From $100k MIA Kickstarter to Legal Drama, The Status of ROAM.
Just when ROAM seemed to enter the ranks of MIA video game Kickstarters, it pops back up. With new details revealed, we at Cliqist ponder ROAM’s situation. Here’s an excerpt of the full story:
Back in February 2013, an online co-op post-apocalyptic zombie game by the name of ROAM was funded to the tune of $102,518 by 3,526 backers on Kickstarter. After the campaign’s end, updates were released every month up until March 2014. It’s a small hiccup that the devs quickly apologize for, and following that, the updates resume on a monthly basis up until December 2014. After that, nothing. For over five months, backers suffered through a worrying silence from the dev team, until May 22nd, when they released this post and an additional backer only update. So what happened? Why did ROAM seem to go MIA, and is the project still in good shape?
According to Ryan Sharr, one half of the original team behind ROAM, co-creator Zach Barson is suing him for $100k. In this Reddit post, a user shared the contents of the backer only update, presumably because Sharr gave his backers leave to do so. His attempt at keeping the information behind a backer-only wall was likely to avoid more negative attention. The information in the post is detailed and complicated, but it summarizes an alleged inability by Barson to relocate to a suitable working environment and a refusal to agree on certain financial and contractual terms. On top of that, Sharr also claims that Barson failed to produce much original content for the project, as per his position on the team. Thus, given these events and the lack of trust between them, Ryan Sharr released Zach Barson from the game project about six months after the completion of the Kickstarter.
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...Prepare to Die. 