Breaking: SCi Denies Theft Reports On Battlestations: Midway

Officials from British publishers, and Eidos Interactive owner, SCi have attempted to clarify press reports over the weekend that suggested that the company was being investigated for theft following complaints from a developer in Hungary. British newspaper The Sunday Times claimed that developers MGE and Mithis Entertainment (developers of Nexus: The Jupiter Incident and Joint Task Force for Vivendi) have filed complaints with police alleging that SCi employees broke into offices in Hungary and stole software, including the source code for Battlestations: Midway. In a statement given to Gamasutra by SCi head of communications, Chris Glover, the company suggests that The Sunday Times has confused the games Battlestations: Midway and Joint Task Force as a single title and that the majority of complaints referred to in the article do not therefore relate to Battlestations: Midway. Indeed SCi suggest that there ware no specific allegations against the company. SCi has admitted that in November 2005 the company exercised its contractual right to take over development of the game, following dissatisfaction with MGE. According to SCi, MGE then demanded compensation and when none was forthcoming made an official complaint to the authorities in Budapest, relating to the ownership of intellectual property rights. Jane Cavanagh, CEO of SCi Entertainment said; “We would never normally comment upon such relatively minor matters and have only done so to clarify the position. We wish to correct what we believe are a number of misleading statements and material inaccuracies, particularly in this instance as allegations raised in the article appear to relate to a totally different and unrelated company or companies.”