Deaths Maze is no longer available to purchase. Players deserve an explanation of how that happened. This is Displacement Studios' account of the disagreement surrounding the game's artwork and commercial release. It describes our position and decisions; it is not a finding by a court or a statement on behalf of the other parties.
The agreement we encountered
When we took on the game, its sprite artist had an agreement with the previous developer for a split of net proceeds. Our understanding was that we had taken over the existing publishing rights and obligations, including the revenue-sharing arrangement, which we were prepared to continue honouring.
We had successfully negotiated artist buyouts in other acquisitions on terms both parties considered fair. Drawing on that industry experience, we offered to replace the existing revenue share with a one-time payment — not a request for permission to use artwork that had never been licensed. For this title, we received a counter-offer. We considered the requested buyout commercially unrealistic given the game's sales and declined it. That did not, in our view, invalidate the existing artwork permission or require a replacement agreement.
Why we stopped selling the game
We suspended sales on our own initiative while discussing the buyout, intending to de-escalate the disagreement rather than continue commercial sales during it. The store page remained visible, but customers could no longer purchase the game through it.
We also proposed making the game free to play as a possible resolution: keeping it available to players without generating new game-sale proceeds to divide. Our intention was to remove the immediate disagreement over future sales income and find an amicable way forward.
The copyright complaint and removal
According to our recollection, the artist threatened a DMCA complaint and contacted Valve with allegations we disputed. We considered the threats of legal escalation unnecessarily hostile: we had declined the requested price for an optional buyout, not refused to honour the existing revenue share. From our perspective, continuing under the original agreement remained an available alternative, which made the escalation particularly frustrating.
We supplied Valve with documents showing inconsistent spelling of the artist's first name between the agreement and subsequent correspondence. We considered that discrepancy worth clarifying alongside the existing artwork authorisation and remain dissatisfied with how our documentary objections were handled.
The store page was subsequently taken down. We disagree with that outcome, but cannot speak for Valve's internal assessment. The removal did not establish that Valve or a court resolved the underlying contractual dispute in either party's favour.
Where things stand
We chose to stop spending further resources on the dispute and cut our losses. We are not currently pursuing the dispute further and have no plans to resume distribution. That unresolved history is why we are explaining the absence of Deaths Maze from sale.
The Steam community archive still records the original release announcement on 13 October 2017 and subsequent development updates.
We acquired Deaths Maze because we saw a future for it, and we wanted its next chapter to be about improvements and new content. Instead, this chapter ended with a costly disappointment.