Update on Temporary Unavailability Due to Legal Action (Patreon)

Hello everyone,

I wanted to give you all an update on the progress we've made regarding the threat of legal action against us.

Since replying via email to the composer's initial threat, we have not received any further communication from them. However, using our version control system, we were able to compile a list of all assets the composer added or modified in the game. This has allowed us to remove all audio content generated by them and review their other work to determine whether it would meet the standards required for copyright to apply.

We're happy to announce that we've now replaced all of their sound assets and have found that their other contributions were not unique or complex enough to qualify for copyright protection. In addition, much of their other work had already been redone, modified, or was no longer in use anyway.

We have made this new game build available to the composer to verify that their copyrighted material is no longer present. We have given them a deadline of Tuesday, June 30th, 2020 to respond. If we do not hear from them, we will assume that they have verified that the new build is free of their copyrighted material.

Thanks to our version control system, we feel confident that we have removed all of the composer's copyrighted material and therefore, if in the future we receive any additional claims from the composer, we will not take down the game as we have done in this instance without a court order. We will investigate their claims and if they prove credible, we will replace the content and release an update. We have given the composer the opportunity to provide a list of material over which they own copyright, but they have not done so yet. Therefore we consider this policy to be reasonable.

It is still possible that the composer will proceed with legal action against us, however we do not think they will win if the matter goes to court. We have ample evidence that we have acted properly over the course of our communications and we took immediate action to stop distribution of the game and remove their copyrighted material as soon as they informed us that we were no longer permitted to use it.

Thank you all very much for your patience with this matter. You should hear from us again on Tuesday, or earlier if there are new developments.