The International Game Developers Association, an advocacy organization based in New Jersey, recently criticized King.com Ltd, the developer of the popular game "Candy Crush Saga," for its application to register the term "Candy" as a trademark in the U.S.

In its statement, the trade group said King.com Ltd is stretching validity in attempting to claim a common word as its own intellectual property.

"While we understand and respect the appropriate exercise of trademark rights, King's overreaching filing in its application for the Trademark for its game 'Candy Crush Saga,' and its predatory efforts to apply that mark to each separate word contained in that name, are in opposition to the values of openness and cooperation we support industry-wide," the statement read.

King.com Ltd asserted it is common practice to register a common word as a trademark, pointing to registrations for words like "Time," "Apple," "Money" and "Sun," according to Bloomberg.

"We believe in a thriving game development community, and believe that good game developers - both small and large - have every right to protect the hard work they do and the games they create," King.com Ltd asserted in its own statement.