Something happened on the way through our Twitter timeline: SEED, the in-development colony-building MMO from Klang Games, put out a tweet announcing a hold on communications because of an “ongoing legal issue.”
A visit to the game’s official site shows a copy of a cease and desist order issued to Klang from New Life Ventures, Inc. (newlifeventures.com), the apparent owner of – brace yourselves – sugardaddie.com, a dating site specifically tailored for women who want to date millionaires. Seriously. The corporate name and address (12955 Biscayne Blvd in North Miami, Florida) given by the attorney in the C&D match the corporate name and address on the Sugardaddie website, which is definitely a thing we now have in our browser cookies. What makes it all extra confusing is that Klang Games is actually owned by a company named New Life Ventures (newlife.ventures), a venture capital firm in New York. At this point, we don’t know whether these companies are one and the same or – and this is more likely – the law firm issuing the C&D got the companies confused and slapped the address for the wrong company on the letter. But we do know the mixup part of this is funny as heck!
“Until further notice, Klang Games is to cease and desist from any public mention of or promotion of SEED and all related enterprises on any channel. […] We would like to remind you that New Life Ventures is the true and sole owner of anything related to SEED.”
Of course, even if we’re right about the law firm using the address for the wrong company in the C&D, that doesn’t assuage whatever legal problem has arisen between Klang and the actual New Life Ventures that claims the studio in its portfolio.
A message on the game’s Discord from one of SEED’s devs assures players that there’s nothing to worry about. “[T]his is just a temporary interruption and we’ll figure this out in no time,” the message assures. “Discord will stay up, we just need to be a bit more careful about what we share for a bit. All is well!”
Readers will recall that Klang raised $41M in Series C investment over the summer – and raised eyebrows as the core investor was Web3 metaverse crypto outfit Animoca Brands. At the time, Klang told players it would use the investment to double its staff and improve its technical infrastructure, and though the studio did not immediately pivot to the blockchain, it also didn’t rule it out.
— SEED (@seedmmo) November 17, 2022
