Rockstar files new Bully trademark in Europe

It looks like Rockstar is gearing up for a sequel to one of its most celebrated games—Bully. Spotted by Junkie Monkeys, the company seems to have filed for a trademark for the name Bully Bullworth Academy: Canis Canem Edit in Europe. For the curious, Canis Canem Edit is Latin for “dog eats dog.” There was a similar trademark filing in the US back in July where Rockstar's parent company Take-Two updated its existing Bully trademark.

This could point to a number of possibilities, and our favourite among these is the idea that Rockstar might be working on a new Bully game for next-gen consoles. Going by the company's track record for the last couple of years, however, we wouldn't be surprised to see a simple port of the game to mobile devices too. Back in November, 2011, Rockstar's Dan Houser had talked about the studio's philosophy of not rushing sequels to games. Keeping that in mind, it has been almost eight years since Bully was first released on the PS2, and Rockstar might be working on a sequel.

The best reason to get a next-gen console

After being released on the PlayStation 2 to critical acclaim, Bully was then ported on to Xbox 360 and PC. It revolves around James Hopkins—a 15-year-old boy with a dodgy past—who is dropped off at a "prestigious" school in New England, Bullworth Academy. In reality, Bullworth Academy is actually the worst school in America, with a reputation for attracting the worst students in the country, and it is the last stop for Hopkins before he is sent to Juvenile Hall, owing to his checkered past involving vandalism, violence and vulgarity, among other things.

Players discover that the school is in a constant state of turmoil because of the feuding cliques: the Bullies, the Nerds, the Preppies, the Greasers and the Jocks. Headmaster of the school, Dr Crabblesnitch, ignores all of the bullying that goes on, and insists on calling it "school spirit". Hopkins has to pacify the situation so that he doesn't end up in jail.