally I think GW should cool it on the legal bullying, there didn’t seem to be any legitimate case of brand confusion or dilution here, it’s purely throwing their weight around.

[phaidknott 7250xp 2]

Personally I think Andy should have changed the name to “War Hamster” (if he had the money to throw away). Purely so he could frame the legal letter from GW on the second attempt on the office wall.

I still liked Footsore as a name, perhaps they should have reverted to that (although War Banner was supposed to encompass all the different product lines, not just the Footsore range that initially formed the core of the business). It’s that now Andy and co have to spend a lot of money on the rebrand, redoing all the packaging et etc (not just the legal cost of changing the company name).

I DO however still have this naïve concept that companies shouldn’t be able to claim words in the English Dictionary as theirs. War Banner was used far, far long before it ever featured in a GW publication (as did the word Warhammer). A company logo is usually a mixture of the word, colours used and font etc (this is them copyrighted). Alas these days it seems we can’t even have the English language as “open source”. I wonder if we’ll need to change the name of the hobby from “War Gaming” to “Miniature Gaming” at some point in the future 😀

Still I wonder if “War Hamster” is available, Anne?

 

[zeker1966 1633xp 0]

Even New York City Transit Authority (the MTA) has filed C&D’s to prevent people from using their symbols. Basically colored dots with letters or numbers in them.

[Anonymous]

In good news, North Star have sold out of Mortal Gods and War Banner only have a few left in stock!  Seems to be popular.

[torros 23839xp 0]

On a facebook 10mm group someone was saying that this company got another C&D over the Dark Peak name. It was said it was from a mobile phone games company

[Anonymous]

@torros yes, I read that yesterday as well, from a company called Peak Gaming.

[blipvertus 12578xp 1]

Yep, they’ve temporarily labeled themselves as DPG: Footsore until they sort it out.

Im thinking the next move is No Name Games. Or Cease and Desist Games.

[zoidpinhead 12717xp 0]

These guys just can’t catch a break.  Perhaps their Google-fu should have been a bit stronger though.  Having got into issues with one name it seems a bit careless the run up against another C&D quite so quickly.

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