The
Madden franchise, long been the crown jewel in the EA sports arsenal, seems to be coming under attack more frequently. In the recent past, Jim Brown sued (unsuccessfully, and is
appealing the decision) EA for using his likeness without permission. Also, earlier this year the
NFL was hammered by the U.S. Supreme Court in the American Needle case, which dealt with exclusive licensing agreements that the league has signed (which would cover the NFL/EA agreement for the Madden franchise to be the exclusive NFL endorsed game)
The
latest lawsuit involves former Tampa Bay Buccaneers player Tony Davis filing a lawsuit seeking class-action status against EA on behalf of himself and 6,000 former players. The suit alleges that EA used their likeness without consent when compiling the rosters of classic NFL teams and that EA changed the numbers and a few other details of the players on those classic teams in order to not have to pay them.
Again, this will be interesting to watch as all these cases will be creating plenty of opportunity for a company like Take-Two to jump into the lawsuit arena and try to open that door to create and officially licensed NFL title again.
