Last year, Bethesda sued Minecraft developer Mojang over their upcoming title "Scrolls" due to copyright infringement, which is like Monty Python suing us for making the movie Holy Grail. At the time, Daniel Kaplan of Mojang said that they were "going to do as much as we can, since I really hate it how the big boys always get their own way".
It seems that pledge won't be fully realized. Today, Bethesda owners ZeniMax and Mjoang have reached a settlement, where ZeniMax retains all rights to the "Scrolls" trademark but Mojang will be allowed via licenese to use the "Scrolls" name for its existing Scrolls digital card game. However, Mojang will be unable to make a sequel to the card game or make any video game with the Scrolls name.
Chairman and CEO of ZeniMax Robert Altman is more than satisfied with the result:
We are pleased to have settled this matter with Mojang amicably. The Elder Scrolls is an important brand to us, and with this settlement we were able to protect our valuable property rights while allowing Mojang to release their digital card game under the name they preferred.
Of course, I still don't understand the point. No one will be confused between The Elder Scrolls and Scrolls; if you are, you deserve to be confused. All this settlement really does is sow bitterness between big corp ZeniMax (plus Bethesda by association) and the indie development community.
In future news, Mojang announces their new game, "Rolls of Papyrus".
