Trump administration takes down Tetris-style anti-immigration arcade game after IP owner complaints

Photo by Tom Tang on Unsplash

After complaints from the company which owns the intellectual property (IP) behind the classic arcade game Tetris, the Trump administration has removed ‘Build the Wall,’ a Tetris-style game, from its website. 

In the Build the Wall game, which is subtitled ‘Zombie Border Siege,’ the aim is to create a barrier and stop ‘illegals’ crossing.  

The Tetris Company, the licensor for Tetris, complained about the game a week ago. It posted on its social media accounts: 

It backed it up with a statement: 

“The Tetris Company was not involved in the creation of ‘Build the Wall’ and did not authorize or license the Tetris brand or intellectual property for the game. For more than 40 years, Tetris has brought people together across generations and cultures through play and joy. The objective of the game has always been to stack with purpose to clear as many lines as possible. We are currently reviewing the matter.” 

Ironically, Tetris was developed by a Russian computer scientist, Alexey Pajitnov, in the mid-1980s; after the fall of the Iron Curtain and the Berlin Wall, he moved to America and became a US citizen.  

Several other retro-style arcade games are still available on the White House Arcade site.  

The Trump administration, and past Trump presidential campaigns, have frequently drawn criticism for using other people’s IP without seeking permission first. This used to be from music and film rights owners; more recently, however, it has been using IP from computer games, apparently to promote its anti-immigrant policies to a younger audience.  

In September, as this BBC news story reported, the Pokémon Company objected to the use of Pokémon IP in videos for the Department of Homeland Security: 

“We are aware of a recent video posted by the Department of Homeland Security that includes imagery and language associated with our brand,” Pokémon Company International said in a statement to the BBC. “Our company was not involved in the creation or distribution of this content, and permission was not granted for the use of our intellectual property.”