Famed indie developer and Minecraft supremo Markus ‘Notch’ Persson has returned to work after his recent marriage ready to take on the world, including apparently US publisher Bethesda Softworks.

Persson’s company Mojang is currently being threatened with a lawsuit by the Brink publisher over Mojang’s forthcoming action card game Scrolls. Bethesda’s lawyers claim that the name could lead to confusion with their well-establised Elder Scrolls series, the latest edition of which, Skyrim, is due out in November. According to Persson, in a blog post of August 5th, “they demand us to stop using the name Scrolls… and they demand a pile of money up front before the legal process has even started.”

Since then, news on the prospective legal action has been hard to come by. It seems unlikely that Mojang will be willing to change the game’s name after much design work and investment, and trademark law demands that Bethesda actively defend its intellectual property in order to keep it. Both sides seem to be at an impasse, which may leave room for a negotiated settlement.

Something similar seems to have occurred to Persson, who posted a new blog today, challenging “three of your best warriors” to a Quake 3 deathmatch to settle the issue. “If we win, you drop the lawsuit,” he says. “If you win, we will change the name of Scrolls to something you’re fine with. Regardless of the outcome, we could still have a small text somewhere saying our game is not related to your game series in any way, if you wish.”

While this might seem a bizarre way to settle a business issue, there is precedent for cutting through complex legal issues this way. In 1992, the CEOs of two American airlines agreed to hold an arm-wrestling contest for the right to use a disputed advertising phrase, generating plenty of publicity for both companies and avoiding a costly lawsuit.

Persson signs off with a plea for Bethesda to take his request in earnest, claiming “I am serious, by the way.”

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