Skullgirls Dev Hidden Variable Halts Work on Franchise Over Authorized Dispute Avid gamers Area

Skullgirls developer Hidden Variable has introduced it’s going to stop all work on the franchise owing to an ongoing authorized dispute with writer Autumn Video games.

In a put up on Bluesky (noticed by ResetEra consumer dgamemaster), Hidden Variable says it’s “not concerned” in growing any Skullgirls recreation, together with Skullgirls 2nd Encore, Skullgirls Cellular, and “different Skullgirls IP-related efforts”.

The studio says it is in the course of a dispute with Autumn Video games which has been escalated to “litigation filed within the Los Angeles County Superior Courtroom”, and that it will not be offering additional touch upon the matter till stated difficulty is resolved.

Though Hidden Variable says it will not be commenting on the matter, dgamemaster sought out the authorized doc filed by the studio, and it seems to be as if the dispute comes right down to missed funds.

Particularly, Hidden Variable seems to be alleging that Autumn Video games did not pay it a variety of occasions between November and now, with funds amounting to $1.23m because of Hidden Variable on Autumn Video games’ behalf.

The developer says Autumn’s actions had been intentional, and that the writer was desiring to discover a new developer for the Skullgirls video games after it “unsuccessfully sought to promote its enterprise”. Ouch.

In line with dgamemaster’s put up, Autumn Video games has stated that it intends to proceed updating Skullgirls regardless of the dispute, but it surely hasn’t specified which of the video games it is going to be updating, nor when new updates will likely be made out there.

This is not the primary time Skullgirls has run right into a spot of trouble. Again in 2020, Autumn Video games kicked authentic developer Lab Zero off the IP following allegations made in opposition to that studio’s head Mike Zaimont.

Following these allegations, Zaimont subsequently laid off all remaining Lab Zero staff, with former workers happening to create a brand new studio by the identify of Future Membership. That studio would then work on Skullgirls DLC, thus finishing the cycle.

The way forward for the Skullgirls franchise is at present unclear, though it seems like Autumn Video games intends to proceed engaged on no less than one of many video games within the collection. Keep tuned for extra.