Last Guardian Trademark Abandoned, Game Not Cancelled?

News
By Catherine Cai
published

The Last Guardian's trademark has been abandoned, but that doesn't mean the game is cancelled.

If Team Ico's past work is any proof of quality (Ico and Shadow of the Colossus), The Last Guardian will be a work of art.

Unfortunately, it's a work of art that has been long overdue. Originally revealed in 2009, The Last Guardian was expected to be released in 2011.

Two key departures (although designer Fumito Ueda has agreed to stay on until the end of the project) and no new announcements are worrying signs about whether The Last Guardian will ever see the light of day.

Recently, it's come to light that The Last Guardian trademark has been cancelled. There's no need to panic just yet, as it doesn't mean that the project has been cancelled. Rather, Sony's allowed the trademark of the game to expire, without renewing it.

Sony has up to three years since it received the Notice of Allowance—back in January 2010—to renew the trademark, which will be January 2013. Since The Last Guardian is unlikely to make that time, the trademark expired and someone at Sony just neglected to file for an extension.

For now, don't worry just yet about The Last Guardian being cancelled. Sony has plenty of time to file for an extension to keep the trademark.

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Catherine Cai
21 Comments Comment from the forums
  • Pennanen
    That game is going to flop like duke nukem forever.
    Reply
  • alidan
    PennanenThat game is going to flop like duke nukem forever.it wont flop. what i know is that it hasnt changed development studios yet, and the two games before it.

    will it live up to hype... no
    will it be a pieced together zombie of a game that only went to market because someone put everything to gether? no
    Reply
  • DRosencraft
    To compare this game to Duke Nukem is just completely off base. Duke Nukem was always a cheesy title that just happened to have a large cult following that wanted a sequel and was extremely over-hyped despite few insights into what the game would be like. Not to mention the extremely long time it took between games. It is always troubling when a dev can't meet their own production goals, but we are far from this being a Duke Nukem Forever scenario. Even if Last Guardian comes out next year, that's just a mere 18-24 month departure from its original scheduled release. That is a long time, but it's far from unusual in the gaming industry, particularly for a game that is supposed to have so much going on in it.
    Reply
  • NuclearShadow
    Hopefully with this news being released it will force those involved in the project to make things a little more clear on whats happening.


    PennanenThat game is going to flop like duke nukem forever.
    Not sure if trolling or just stupid?
    Reply
  • bryonhowley
    PennanenThat game is going to flop like duke nukem Forever.Well that is just YOUR opinion not everyone thought Duke Nukem Forever was a flop in the first place and to just assume it will be a flop without any info one way or a another is just wrong.

    As for Duke Nukem Forever I really enjoyed the game and thought it was well worth the money and I did pre-order the game. No game will please every one it just is not possible but some it seems will never be happy with any game.
    Reply
  • mazty
    This will either never see the light of day, or if it comes out on the PS3, it'll be like GT5; average in every department due to it being stuck in development for far too long. You can't have a game stuck in dev for so long as expectations of the industry increase every year.
    Reply
  • mazty
    bryonhowleyWell that is just YOUR opinion not everyone thought Duke Nukem Forever was a flop in the first place and to just assume it will be a flop without any info one way or a another is just wrong. As for Duke Nukem Forever I really enjoyed the game and thought it was well worth the money and I did pre-order the game. No game will please every one it just is not possible but some it seems will never be happy with any game.DN: Forever was a terrible game. What you are saying is that you were going to like the game regardless of its contents as you pre-ordered it. Last Guardian won't be as bad, but don't try to claim DN:F was any good - it was bad in every way, from the graphics, to the infantile script.
    Reply
  • palladin9479
    We'll see how this game goes, I rarely believe any hype.

    As for DN, it is EXACTLY what it was meant to be, an homage to the original Duke3D. That includes all the crass off base jokes and perverted juvenile thinking. Anyone who bought it not understanding that was in for a rude shock. I really thought the reviewers were just reviewing the jokes and not the game itself. The controls were good, the levels a mix of shooting and platforming and as a total was mildly challenging. Overall it was exactly what it was meant to be, a cheesy off base fictional FPS loaded with sexist and insulting jokes. I even went back and played the original Duke3D just to be sure I wasn't remembering things wrong, and nope the original had just as many bad jokes and sexist content.
    Reply
  • mazty
    palladin9479We'll see how this game goes, I rarely believe any hype.As for DN, it is EXACTLY what it was meant to be, an homage to the original Duke3D. That includes all the crass off base jokes and perverted juvenile thinking. Anyone who bought it not understanding that was in for a rude shock. I really thought the reviewers were just reviewing the jokes and not the game itself. The controls were good, the levels a mix of shooting and platforming and as a total was mildly challenging. Overall it was exactly what it was meant to be, a cheesy off base fictional FPS loaded with sexist and insulting jokes. I even went back and played the original Duke3D just to be sure I wasn't remembering things wrong, and nope the original had just as many bad jokes and sexist content.
    D3D was actually good. DNF wasn't. It was a confused blend of trends, poorly executed humour, tied memes and bad graphics. It was a terrible came and only people who can't admit a poor purchase will say otherwise.
    Reply
  • palladin9479
    9390041 said:
    D3D was actually good. DNF wasn't. It was a confused blend of trends, poorly executed humour, tied memes and bad graphics. It was a terrible came and only people who can't admit a poor purchase will say otherwise.

    Like many of the people who played DNF their remembering D3D from a different perspective then now.

    I actually did go back and replay D3D just to be sure, and yes it's just as bad as DNF was (bad being a subjective word). The thing with D3D was that when it was released there wasn't many great FPS's, we were still running on software 3D engines with 640x480 resolutions. That is why D3D felt so great at the time. We're now criticizing DNF after having experienced much better 3D FPS games and expecting it to be some sort of great game when it's just an homage to the original D3D.
    Reply