Considering the very public back-and-forth between Nexon and Dark and Darker developer Ironmace, this development seems like a foregone conclusion, but it is now official: Nexon is taking Ironmace to court for copyright infringement.
Nexon’s legal complaint makes similar accusations that it did when the dungeon crawler was first hit with a Steam copyright strike – that Ironmace devs stole code, visuals, and other assets from its developing Project P3 and used it to develop Dark and Darker, which it calls “substantially similar.”
The complaint also references a year-long “non-compete clause” in Nexon’s employment agreement that prevents employees from “working in the same line of business that could potentially infringe on Nexon’s trade secrets” without the company’s prior consent.
“Condoning the Defendants’ conduct would threaten Nexon, the video game industry, and all of the consumers who enjoy playing sophisticated video games,” the lawsuit argues.
Nexon is seeking restitution in the form of monetary costs that went into the development of P3 and the halting of Dark and Darker’s development. Meanwhile, readers will remember that Ironmace enacted what it called “plan Z” and released the latest test build of the game via torrent.
