A new report from VGC claims that the developer of Kena: Bridge of Spirits, Ember Lab maliciously forced out its Lead Designer and multiple employees worked unpaid overtime, with the Ember Lab offering a statement in response.
In the lengthy report, the former designer and programmer of the game, Brandon Popovich, claims that he created “95%” of Kena’s code by the time he left the studio in 2017. He also alleges that some of that work went unpaid and the long-term job offer he was promised with the studio was severely diminished, leading to him turning it down. A second Ember Lab contractor also backed up these claims with their own reports of unpaid overtime and broken promises.
However, Ember Lab responded to VGC by saying that Popovich’s claims contain “a number of false accusations”. They also mention that development on the game has lasted more than five years and Popovich only contributed seven months of work. He will be credited in the full game when it releases next year.
There is a lot more, which you can read about at VGC focusing on the individual claims made by Brandon and a record of the work he says he did on the upcoming PS5 and PS4 title. You can read the excellent report here.
Ember Lab’s full statement to VGC on the situation can be found below:
“Brandon’s statement includes a number of false accusations that diminish the efforts of those who worked on the original Unity prototype and our talented team members who have worked so hard over the past 5 years.
“A Game Design Document, character concepts, and a fully functioning Unity prototype, including the game’s core mechanics, were developed prior to Brandon joining the project.
“Brandon was fully compensated for all of his work which focused on migrating the features of the Unity prototype to an Unreal prototype using UE4 Blueprints. None of the work developed for the Unreal prototype is currently being utilized in production. When it came time to build a team for full development, we offered Brandon a position which he declined. We’ve been building our dream game, together with the efforts of a very dedicated team, and we are saddened by these hurtful accusations.”
Kena: Bridge of Spirits is set to release for PS5 and PS4 in Q1 2021.
Source – [VGC]