It seems The Sinking City which is currently available on Steam is an old build of the game. One Steam review claims that it's not the same version released by Frogwares in January, and is lacking DLC, cloud saves and achievements. Click here to try out the Steam News Hub for The Sinking City A Steam Labs Experiment. All Products News All News. The Sinking City. Now, a month later, Nacon has put The Sinking City back on Steam, and already it's being review-bombed, with customers complaining that the latest release appears to be an old version of the game. The Sinking City, a Lovecraftian horror detective game from the Ukrainian studio Frogwares, returned to Steam on Friday after a monthslong absence.
© Screenshot: Frogwares
Moody cosmic horror game The Sinking City is now back up on Steam and other digital storefronts following the latest developments in an ongoing legal fight between developer Frogwares and the game’s publishing partner, Nacon, taking place in the Paris Court of Appeal.
The Sinking City, an excellent open world mystery game about exploring a flooded New England town during the 1920s, was originally released in June 2019, but was pulled from most digital storefronts last August by maker Frogwares over accusations that Nacon had failed to uphold its end of the publishing agreement. In a statement yesterday, Nacon—the publisher of games such as Warhammer: Chaosbane and the World Rally Championship series—announced it was bringing The Sinking City back to the Microsoft, PlayStation, and Steam digital storefronts following a court ruling from October upholding its existing publishing contract with Frogwares until a final legal decision was reached.
“NACON is continuing its action in defense of its rights and has proceeded with the execution of this court decision by asking platforms and sites to put The Sinking City game back online so that no one is held hostage to this situation,” Nacon wrote. The company declined to comment further to Kotaku. Frogwares did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
Frogwares has claimed that Nacon failed to cover certain production costs in a timely manner and at one point stopped royalty payments after the game was already out. Frogwares has also alleged that Nacon at one point tried to take ownership of the source code for The Sinking City. Nacon rejected Frogwares’ claims at the time, calling them an “erroneous interpretation of the content of the agreement and the nature of this dispute.”
During this period, the game still remained available on the Switch eShop, where it was distributed solely by Frogwares. It’s unclear when a final ruling by the Paris Court of Appeal will be rendered to determine The Sinking City’s ultimate fate on other platforms.
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The Sinking City developer Frogwares has said the version of its game currently on Steam was not made by Frogwares.
In a tweet posted today and shared over to the game's newsfeed on Steam, Frogwares is asking users not to purchase the game.
Sinking City Steam Release
'Frogwares has not created the version of [The Sinking City] that is today on sale on [Steam]. We do not recommend the purchase of this version. More news soon,' reads the statement.
The studio has not published any additional updates as of the time of this writing. We've reached out to both the developer and the publisher, Nacon, for comment.
The Sinking City was pulled from shelves by Frogwares amid a legal dispute between the studio and Nacon in August 2020, after it alleged Nacon -- formerly Big Ben Interactive -- breached several clauses of the licensing agreement for the game, and allegedly owed Frogwares around €1 million in payments.
It was returned to digital platforms last month, following a decision in the Paris Court of Appeal that Frogwares had 'terminated [its] contract in a 'manifestly unlawful' manner.'
In a statement last week coinciding with the release of The Sinking City on PlayStation 5, Frogwares stated that it was both the developer and publisher of the PS5 version, but the PS4 version had a separate publisher and different game IDs due to 'an ongoing current legal and technical situation,' preventing a platform upgrade for PS4 owners.
The Sinking City In Steam
The Sinking City Game Steam
As it stands, The Sinking City is currently available for sale on the PlayStation Store, Xbox storefront, Nintendo eShop, and various PC storefronts including Steam.