Disco Elysium studio ZA/UM resolves lawsuits with former employees
Disco Elysium developer Studio ZA/UM has, to various effect, resolved numerous lawsuits filed against it within the past year. These include a case with the game’s executive producer, Kaur Kender, as well as several Unfair Dismissal suits filed by several key members of the studio, who left the team in fall 2022.
The Kaur Kender lawsuit saw the former ZA/UM producer sue the studio’s majority shareholding company Tütreke, claiming that ZA/UM CEO Ilmar Kompus had essentially “cheated” him out of €1 million, while also trying to illegally wrest control of the studio away from the founding members of the team. However, the case will no longer be progressing, as per a statement from Kompus offered to GamesIndustry.biz.
“The facts and the law led to this outcome,” Kompus writes. “We are pleased that Kender and his attorneys have chosen to withdraw their lawsuit — one that should never have been filed in the first place. Their decision affirms there was no basis for their accusations and that I have acted appropriately and responsibly, as underscored by the corporate records I provided.”
A press statement from the studio also includes comments from Kender, who has now “divested all his shares in the studio” and “repaid all his debts to the studio”, as well as reimbursing Kompus’ legal costs.
“After leaving my full-time role, I filed a lawsuit which I realised, after seeing the facts, was misguided.” said Kender in the press statement.
The unfair dismissal suits were filed following the revelation that Disco Elysium designer Robert Kurvitz, writer Helen Hindpere, and art director Aleksander Rostov were no longer at the studio, having been “involuntary” pushed out of the company by its owners. While initially offering a more
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