Dark and Darker was a real surprise hit on Steam when serious allegations from a competitor led to its removal from the platform. Now there is a first victory for the dungeon crawler.
What is Dark and Darker?
- Dark and Darker is a dungeon crawler with a PvP focus set in a medieval fantasy setting. In addition to magic and sorcery, you can use swords and shields as well as ranged weapons like a crossbow.
- The gameplay of Dark and Darker is reminiscent of extraction shooters like Escape from Tarkov – but without the shooting. Within a match, you fight in teams of three for loot. If you die in an ongoing round, you lose your loot.
- The dungeon crawler had already conducted some playtests on Steam that excited thousands of players.
- On August 7, 2023, Dark and Darker started early access, but not on Steam. It is still absent due to serious allegations from Nexon.
Dark and Darker celebrates a small success in the dispute with Nexon
What are the allegations? On March 25, 2023, Ironmace, the developer studio behind Dark and Darker, announced on the game’s Discord server that they are battling a cease and desist and a DMCA notice from the South Korean developer studio and publisher Nexon.
Nexon accuses Ironmace of stealing the idea and using parts of the code and assets that belong to Nexon. In early March, a police raid occurred at Ironmace’s office.
What success have the developers celebrated now? On the game’s Discord server, the developer “sdf” provided a brief update on the legal dispute in Korean. He writes that the “preliminary injunction for violation of trade secrets and copyrights” submitted by Nexon was dismissed by the court.
Furthermore, the court decided according to the developer that Dark and Darker should not be shut down based on the evidence provided by Nexon:
Dear players,
yesterday the preliminary injunction from Nexon against Ironmace for violation of trade secrets and copyrights was dismissed.
The court decided that ‘the game by Ironmace cannot be considered a violation of Nexon’s copyright or trade secrets’ and thus dismissed the claims and suspicion that Dark & Darker was developed using Nexon’s trade secrets and in violation of copyright. That was not the case. Moreover, the court decided that the service of Dark & Darker should not be shut down solely based on Nexon’s claims and evidence.
Ironmace developer “sdf” via Discord
What happens next? That is unclear, as there are not only good news for Dark and Darker in the announcement on Discord. The Ironmace developer also speaks about an unspecified “court decision regarding unfair competition”.
It is also not known when and if Dark and Darker will be available on Steam again. We will just have to wait until we receive more precise information on this matter.
For Ironmace, it would certainly be good if the dungeon crawler could soon be back on Steam, as more and more games want to fill the empty space left by Dark and Darker on the platform: New game on Steam could take the place of the banned Dark & Darker – not only criticism for similarity
