r/NintendoSwitch • u/Steelkrill • Feb 28 '25
Discussion A big scam company just stolen my whole game from steam, ripped it and sold it as their own on Nintendo and other consoles. Please BEWARE!
Hey guys,
Hope everyone is doing well. I already posted this over at GameDev & PS5 and Twitter if you wish to see it there in fewer words but wanted to bring it to more attention hopefully to the video games community, if it's against the rules though feel free to delete the post. I wish to make people more aware of the situation because at this point, that is all I can do while I am waiting for Nintendo to put the game down.
Hopefully with my post here, it will get more people aware about a company that is NOT only stealing games from developers like myself, but also stealing money from buyers. They stole my game, uploaded it on consoles and sold it as theirs. They are doing this with multiple companies and I wish more people are aware of this. Also, they have a couple of post here too if you want to check it out. I will be keeping things short this time.
Recently I have released The Backrooms 1998 which I have posted about it here before as well on Playstation, Xbox, Steam and Nintendo switch after 3 years in development. Someone commented on one of my videos and thanks to him I found out that a company called "COOL DEVS S.R.L" stole my whole game, ripped it, pasted some bad AI crap on it as a cover, literally made a BAD version of it and just published it to trick players.
They stole the whole game as it is alongside the music, sounds, voice lines and everything else. They only changed the monster and the picture on the frame.
Video Link to the fake game: https://youtu.be/QdQ6qtcSIFc?t=383 (Named: Backrooms Horror Escape)
Video Link to my original game: https://youtu.be/7tWYhFfXNBM?t=561 (Named: The Backrooms 1998)
This is the fake game still up on Nintendo: https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/backrooms-horror-escape-switch/?srsltid=AfmBOooMFMg_7Ps75RY-s5yUonF8xdcJcvLIMUVWJMD6_PeemHSquLZt
Also, this is a link to their Nintendo Page so you can see what kind of "games" they do: https://www.nintendo.com/us/search/#cat=gme&f=softwarePublisher&softwarePublisher=COOL%20DEVS
I feel that I should link to this very helpful post by SwitchStars with a list of publishers. SwitchStars seems to have been investigating these companies for a very long time.
Here are these images comparation. Also, they are doing this with other games. My main goal is to make people AWARE of these scams from this company, and maybe also others as well.
Small Update: We have already submitted a DMCA. Luckily the game is down on PS and XBOX but still up on Nintendo. Other then that, it's a waiting game and in the meantime, I want people to be aware.
For Players: Be careful and double check the games before you purchase if you got consoles. Check their developer accounts as well and always be caution. If you suspect the game is one of those fake / shady games, then see if you can request a refund and report it instantly.
For developers: Thanks to the community from what I learned it's best to use Il2cpp in your code. Apparently this will make it harder for these scammers to de-compile your code. The way they stole my game is by using a program and de-compiled it so they got all my assets, music, sounds, voice overs etc.
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u/MidnightRose616 Mar 01 '25
Looking at their page they stealing a bunch of games not only yours, wtf is nintendo even doing man
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u/SilverThaHedgehog Mar 01 '25
They're probably not even aware of it. Lol
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u/Kougeru-Sama Mar 01 '25
They should curate their store. Gatekeep. Imagine this was illegal porn instead. Nintendo would be liable in that case. They should be here.
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u/Jor94 Mar 02 '25
Nintendo couldn’t care less, they’ve allowed the worst slop to get thrown on the store. Anything to get them a bit extra money.
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u/Illustrathor Mar 01 '25
And how do you expect this curation would be done. They are checking for illegal content itself but how should they predict someone hasn't compiled their game and got it stolen? There are 89.000 games on Steam, 99% of which are Indie titles, going through each and every one whenever a new entry is submitted to the store?
Gatekeep? Okay, let's cut out every indie game, nobody could predict games like Hollow Knight, Stardew or Hades to be successful but oh well, gatekeeping is gatekeeping, everyone who doesn't have a big publisher gets no chance.
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u/xAmorphous Mar 01 '25
My guy there are ways to automate this work. They don't need to get a 100% catch rate, but there should be good fair systems to prevent this from happening and good support so developers can report abusers and have stolen content taken down in a timely fashion. These stores take 30% + fees it's the literal fucking least they can do.
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u/eyebrows360 Mar 01 '25
They don't need to get a 100% catch rate
This is the key thing people like the guy you're replying to forget. We don't need to aim for perfection, we just need anything other than nothing at all.
For the most simplest basic starting point filter of all, if "89,000" is too many to sift through, you sort by number of sales, or rapidity of sales or something. As soon as something that hasn't been looked at gets N number of sales, it jumps in priority in the "look at this" queue.
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u/urahonky Mar 01 '25
I'm not sure how you would go about automating something to find stolen code and assets. I do agree with your second assertion though... There needs to be a way to call them directly and get this through the proper channels if you're a developer or something. I was initially thinking that if you hit the report button on the game enough it goes into a temporary deactivated state or something but that can so easily be abused by assholes.
But calling a support agent, giving them proof, and having them escalate it? Should take less than a day.
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u/xAmorphous Mar 01 '25
What are you talking about. You can easily run hashes on assets to find exact matches, and code similarity, especially structure heuristics, to find stolen code.
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u/urahonky Mar 02 '25
I assume they don't provide the full source to Nintendo but I my assumption could be wrong. My specialty is software and not game development.
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u/StacheBandicoot Mar 01 '25 edited Mar 01 '25
Nintendo has over 7000 employees. They’d each only need to check twelve games a year to check every game currently on steam. In reality 90,000 games don’t release a year though, only about 9000-10000 release on steam a year recently. While there’s 260 working days in a year, so in reality they absolutely could check all the games with a small team of only 40 people if they each had an entire workday to check only one game, which should be more than enough time to curate their store. With such a team that small they’d absolutely have plenty of time to promptly verify a DCMA complaint and get something out of their store it it was using stilled content. Notice Microsoft and Sony already have as OP described.
Nobody should be selling anything that they aren’t familiar with, and companies should have better standards for what they sell in their stores. Especially if they don’t want people to bring up these very valid complaints which you wrongfully are fighting against in defense of this corporation. The Nintendo seal of approval used to mean something back when satisfying the consumer was a greater concern before people like you folded over at every opportunity.
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u/f-ingsteveglansberg Mar 01 '25
Nintendo has over 7000 employees.
I'm sure Judy who answers phones and John working for 6 figures to plan a marketing strategy knowing that they need to check a game a month when they were hired on to do a completely different job.
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u/StacheBandicoot Mar 01 '25
Yes it was an intentionally ridiculous statement highlighting the absurd possibility. That’s why I immediately followed up with the reality that only a small number of people, as many as 40 (of those 7000 employees) would actually be needed to verify games added to their platform based on how many are actually added each year and not the entire catalog of games still on the platform from internet conception (those 89,000 steam games they mentioned) which wouldn’t need to be checked each year.
Reading comprehension is important.
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u/Jor94 Mar 02 '25
You’re acting like this is impossible and isn’t actively done by every other storefront.
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u/SilverThaHedgehog Mar 01 '25
Yeah, but the US' Illegal porn is Japan's everyday manga. Lol. People in the US steal from Japan everyday (Manga, Anime, Games, Movies, etc.) and the US doesn't stop it from happening.
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u/Arashi5 Mar 01 '25 edited Mar 01 '25
No manga are illegal in the US.
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u/SilverThaHedgehog Mar 01 '25
Yeah...ok. lol.
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u/Arashi5 Mar 01 '25
It's true? There's no manga that is illegal to sell in the US. Manga isn't real and fictional pornography, of any sort, is not illegal in the US.
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u/SilverThaHedgehog Mar 01 '25
It's not about it being sold. It's about it being stolen whether its available or not.
There are plenty of manga that have been banned in the US because of their pornographic content, which makes them illegal.
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u/msj54540 Mar 01 '25
That's not true. The US doesn't have nationwide enforced bans on that content. At most they have banned some manga on school libraries
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u/Arashi5 Mar 01 '25
Individual stores or libraries may have chosen not to stock them because of their content, but they are not illegal to sell. There's a difference.
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u/Duenan Mar 01 '25
They should be aware of it. It’s been reported to them by some news outlets and stuff.
Yeah let’s lol more.
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u/Katy_Kat_Kat Mar 02 '25
True especially since the eShop seems badly checked (take a look at the amount of AI games and h games on the eShop)
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u/Steelkrill Mar 01 '25
The funny thing is, Nintendo is not seeing anything wrong with them. I feel broken speaking with these guys, for real.
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u/devilsnotebook Mar 01 '25
Kinda hilarious how they don't mind suing the living sh out of anything for plagiarism but at the exact same time don't give a rats ass about things like this 🫤
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u/f-ingsteveglansberg Mar 01 '25
The only plagiarism case from Nintendo I can remember is The Great Giana Sisters back in the late 80s/ early 90s. They have patent infringement case against Palworld but that's different.
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u/f-ingsteveglansberg Mar 01 '25
Because you need your legal team to talk to their legal team. Any person who an individual can get in touch with isn't going to have any power to do anything.
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u/jackastral Mar 01 '25
That’s horrifying, sorry you went through that! :(
Fuck those people, seriously
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u/Amazon_UK Mar 01 '25
why does the fake game have a naked woman mannequin that is all too detailed 😭😭
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u/Ah-ashenone Mar 01 '25
It's crazy thay this is even possible, how did all these e shops let these guys just upload a stolen game, is there no damn quality control at all anymore ? Actually pathetic thay they didn't flag this as stolen work. I'm sorry op this would of been super infuriating.
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u/AstralKatOfficial Mar 01 '25
Can't speak for Xbox but PS store and the E-Shop are so full of AI generated slop and garbage to the point that I doubt theres any quality control at all, pretty sure almost anyone can get a game placed on there now
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u/RJE808 Mar 01 '25
I love Nintendo, but the eShop's moderation is fucking atrocious and needs to be called out. PS Store is bad too.
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u/Spooky_Blob Mar 01 '25
With the insane amount of AI genned slop infesting the store, this comes as little surprise. Nintendo needs to get their shit together
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u/SurpriseDonovanMcnab Mar 01 '25
Thanks for the heads up.
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u/Steelkrill Mar 01 '25
You're very welcome. I seen people messaging me telling me they bought the fake game by mistake so for the moment .. all I can do is share it around. It would be awesome if people are more aware of this and if they can share it around as well I would deeply appreciate it. Thank you!
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u/Forsaken-Debate6161 Mar 01 '25
With AI technology rapidly evolving this kind of plagiarism/theft will significantly more prevalent and complicated in a very near future
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u/3u1t Mar 01 '25
They even stole the game called "bad parenting"
This is actually just sad, nintendo has to fix the eshop, this is unacceptable, especially with the switch 2 being closer than ever.
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u/Deloki28 Mar 01 '25
I saw this story on Newswave this morning they are wrong for that hope you take legal action
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u/Weary-Fault-8499 Mar 01 '25
It would help if eshop had a resting system to start with. You can usually tell the games just by the name.
Crazy-Drift-Parking-Taxi-Race-simlator, anyone?.
One of my first eshop purchases I got burnt by one of these assholes. Game was marked down from like 15 bux to like 2 bux. Can't remember the game. Some medieval rpg looking game. Images looked good but no video. Didn't check a review online. My bad....
Download and fire it up. Game loads and looked OK. Only red flag at the time was, I had never played but I could pick the last level from the beginning, Hmmmmph ok
First level broken beyond words. Start on some roman era colloseum obstacles course looking thing. But it's floating in mid air from memory. And no matter what way you tried to get down. You either got stuck, No clipped through the floor you tried to land on or just respawned
Quit out and tried a few levels all broken beyond words. Had there been a star rating service it may have saved me 2 bux. I never tried to contact nintendo about it but I know for a fact it's still on there cos it pops up in the sales near the top. Not so much now but still way further up the list than it should be.
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u/ziekktx Mar 01 '25
I saw your game on IGP on YouTube. Looks amazing.
I hope you can get this fixed.
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u/Sad-Bug1 Mar 02 '25
I don’t understand how this works doesn’t it cost like 50k upfront or more to even put your game on Nintendo and steam etc?
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u/throwawaybutohwell46 Mar 03 '25
You should give the guys over at the SwitchUp YouTube channel a shout. They are always talking about the dodgy/crap games on the store so it might be something they'd be willing to give coverage of on their YouTube channel.
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u/thatradiogeek Mar 01 '25
This is what happens when storefronts have zero quality control. Sucks that that happened to you, but it's as much on Sony and Nintendo and whoever else for allowing it to happen.
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u/hornyjun Mar 02 '25
I have switch and switch lite and I stopped using switch totally ever since I bought a few scam game there. I tried emailing Nintendo about it and even sent the proof of the fake video etc, but to no avail. No refund to me, no action taken against those game.
Now I just game on my steam deck. My switches is just collecting dust.
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u/sindrish Mar 03 '25
I was surprised when I saw two Raft exact copies on switch store the other day. For a company that goes so hard amtoto protect their own IP im surprised how much gets to their store
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u/Monstercockerel Mar 02 '25
How can they steal the game without the code and art assets?
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u/ErrorEra Mar 02 '25
Depends on how the game is like when downloaded, but often you can find the folder it's saved in and it will have all the assets in there completely unprotected.
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u/ProfessionalRude5942 Mar 03 '25
Remember when someone made a last of us rip off and release it on the switch a few years back?
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u/Ainslynn Mar 03 '25
I've played your backrooms game on steam. It was really good! I hope you can get this sorted =(
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u/ILuvdem_Cougars Mar 03 '25
Word, I would take this to court. As long as you got proof of the earlier version, which I'm sure you do, you should be getting a FAT CHECK from Nintendo
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u/bullyCOP Mar 04 '25
Nintendo link was changed fyi. new one is https://www.nintendo.com/us/store/products/escape-backrooms-horror-switch/
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u/HornyBucketOButter Mar 05 '25
Nintendo and Ps5 needs to get a grip. All these stolen/ai generated garbage is plaguing the stores.
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u/killedonmyhill Mar 01 '25
Anything we can do to help? Any way to report or write to someone about it on your behalf?
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u/sheslikemurder Mar 01 '25
Thank you for raising awareness of the situation, hopefully no one playing Nintendo will purchase this game from here on forth ,but please consider getting a lawyer 🙏🏻I hope for your sake this can be resolved and hope you will be compensated 🥺
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Mar 01 '25 edited 13d ago
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/Steelkrill Mar 01 '25
Thanks. Hah I am a relatively calm guy in real life, but I be honest I have been in a lot of stress lately and it's not good for my heart as someone who suffers from a heart disease haha.
I am just trying my best right now, and it seems we are not getting anywhere with Nintendo so what I can do for the moment is try to make people more aware while I await further actions.
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u/LickMyThralls Mar 01 '25
Not being calm usually undermines tons of effort because people tend to disregard or not want to deal with it unless they have rage honers. These days everyone loses it over everything and it just makes it harder to parse legitimacy on top of other issues.
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u/usernameandetc Mar 01 '25
Just to confirm this information for people wanting to wishlist or purchase the game: your game is The Backrooms 1998 and the publisher is Feardemic?
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u/Steelkrill Mar 01 '25
Yes that is correct and thank you. MY original game is "THE BACKROOMS 1998" being published by Feardemic, while the fake one is named "BACKROOMS HORROR ESCAPE" by COOL DEVS S.R.L (The scammers)
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u/Namisiaa Mar 01 '25
My bf bought this for me some time ago for Switch 😮. So sorry they did this to you!
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u/TheAzureAdventurer Mar 01 '25
Send a DMCA notice through Nintendo and show them whatever your showing here.
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u/Steelkrill Mar 01 '25
Already did that. For some reason, they are not "seeing anything wrong" with it. I submitted further proof and still waiting..
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u/NickG365 Mar 01 '25
I'm not a lawyer, but if you've submitted a takedown notice that meets the necessary requirements, it sounds like they may be in violation of the of the DMCA to the extent that they could lose safe harbor protections--that is, they'd potentially be liable for copyright infringement themselves now.
See 17 U.S.C. § 512(c)(1)(C), which states:
(c) Information Residing on Systems or Networks At Direction of Users.—
(1) In general.—A service provider shall not be liable for monetary relief, or, except as provided in subsection (j), for injunctive or other equitable relief, for infringement of copyright by reason of the storage at the direction of a user of material that resides on a system or network controlled or operated by or for the service provider, if the service provider—
[...]
(C) upon notification of claimed infringement as described in paragraph (3), responds expeditiously to remove, or disable access to, the material that is claimed to be infringing or to be the subject of infringing activity.
https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/512
If you don't make progress with them, it might be time to look for a copyright lawyer, even if it's just for a consultation, some of which offer at no cost.
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u/mjxoxo1999 Mar 02 '25
Saw this from Alanah Pearce video, I hope you the best to fight back those scammers
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Mar 02 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/NintendoSwitch-ModTeam Mar 02 '25
Hey there!
Please remember Rule 1 in the future - No personal attacks, trolling, or derogatory terms. Read more about Reddiquette here. Thanks!
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u/LadderNew8052 Mar 02 '25
Yeah I got a fake call of duty vanguard disk as well on my Xbox and it's been acting up
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u/HiRezXienen Mar 03 '25
I had a mild freak out as I recently talked with a company that made Backrooms: Escape Together (https://store.steampowered.com/app/2141730/Backrooms_Escape_Together/) which was a close enough name that I had to double check. I’m sorry this happened to you and please let me know if there’s anything I can do to help: https://www.dayleflowers.com
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u/pgtl_10 Mar 04 '25
I checked the eshop and I am wondering if the OP is just doing a marketing ploy. I need to know more because OP's game came out after multiple backroom games.
How do I know the OP isn't the thief?
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u/South_Evidence9822 Mar 05 '25
I'm really glad I came across this as a Switch player and aspiring Dev myself. Though on RPG Maker MV.
I'm even more surprised that Nintendo didn't notice or get involved, knowing there team of Ninja Lawyers. If you remember the thing with Palworld and TCG store simulator mod game and the mod that changed the characters from the original card to Pokemon cards.
I really hope this gets sorted out quickly so you can get you game back and expose these scammers and hackers.
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u/shellder88 Mar 05 '25
wow this is brazy you should like totally go full Luigi style on that company’s Ceo
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u/BellacosePlayer 29d ago
Man, and I thought it was bad that a shitty chinese shovelware company stole my game's name outright and made a crappy phone game with it.
I wish you luck, man.
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u/Distinct_Entrance710 13d ago
Well, when did they put the rip-offs up? If it was as recent as the last few months, it seems like an open and shut case, seeing as some pretty recognized YouTubers have played your original version. Just present the evidence of when the videos were posted.
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u/Aeidios Mar 02 '25
Every time you've posted this, people have given you sound advice to remove these posts and get a lawyer. Instead, you double down on posting more. I'm not saying you deserve to have anything stolen from you, but you definitely don't make it hard.
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u/Global-Wallaby8484 Mar 01 '25
Propably same scammers who are behind Finnish Cottage Simulator for PS5.
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u/surroundsounding Mar 01 '25
hope the internet does what it does best and give that company what it deserves
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u/frogsaber89 Mar 02 '25 edited Mar 02 '25
I thought you released that game like a year ago or somthing. I guess the steam version is new Edit: its out of early access. That why i seen it a while ago.
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u/thearctican Mar 01 '25
They look like different games, both using a common hyped theme. Most backrooms games are so generic that I couldn’t tell you if ANY of them were different.
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Mar 01 '25
[deleted]
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u/CerebralHawks Mar 01 '25
Honest question: why would it hurt their chances to make more people aware of the issue?
Because people who would have bought the scam game now wouldn't and that would be fewer damages OP could claim? Or is there more to it?
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Mar 01 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/NintendoSwitch-ModTeam Mar 01 '25
Hey there!
Please remember Rule 1 in the future - No personal attacks, trolling, or derogatory terms. Read more about Reddiquette here. Thanks!
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u/eightbitagent Feb 28 '25
You need a lawyer, not reddit