From a really old interview with Lorne Lanning:
Q: There seems to be an anti-industrialisation message within Oddworld. Does this mean Abe won't be seen advertising root beer or beauty products?
Lorne: Our licensing philosophy has one rule: don't tell us how to make content or tell our stories. By default, this counts out a lot of products and big corporations. For example, it's okay with us if M*D*****s licenses Abe...but they never will. They won't do it because they will never put a character on their burgers who is an anti-deforestation representative. M*D*****s is supporting the clear cutting of rain forests at a rapid pace, so they wouldn't touch Abe unless they could have have change the story. To which we would tell them to piss off. Our characters all have issues like this. Characters like Mario or Crash are completely consumer product friendly because they don't stand for anything. However, Abe and Munch have some serious issues.
Besides, if Oddworld struck up a deal with M*D*****s, I would leave their side and not even think about returning to fandom unless either a) they withdrew the contract before anything happened, or b) M*D*****s stopped being so malevolently evil, wicked and twisted.
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