Roam creator Ryan Sharr has retracted claims that 505 Games latest publishing effort How to Survive has ripped off his Kickstarter project, and has published an explanation on the campaign page. Read it here.
It follows Sharr’s original post, calling 505 Games out for allegedly copying his game’s concept.
Sharr was originally offered a publishing deal under 505 Games, but he turned it down. Shortly after, How to Survive was revealed and the developer noticed several similarities between his project and the new title. However, How to Survive was in development before the reveal under the name ‘Monster Island.’ it apparently pre-dates Roam.
Over on Kickstarter, Sharr’s apology reads:
So, after this thing has blown up so big it’s been brought to my attention that on a French website “How to Survive” had existed under a different name, “Monster Island”. A title being developed in France. 505 games picked up “Monster Island” and renamed it to “How to Survive”. I scoured the net to find the development history behind “How to Survive” and I couldn’t find anything of it besides it being announced by 505 out of the blue in May, months after our Kickstarter campaign had ended. I don’t speak French, but I did try my best to do my homework before posting a statement.
In my mind during the chain of events: 505games contacted Roam about publishing, Roam declined, 505games went and found someone to make “Roam”.
What might’ve actually happened: 505games contacted Roam about publishing, Roam declined, so 505games went to Ekosoft and picked up their “Monster Island”. This is fair.
I don’t think anyone else would have reacted any differently about something they are so passionate about given the circumstances. I apologize to 505 and Ekosoft for causing a scene. I’ve put so much of my life the last year and a half into making this game so it was frustrating to think someone could have just swept in a taken it, but that wasn’t the case. Ekosoft actually had a game in development that had an extremely similar concept to Roam that I had no knowledge of before or even after the Kickstarter, until “How to Survive” was released
This incident is personally the craziest coincidence I have ever experienced.
It was my mistake by making the Kickstarter post not private, and it was my mistake to post something like this on the internet not thinking about the impact of viral media. Hopefully everyone can move on from this.
What do you make of the above? Let us know below.
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