Krafton confirms cut content and missed milestones during Subnautica 2 development
The Subnautica 2 drama continued over the weekend. Last month, two of the founders of Unkown Worlds, along with the CEO of the game studio, left the project behind, citing disagreements with the executives at Krafton, the publisher for Subnautica 2. The three former developers claimed that Krafton was intentionally holding the game back to avoid paying out a bonus, but a leaked document seems to indicate that numerous deadlines were indeed missed.
Krafton is facing a lawsuit from the founders of Unknown Worlds, who claim that Subnautica 2 is ready to release in Early Access right now. As the game won’t be releasing this year, Unknown Worlds will not hit a crucial financial target that would have unlocked a $250M bonus for the studio, a sum that was going to be split up amongst the development team.
While fans were quick to blame Krafton for the current issues, a new leak lends some validity to their argument. A document shared on Reddit shows the most recent ‘milestone review’ for Subnautica 2. The document showed that milestones were missed repeatedly and details a number of pieces of cut content, including six hours worth of ‘narrative’ content, multiple tools and vehicles, as well as an unnamed custom game mode.
In a statement sent to media outlets like IG, Krafton confirmed that this leaked document was legitimate but did not expand beyond that. As Unkown Worlds co-founders, Charlie Cleveland and Max McGuire, as well as former CEO, Tim Gill, are now suing Krafton, we’d expect public statements from both sides to slow down while the legal process plays out.
KitGuru Says: Assuming this lawsuit moves forward, more documents, like the one shown in the leak, will appear in court documents, so that is where the bulk of the information will be coming from moving forward.
