This week, developer on The Sinking City, Frogwares, claims that the game's publisher, Nacon, illegally hacked a copy of their game and uploaded it to Steam. Shortly thereafter, Frogwares issued a DMCA takedown notice against its own game to get it removed from Steam. This was just the latest move in the ongoing battle between developer and publisher that began back in April of 2020.
In response to the DMCA takedown notice and claims against them of piracy and hacking of the game that they once published, Nacon says that they were totally in the right to put the game up on Steam.
NACON is contractually the sole exclusive distributor of The Sinking City game on STEAM.
NACON has contributed to the financing of development and the payment of royalties to FROGWARES to the tune of 8.9 million euros to date (including the full payment for a version of the game for STEAM), making the global investment far above 10 million euros when integrating the marketing costs. Contrary to FROGWARES’ allegations, NACON has paid all amounts due.
Today, unless FROGWARES is acting in bad faith, it has no reason not to make the game available to NACON on STEAM.
In the past, FROGWARES has improperly relied on accusations regarding a lack of payment to refuse delivery of the game on STEAM, at which point they tried to unsuccessfully terminate the contract. The Paris Court of Appeal deemed this action “manifestly unlawfulâ€; ordering the continuation of the contract and encouraging FROGWARES to refrain “from any action which would impede such continuationâ€.
In line with the courts’ decision, NACON has repeatedly and unsuccessfully requested that FROGWARES make the game available on STEAM, failing which it would apply a clause in the contract wherein such a case, the game would be adapted by a third party. FROGWARES then attempted, without the knowledge of NACON and in violation of our rights, to make the game available on STEAM without mentioning NACON in its capacity as the publisher. This is, therefore clear proof that no technical impossibility prevents the game from being put back on STEAM.
NACON has contributed to the financing of development and the payment of royalties to FROGWARES to the tune of 8.9 million euros to date (including the full payment for a version of the game for STEAM), making the global investment far above 10 million euros when integrating the marketing costs. Contrary to FROGWARES’ allegations, NACON has paid all amounts due.
Today, unless FROGWARES is acting in bad faith, it has no reason not to make the game available to NACON on STEAM.
In the past, FROGWARES has improperly relied on accusations regarding a lack of payment to refuse delivery of the game on STEAM, at which point they tried to unsuccessfully terminate the contract. The Paris Court of Appeal deemed this action “manifestly unlawfulâ€; ordering the continuation of the contract and encouraging FROGWARES to refrain “from any action which would impede such continuationâ€.
In line with the courts’ decision, NACON has repeatedly and unsuccessfully requested that FROGWARES make the game available on STEAM, failing which it would apply a clause in the contract wherein such a case, the game would be adapted by a third party. FROGWARES then attempted, without the knowledge of NACON and in violation of our rights, to make the game available on STEAM without mentioning NACON in its capacity as the publisher. This is, therefore clear proof that no technical impossibility prevents the game from being put back on STEAM.
As it stands right now, The Sinking City is not available through Steam. If you would like to pick up the game while supporting the actual developer, Frogwares, you can do so through Gamesplanet (via the Frogwares Store), Origin, or through the PlayStation Store on the PlayStation 5. Apart from those locations sales of the game may not go towards Frogwares.
