Bruno Faidutti schrieb bei BGG als Vertreter der französischen Autorenvereinigung Société des Auteurs de Jeux (SAJ):
[…] A game publisher, Wonder Dice, is launching a preorder campaign for the game a young designer, François Bachelart, has shown them a few years ago. The publisher even proposed him a contract then, but they failed to find an agreement and it wasn’t signed. From what we know at the moment, it looks like the publisher simply « stole" the game from its designer, developing and publishing it without his agreement, without his name and of course without royalties.
[…]
We want to make clear that this sad story is only an exception. Relations between game designers and publishers are usually trustful. As a matter of fact, Edge, a major French distributor, has declined to sell the game. All the gamers and game designers who have heard of this story are already spreading the word about Wonderdice obvious dishonesty, and are of course restraining from ordering the game. The boardgames world reacts in the best possible way, and it’s not a surprise for us.
Wer sich anhand der Anleitungen (FR) selbst ein Bild machen mag, findet Links bei BGG.
Es folgte ein Shitstorm und heute eine Stellungnahme des Chefs von Wonder Dice:
First of all, I apologize for our response delay, we preferred to have a better overview before making a more official statement.
We are very saddened by the situation and quite stunned by what is happening around the Nostromo project. We sincerely seek to do the right thing in this situation so we contacted François Bachelart at the beginning of this campaign, to clarify things and see what can be done together.
In view of a situation beyond our control that we had to manage since the day before yesterday, we have not yet had the opportunity to have a discussion with François and we think it is important to address the subject calmly with him.
It is obvious that we are perfectly against plagiarism, especially since the game environment is a medium that we love and respect. Game designers do a great job and it is important to us that it is valued and paid for.
We will keep you informed of the next steps.
Alles klar …