The ongoing saga surrounding the upcoming RPG Dark and darker continues as developer Ironmace turned to torrents for playtesting after being banned from Steam.
It all started in March when the police raided the Korean developer’s office due to allegations by the publisher Nexon that the studio founded by ex-employees stole assets and personnel from the company Dark and darkerand that the game closely resembled a working project under the working-title publisher P3. According to Nexon’s attorneys, this extended to “big gameplay, rules and art.” Shortly thereafter, Dark and darker was pulled from the Steam PC gaming platformand there was one short-lived GoFundMe campaign by the developers to raise money for the project. Now, without a storefront to work with, it looks like the team has turned to torrents to distribute the game for testing.
in one Post on the official Dark and darker discord (forwarded the games underreddit) the team provides instructions for those interested in participating in the latest alpha test of the fantasy role-playing game to download the client via torrents. Although the studio is based in Korea, Ironmace says it cannot conduct the playtest in the country in accordance with its game ratings regulations because the alpha playtest is being distributed through unofficial channels.
“Rest assured that we are working around the clock to ensure the continued existence of Dark and darker‘ the post says. “Unfortunately, due to the complexity of our situation, especially at international level, it takes time to resolve the Steam situation. In order to keep our promise to our fans, we had to go old school this time.”
While it’s not illegal to stream anything (piracy and torrenting are two different things that are often used interchangeably), because the practice is so often used in piracy and other forms of illegal file distribution, it’s not quite as regulated as something like Steam or the Epic Games Store. For this reason, Ironamce warns players against torrenting Dark and darker from another source, as it may contain files harmful to someone else’s computer. The team also plans to release updates about this method for the time being. It’s unorthodox, but since the project is in such a precarious position and the team doesn’t seem ready to drop the project, this is one way to bring it public.
The Dark and darker Alpha testing ends on April 19th.
