Subnautica 2 publishers Krafton have issued their response to the lawsuit filed against them by the game’s former lead developers. If you’re wondering whether things have cooled off a bit between the two parties now we’re in Saul Goodmanville, think again, because the second paragraph of the response sees Krafton accuse the leads of having “resorted to litigation to demand a payday they haven’t earned.”
It’s an almost impossible task at this point to sum up the Subnautica 2 saga in less than a War and Peace length novel, but here’s my attempt to give you the abbreviated version. Krafton delay the game from a 2025 early access release to 2026 and fire three leads on it: Charlie Cleveland, Max McGuire, and Ted Gill. The company accuse those leads of abandoning their duties and argue the game wasn’t ready for early access. The leads disagree and file a lawsuit. A big part of what makes the disagreement so noteworthy is a $250 million bonus to be paid to Unknown Worlds staff if the game hit certain targets by the end of 2025, which Krafton have now said they’ll still pay out a fraction of. Annnnddd breathe.
That takes us up to this response from Krafton to the three ousted devs’ lawsuit. In it, the company argues that “rather than investing the effort necessary” to meet the conditions for earning their bit of the bonus, the trio are merely attempting to extract that cash through legal action.
The not-putting-in-the-effort part leads onto the publishers once again arguing their view that the trio “quickly lost interest” in developing Subnautica 2 after Krafton bought Unknown Worlds in a $500 million deal, and promised that additional $250 million payout linked to Subnautica 2’s success. Cleveland and McGuire, the response says, went off to do other stuff, while Gill is claimed to have “focused on leveraging his operational control to maximise the earnout payment, rather than developing a successful game.” The game’s design director is cited as having said the former two leads were “checked out.”
Krafton go on to suggest that problems with Subnautica 2 were revealed via a March 2024 internal assessment, but rather than working to improve it, the leads “blamed others and overhauled the team” and “continued to reduce the scope of the game.” Roll forwards to breaking point. Krafton then claim that they were concerned releasing Subnautica 2 into early access in an undercooked state could cause “irreversible harm” to the series’ name and future potential, pointing to Kerbal Space Program 2 as an example of such reputational damage.
Krafton pushed for the delay, and allege the three leads not only opposed that move, but said they would self-publish the game. The company also claim the trio “secretly downloaded massive amounts of confidential information” from Unknown Worlds. Basically, Krafton’s view is that Cleveland, McGuire, and Gill only cared about getting that $250 million payout, and were prepared to put out whatever version of the game they had on time to get it. Or, as the publishers put it:
The Key Employees’ insistence on releasing the game immediately was singularly driven by self-interest in obtaining the earnout. At every turn during development, the Key Employees were laser focused on avoiding ‘a timeline that doesn’t tank the earnout opportunity’ and scheduling the release to maximize their payments. Conversations throughout the post-acquisition period make clear the [Key Employees’] focus was on their payday, and not on the game.
The rest of the response sees Krafton provide direct rebuttals to different elements of the ex-leads’ lawsuit, but as you can see here, despite all the Lionel Hutz language, punches are very much not being pulled whatsoever in this legal drama. We’ll have to see if Cleveland, McGuire, and Gill issue any response, but otherwise we’re likely into the part where all the lawyers get to work lawyering:a back-and-forth that could lead to court proceedings if both parties can’t come to an arrangement before then.
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