So things were going well for Shaw and “The Store is Closed” – until the end of October, a letter from IKEA lawyers fluttered into the house. In the letter, the lawyers accused him of infringing on trademark rights. Accordingly, the furniture store is too similar to the furniture giant IKEA in the game with its blue facades and yellow signs and must therefore be changed.
“It was very stressful and both I and my fans are angry because we want the game to be true to the original idea,” Shaw told Swedish news site SVT.
Despite his anger, however, he definitely does not want to mess with the large furniture company, which made sales of around 4.9 billion euros last year. “There is no way I would survive any form of lawsuit, so I have no choice but to bow to the claim,” Shaw said. He just wanted to get out of the matter “unharmed”.