Tattoo studio Solid Oak Sketches are commencing legal action against Take-Two Interactive after copyrighted designs were used in NBA 2K16.
The issue stems from the depictions of tattooed basketball players such as LeBron James in the game, which feature artwork that was designed and copyrighted by Solid Oak Sketches.
2K and developer Visual Concepts allegedly went ahead and created replications of the art without permission from the tattooists, who wanted to license the use of the artwork to 2K for the sum of $1.1 million.
2K didn’t take Solid Oak Sketches up on the offer but went ahead anyway and featured players in the game that sported those copyrighted tattoo designs.
"After various requests for documentation, the Defendants [Take-Two] ultimately terminated negotiations and continued with the production of their intentionally infringing basketball video games," reads a legal document uncovered by ESPN.
This isn’t the first case of its kind. THQ were sued successfully by artist Chris Escobedo after it featured a copyrighted lion tattoo on fighter Carlos Condit in UFC Undisputed 3.
Publisher Electronic Arts did the wise thing by side-stepping any possible legal action by omitting Conduit’s tattoo altogether in EA Sports UFC in 2014.
Maybe 2K should have followed suit.