In a significant escalation of the legal battle between Disco Elysium's ousted creators and the development studio ZA/UM, both parties have presented conflicting statements regarding the dismissal of Robert Kurvitz, Aleksander Rostov, and Helen Hindpere.
In an online message posted by Kurvitz and Rostov, the pair allege that they - along with Hindpere - were "excluded from daily operations" before being dismissed and blocked from accessing company information. Thet state that their firing "came weeks after [they] started asking for documents and financial data".
They also allege that their troubles began when a new majority shareholder by the name of Tütreke OÜ gained control over studio ZA/UM. They claim that Tütreke OÜ fraudulently gained money from the company itself in order to purchase the majority stake, and that if proven, could lead to prosecution and imprisonment of up to three years. They state that one of the majority shareholders involved, Tõnis Haavel, had previously been convicted of defrauding investors back in 2007.
However, in a conflicting statement from studio ZA/UM to GamesIndustry, the company claims that former employees were fired due to misconduct (though it declined to identify the employees by name). It claims that "the dismissed employees had limited to no engagement in their responsibilities and work, created a toxic work environment, demonstrated misconduct towards other employees including verbal abuse and gender discrimination, and attempted to illegally sell ZA/UM's intellectual property".
In a previous statement to Estonian Ekspress, ZA/UM CEO Ilmar Kompus claims that Kurvitz had "been known for belittling women and co-workers in the past" and that he and Saandar Taal (an alias of Aleksander Rostov), former director of ZA/UM, had discussed taking full control of the studio's intellectual property, which Kompus had described as "delusions of grandeur". Another source who spoke with GamesIndustry stated that long-term staff were reluctant to speak of Kurvitz's behaviour out of respect, having felt like they owed their positions within the company to him.
Finally, in an apparant direct response the claims made by Kurvitz and Rostov, ZA/UM states that "the rumour that our decision to terminate the contracts of these individuals was taken for financial gain is entirely unfounded and does not in any way reflect the facts", clarifying that "it was a decision that had to be taken for the wellbeing of the collective". It also catagorically denies all claims of financial malfeasance or fraud.
[source medium.com, via gamesindustry.biz]
Comments 36
Jobs, money and profits are ruthless.
Too many articles about disgruntled/fired employees, voice actors talking about whatever. More video game articles please.
Thanks for posting this article as I had no idea. I own this game so it’s nice to be informed on what’s going on with these companies good or bad.
Is it time to shout "OBJECTION!" yet?..
Both parties are guilty!!!
Guilty of boring the world with their disagreements.
@Jacoby It's important that we make our community aware of issues such as this, particularly if some of them own and are fans of Disco Elysium. If it's not for you, I'd recommend sticking to the more lighthearted articles.
@dew12333,
And Nintendo life is guilty or boring us, with this article about these guys very uninteresting arguments.
@Olliemar28,
This is a comment section, you can post that you feel an article is boring, just like you could post a positive comment about it, that's the whole point of comment sections, and as long as you are not being rude or insulting someone, I am pretty sure it does not break any of the sites rules.
Pretty sure someone who is very invested in all this, will not be put of by somebody who is not.
@johnvboy Did he say that posting a comment saying that this is boring is against the rules or something?
Although, I love the comments that exist just to tell others how not interested they are about an article they clicked and left a comment.
This is another backlog casualty I’ve yet to play but I’m looking forward to playing. This dispute between the employees vs employer is really turning into a mystery. It should be released as DLC!
You should also do an article about Mick Gordon's recent post, where he explains what happened while making the music for Doom Eternal. It's very detailed, and it gives another look at another poorly managed development of a game.
@jowe_gw,
Glad you like them, and not sure why the writer of the article had to comment in the first place, unless his pride was somehow hurt by the fact not many people thought this article was the slightest bit interesting.
Also he did suggest in a pretty flippant way, that the original commenter should stick to more light hearted articles, when all they asked for was more videogame ones.
I did say in my comment, that it should not bother anyone interested in all this, by people that are not as invested, seems I was wrong.
@johnvboy For starters, I never said I "liked" this articles. But I do find it necessary to report on the business side of the industry more than just "look at how many units this game sold", you know? Like it or not, there are people behind the games you play. Reporting on what happens behind the scenes should be normal. Why shouldn't be?
Besides, I personally find it much more fitting on this website that a lot of the "random" articles that seem to be done only to fit a quota of number of articles per week.
And, as you said, people should be free to comment whatever they want, right? That includes the writer of the article.
Also, the writer was 100% right when he said that. There are plenty of "videogame" articles on this website or others and this is important to report.
Oh and I'll mention this again. You also accused the writer of saying that comment was against the rules. To my knowledge, he never said that.
@Edu23XWiiU Yes. They should do an article about that.
@jowe_gw,
Never said he stated it broke any of the sites rules, I simply stated a fact that we are free to post anything in this comment section, as long as it is withing the guidelines/rules of the site.
If you like or dislike these articles, is a moot point, you can still comment in whatever way you see fit.
I tried playing this game but its so ugly I could not stand it
@johnvboy The writer didn't broke any rules here either and the comment hasn't been deleted by mods. So what was the point there? Just because someone can write a comment doesn't mean people shouldn't critize set comment if they feel it is wrong.
@Olliemar28 yah I like Nintendo Life articles. Box Art Brawls are the best!
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@Jacoby,
The weekend box art battles are the best.
For profit corporations and artists will always clash I fear. As somewhat of an artist myself, when I feel inspired, I cannot deal with deadlines, profit, market, bureaucracy, all that fictional, legal, arbitrary and/or strictly governed hierarchical nonsense. When I make something and I pour my heart and soul in it, it is not for sale, because my soul cannot be bought. When I am forced to create something, I don't, because creating without soul is destructive.
The sad part is just that this probably means we'll hear about legal stuff from them, the most boring and frustrating fiction mankind has ever invented, but not about the infinitely interesting world of Disco Elysium, a fiction no more or less "real", but infinitely more enjoyable as it hasn't forgotten that it is a fiction based on real world stuff, not an stupidly arrogant "real world" that is purely fictional where people have invested in and want to make profit of.
These articles feel like the he said she said rubbish in my wife's celeb mags only somehow less interesting
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Thank you for this series of articles that does a good job sharing both sides of the dispute.
“ahhh don’t show me this! Why y’all gotta traffic in bad news!! Rawr just gimme the games grumble grumble.. why creative people have to be so difficult, they’re just selling off pieces of their soul, ndb .. where’s sonicccc grumble grumble”
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After the Bayonetta 3 controversy, I think I'm not going to side with anyone this time around...Lukily this could be solved in court, I hope money isn't an issue and we get an aswer eventually.
@fenlix It is likely money, and more importantly power, control and influence. Having made Disco Elysium, the creators now earned their badge as bonifide top tier game developers in their own right with, or without the company. This sort of thing often lead to conflicts with employers, pay and ownership of the game and intellectual property etc.
Hope this will sort out without too much bad blood being spilled all around. The courts will deal with it.
*****
As an aside, I would like to be informed of these issues. As a gamer, I would like to know my monetary support to a game isn’t being abused and going to assist deserving game creators and developers.
@Jacoby I think the ratio is already very heavily leant towards video game news. "Disgruntled employee" stories are a tiny minority overall, which you could just scroll past if you're not interested.
@GRW810 Hey don’t forget the “voice actor” stories. Haha.
I do scroll Nintendo Life and I hope you do too. Good video game news around here. ✌️
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