The Sinking City from developer Frogwares has been pulled from major retailers including Steam due to a legal dispute with publisher Nacon.
In an open letter from Frogwares explaining the situation, the developer apologizes for the inconvenience and proceeds to list their grievances against publisher Nacon.
Frogwares has accused Nacon of withholding royalties, presenting incomplete sales data, and misrepresenting The Sinking City intellectual property as belonging to Nacon among other allegations.
“Since the release of The Sinking City on June 27, 2019 we’ve been involved in legal battles with BigBen Interactive/Nacon over the title. In 2017 we signed The Sinking City contract as a licensing agreement with BigBen/Nacon, 2 years after the start of production. In exchange for a financial contribution to the development, we gave them the right to sell and commercialize the game on 4 platforms – Xbox One, PS4, Steam and later, Epic Games Store. The intellectual property would still belong to Frogwares, which has always been the only producer and owner of its games, including The Sinking City.
We signed the deal on those terms and we would receive part payments for each production milestone completed. Then a share of revenue starting at the first euro or dollar. So all was well – until the collaboration started.
During production, BBI/Nacon was hundreds and hundreds of days behind in payments in total. Each sum due on average being 40 days late, while our milestones were always on time and approved by the licensee. We had to issue formal notices multiple times so that we were able to receive the money that was owed to us[…]
Given these breaches, ongoing hurdles and an unwillingness to cooperate, Frogwares last resort was to request the removal of The Sinking City from any remaining stores to at least halt any further sales going to BBI/Nacon.
Faced with this situation, we have decided to explain to you why you cannot find The Sinking City on certain platforms today.”
It’s due to Nacon’s alleged mishandling of The Sinking City intellectual property, that Frogwares has decided to remove the game.
However, Frogwares assures consumers that the game is still available through retailers they directly work with, including Gamesplanet, Nintendo, and Origin.
At the time of publishing there has been no statement from Nacon in response to these allegations.
Future updates regarding the allegations against Nacon and the status of The Sinking City will be posted here on Niche Gamer.
Image: Frogwares