In order to get the game relisted, Ironmace will need to file a Counter-Notice with Dark And Darker Gold Steam, consenting to the jurisdiction of a US Federal Court and explaining under penalty of perjury why Dark and Darker was improperly flagged. Nexon will then have fourteen days to sue Ironmace in US Federal Court. If no lawsuit is filed, the game will be relisted by Steam. However, it is likely that Ironmace and Nexon will resolve these issues in a settlement agreement to avoid expensive litigation.
Dark and Darker is a competitive and popular game considered by many to be an indie gem. These moves by Nexon delisting the game from Steam as well as high profile allegations of theft from the Ironmace team means that it has a lot a stake in this fight. Ironmace by contrast needs to prevail to demonstrate the legitimacy of its project and the studio itself. While there is a lot of uncertainty right now over the future of Dark and Darker, and Ironmace on the whole, one thing is certain, the RPG and dungeon crawling community will be watching this upcoming legal battle with bated breath.Dark and Darker Devs Take Down GoFundMe for Nexon Court Battle
A GoFundMe campaign aiming to raise $500,000 to help Dark and Darker developers fight Nexon in court has been deleted.
The ongoing battle between Dark and Darker studio Ironmace and Korean publisher Nexon has had another interesting development, with a $500,000 GoFundMe campaign meant to support Dark and Darker's legal battle being deleted within an hour of its creation. Although the GoFundMe page was deleted, Ironmace doesn't appear to be giving up in its struggle against Nexon.
The legal drama between Korean studio Ironmace and Nexon can be traced back to August 2021, when a Nexon employee known as "Leader A" was caught leaking assets for a project with the working title "P3". Leader A was fired from Nexon as a consequence, and a later investigation showed that they had leaked thousands of the project's files to an external server buying Dark And Darker Gold. Soon after, members of the P3 team quit Nexon to join Ironmace in developing Dark and Darker alongside Leader A. Nexon contends that Dark and Darker has been built on stolen assets from P3, which has resulted in legal action and even a police raid on Ironmace's studio.
