It’s rare, especially in this day and age, to see a genuine comeuppance play out in real time—which is why I’m savouring this particular piece of glee as I’m informed that Subnautica 2 has hit a 2 million copy milestone in just 12 hours, after selling a million copies in one.
Per a press release sent to PC Gamer, “Peak concurrent players across Steam, the Epic Games Store, and Xbox exceeded 651,000, with Steam alone reaching a peak of more than 467,000 concurrent players. This marks approximately nine times the all-time peak concurrent player count of the original Subnautica, which launched in 2018.”
A judge ordered former Unknown Worlds CEO Ted Gill be reinstated over a “material breach of contract”. Basically, Krafton has to pay the money it said it would pay, and “can—and must—act in good faith to navigate their remaining contractual relationship.”
Now, I’m no cutthroat capitalist businessman, but I do have to wonder out loud if trying to sabotage the launch of a game with a huge amount of hype around it (Subnautica 2 was the most wishlisted game on Steam for a while), spoiling one’s working relationship with the people who made it, and dragging oneself to court and being forced to admit you, a big CEO, were relying on ChatGPT for advice—if all of that is worth just paying the money you said you’d pay in a contract you signed.
I suppose it’s neither here nor there, but I will eagerly await the news of Unknown Worlds getting their payout with a deep sense of schadenfreude.
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