A popular Tekken mod website recently received a cease-and-desist letter from Bandai Namco, accusing it of trademark infringement. However, the website’s administrator denies any wrongdoing.
Programmer and TekkenMods.com administrator Dennis Stanistan revealed the site recently received an infringement notice from Bandai Namco. The email from Bandai Namco states that the website uses trademarked visuals and logos without prior approval. “By doing so,” it accuses, “you intentionally seek to attract Internet users to your website. This unauthorized use of Bandai/Namco’s intellectual property falsely suggests Bandai/Namco’s sponsorship or enforcement of your website.”
Insinuatingly, it does not demand the site’s shutdown. Nor is Tekken’s publisher demanding the complete removal of all copyrighted material. Instead, it specifically demands the removal of copyrighted material from the page hosting a “Reina Devil Form” mod.
As TekkenMods in its official response, the mod’s creator deleted it from the website. However, Stanistan denies doing anything illegal, writing, “Acknowledgement of your complaint is not an admission of any wrongdoing.”
The site administrator also pointed out that the page clearly states it is not affiliated with Bandai Namco. This, Stanistan explains, was specifically done to avoid confusion about whether TekkenMods carries any official endorsement. “Furthermore,” he writes, “the alleged ‘infringing’ elements are used in the context of fan-based content creation which aims to celebrate and promote the Tekken franchise rather than infringe upon or compete with it.”
