In brief
- The White House has released a selection of video games in an attempt at youth outreach.
- The games use copyrighted material from Sega and Xbox. One company is exploring legal options.
The company behind the long-running puzzle video game series Tetris has said that it did not give permission for the White House to use the game's iconic imagery for a controversial online arcade that the Trump administration released on Friday.
"The Tetris Company was not involved in the creation of ‘Build the Wall’ and did not authorise or license the Tetris brand or intellectual property for the game," Tetris told the Agence France-Presse (AFP) news agency in a statement.
"We are currently reviewing the matter," the statement continued.
A block-stacking game called Build the Wall included instructions to "protect the border from the coming horde."
The arcade-style games and promotional content used by the Trump administration contain images that resemble games created by Tetris and other major game developers, including Sega, Microsoft-owned Xbox and the Flappy Bird Foundation.
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"At Tetris, we believe in the power of connection and bringing people together, not dividing them," Tetris said in a social media post.
"P.P.S. We take copyright infringement very seriously," the post continued.
Promotional content posted by the White House on social media also included images that resemble trademarks and designs from Microsoft-owned Xbox.
Microsoft did not respond to requests for comment, and the Sega Corporation couldn't immediately be reached.
The White House released several games Friday, with a placeholder that teased another one "coming soon."
The web-only games, which were published on the official White House website under a new page called "arcade," sparked condemnation for racist themes and prompted questions about potential copyright violations.
In one clip, the letters from the Sega logo transform into MAGA, a term that stands for Make America Great Again, which President Trump turned into his campaign slogan during his first presidential run for the 2016 election.
A game called "Flappy Bill" features a bald eagle carrying a document in its claws that tries to avoid smashing into columns of various heights, against a background that resembles Washington DC.
"This administration is laser focused on ways to innovate and tell the story of the President's many accomplishments in a way that resonates with every American," the White House said Thursday in a statement to AFP.
Rights groups criticised the White House.
"Makes me sick. They've been playing games with people's lives for years, now they've made a video game of what they're doing," Amerika Garcia Grewal, co-director of the Frontera Federation in Eagle Pass, Texas, told AFP.
"There's no attention paid to the quality of life for human beings, both those in their game or those in real life. We who live in the borderlands are US citizens and yet are treated with suspicion and violence," she added.
The game designers "have lost touch with what it means to be human and care for others."
Trump campaigned on a promise to expel millions of undocumented migrants and has taken several actions since returning to power aimed at speeding up deportations and reducing border crossings.
His White House meanwhile has long used social media stunts to ram home its points and troll liberal opponents, and has sparked a backlash from several artists by using their music without permission.
The White House is trying to convince voters that Trump's second presidential term has been successful ahead of the midterm election in November. The balance of power in Congress will also be at stake when Americans go to the polls in just over two months.
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