Early access to a game is not an asset you can “un-receive” just because you purchase your own copy later. Of course, you could make arguments against the terms being overreaching in court, but not many creators have the resources or desire for a legal fight.
Other creators chimed in and said that they brought up the section in Discord and legal said they’d look into it. To me, this just seems as lazy copy and paste that they were warned about but did nothing about. Now they have a possible PR disaster on their hands unless they take swift action.
PS: Apparently section 2.6 is way worse but it hasn’t been shared yet.
What makes you think that? The language is fairly boiler plate and easily enforceable. We, “the company”, give you, “the creator”, an asset, “a free game copy”, under the condition that you promise not to do or say anything that could diminish the value of the asset. Not only is it enforceable, it leaves room for compensatory damages if you are found in breach of contract.
The problem is that unless the agreement explicitly states that the non-disparagment section applies only to the test playtest, the agreement would essentially place a gag order on that creator for the life of the game.
Nobody better talk shit about Crate thanks to headlines like this that don’t clarify until you are 2/3 of the way down the article. Crate and Larian restored my faith in game development.
There are very few companies that are able to reach my only if used or stolen classification. Nintendo has managed to reach the not even if used or stolen classification.
NES releases don’t bother me because I was still a kid when I played them. Things released twenty years ago bother me because it seems like yesterday given that I was already an adult with an established career and a mortgage.
The real story here is that the servers are being shut down. Games like these deserve to have the ability to run their own third party servers. To this day I can still log unto a number of Unreal Tournament (1999) community servers and frag until my eyes bleed.