TheNintendo eShophas been experiencing a sad trend. With constant copycat titles and AI, Nintendo’s online services have been overflowing with plagiarized, repackaged games intended to makedeceitful publishersa quick buck.
This is all the more disheartening to hear directly from an indie developer. In alengthy Reddit post, the solo indie developerSteelkrill announced that their gameThe Backrooms 1998, which just recently was fully released on Steam and all other major platforms, has been illegally copied and republished.
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Luckily, the scam game, titled Backrooms Horror Escape, was removed from the Xbox and PlayStation digital storefronts. Still, rather surprisingly,it has remained available for purchase on the Nintendo eShop, maintainingNintendo’s reputationfor slow decision-making.
If you’re still unsure whether this game truly is an “exact 1:1 copy” like Steelkrill describes, below are a few of the most damagingcomparison imagesamong many others they have posted on Imgur.
The Backrooms 1998’s copycat game,Backrooms Horror Escape,was developed and published by COOL DEVS S.R.L, a publisher of many otherfishy-lookingscam titles that utilize AI assets and cover art.
One of their latest scams,TCG Empire: Card Shop Simulator,takes clear inspiration from thePokémon Franchiseandthe recent hitTCG Card Shop Simulator. That means they made a precise copy of another game intended to copy another jokingly.
While on the surface, it may only appear as tho COOL DEVS S.R.L is solely publishing in-house reproductions,by Steelkrill’s account, they somehow ripped a lot of their custom assets and designs right from their game.
They stole the whole game as it is alongside the music, sounds, voice lines and everything else. They only changed the monster and the picture on the frame.
Stealing property to this degree isn’t onlyjoking plagiarismbut outright theft, asit means COOl DEVS S.R.L is directly attempting to make money from someone else’s work.
We don’t intend to make any heavy accusations, but given how their other games, such as the previously mentionedTCG Card Shop Simulator, look like other low-budget titles, Steelkrill may not be the only person whose work was stolen.
The Issue Behind Nintendo’s Inaction
While having your work stolen must be a complete slap in the face,Nintendo’s inaction to remove the stolen game is what makes this situation even more troubling.
Following both PlayStation and Xbox’s immediate removal, this should have been a clear sign for Nintendo. But sadly, according to Steelkrill in astatement to nintendolife, they’re still taking time to process the request.
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It’s a sad case of mismanagement, which, at this point, rests solely in the hands of Nintendo.According to Steelkrill, “platform holders need to enforce stronger guidelines on the kind of games that get accepted and also [get] better refund and reporting systems.”
Nintendo claims to be “looking into it”, but it’s blatantly clear as daylight that the game was stolen, most probably using a program to download all the scenes and assets. It’s an exact 1:1 copy of my game, covered with poorly generated AI assets, and released to mislead players into believing it’s the real thing.
While some may argue that inaction is appropriate, as it allows each company to ensureblatant misusesof report systems don’t lead to innocent titles being taken down, we need to recognize there’s still an issue since “scammers continue exploiting these loopholes.”
With Nintendo’s history ofweird legal decision-making, it’s sad to see yet another case of their mismanagement, especially one that troubles an independent solo developer.
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