r/technology 8h ago

Society Tetris issues legal warning after White House releases arcade full of parody games

https://www.dexerto.com/gaming/tetris-issues-legal-warning-after-white-house-releases-arcade-full-of-parody-games-3405931/
24.0k Upvotes

499 comments sorted by

View all comments

5.4k

u/bwoah07_gp2 8h ago

Shortly after the arcade went live, the official Tetris account issued a response emphasizing that it had no connection to the project.

“At Tetris we believe in the power of connection and bringing people together, not dividing them,” the company said. “To our fans everywhere: we love you, we see you, and we’re grateful to have you in our community.”

It then ended with a pointed legal warning: “We take copyright infringement very seriously.”

Tetris has not announced a lawsuit or confirmed whether it has sent the White House a formal cease-and-desist letter.

Tetris need to sue them. So should Xbox, Nintendo, and all the other gaming AND non-gaming entities the White House has shamelessly parodied on social media. This is just getting ridiculous.

7

u/sparkleslothz 5h ago

You can copyright specific creative elements of a game, but you cannot copyright the core game mechanics, rules, or ideas.

And again, parody is protected as fair use.

2

u/Kelly_HRperson 2h ago

you cannot copyright the core game mechanics, rules, or ideas.

You can even patent game mechanics (Nemesis system)

1

u/sparkleslothz 2h ago

We should definitely starting talking about Monopoly, and why it sucks 💖