A Space For The Unbound devs walk away from “predatory” publisher PQube

rockpapershotgun.com:

The developers of indie slice-of-life adventure A Space For The Unbound allege that the game’s console publisher in western regions, PQube, withheld information about a diversity grant and used that to leverage for a greater share of the game’s revenue. Mojiken Studio say they were left feeling “manipulated and exploited” by the UK-based publisher’s actions. The Indonesian team have now terminated their contract with PQube and delayed A Space For The Unbound until they can find another publisher.

A Space For The Unbound is a point-and-click adventure set in an Indonesian high school in the Nineties. It’s about young people in love, overcoming anxiety and depression, and diving into other people’s minds using a magic book. Mojiken are based in Surabaya, Indonesia, and have always made games rooted strongly in their team’s Indonesian identity. They say they issued the statement about PQube to “make a stand against exploitative publishers and speak up about this to stop things like this from happening again in the future”.

The full statement from Mojiken Studio and A Space For The Unbound’s PC publisher Toge Productions, also shared on Twitter, is below:

Dear space divers,

We are sad to announce that we will be delaying the release of A Space For The Unbound until further notice.

Earlier this year we discovered that PQube Games, a UK-based publisher that we signed for the console publishing of A Space For The Unbound for western regions had done certain things which have left us feeling manipulated and exploited, and so we have had to terminate our agreement with them.

At the height of the COVID-19 pandemic in August 2020, PQube Games used our position and heritage as developers from Indonesia to obtain a