The Shenmue 3 trademark which popped up this week has turned out to be a hoax, according to CVG. The application was filed with the Office of Harmonization for the Internal Market (OHIM), and after being examined by officials it was discarded. The OHIM discarded the Fallout 4 trademark filed last week, as it did with the Half-Life 3 application in October.

A spokesperson for OHIM would not comment on individual cases, but showed documents to CVG describing how anyone could file a trademark, which mean even fakes will be visible online for a short period of time.

The trademarks will show as unverified until OHIM ticks the “classification examination” box in the listing.

Sega cancelled the Shenmue series in 2003, citing low sales.

Fallout 4 – in some form at any rate – is probably sitting on Todd Howard’s desk at the moment, but other than dodgy looking teaser sites, Bethesda will not comment on the matter.

Half-Life 3 is just non-existent as far as we are aware, despite rumors of its development popping up every blue moon.