The story for 38 Studios has been long and arduous, likely with most of them just wanting to forget the whole thing. Simply search 38 Studios in our search box and you'll come up with many stories of how they slowly fell. You may know them for the game Kingdoms of Amalur which didn't do as well as they had hoped.
The story is long, twisting and complicated and it's hard to understand what exactly happened, but at some point the state of Rhode Island lent the ailing developer 75 million to keep them going. And then the studio closed. Rhode Island was understandably not happy and vowed to change how they did things.
Now they've finally gotten around to suing the developer, but seeing as how all of their property was just sold through auction, I'm not seeing how they're getting any money out of them. Reportedly the studio had trouble even paying the 1.25 million they owed the state as a monthly payment. The lawsuit intends to get the money from whomever it can, listing 38 defendants, including the former founder Curt Schilling in addition to former Rhode Island Economic Developer Corporation head Keith Stokes and Wells Fargo Securities.
Rhode Island claims that Stokes and the rest of the EDC board didn't due their due diligence in figuring out if the studio would actually be able to finish their Project Copernicus MMO. They also claim that 38 Studios heads directly misrepresented the numerous risks in the deal, as well as more than$500,00 in hidden commissions being earned by Wells Fargo.
According to the suit, "Wells Fargo secured its hidden commissions by concealing these facts from the EDC Board, notwithstanding that the undisclosed information showed that the loan was not in the interests of the EDC and probably would never be paid back."
Although the Amalur IP is worth about 20 million and the auction gained about $830,000, that's a far cry away from the $75 million someone owes Rhode Island.
Source: GiantBomb
