Subnautica 2 Controversy: What’s Going On Between Krafton and Its Developers?

The gaming world was shocked when Krafton, the publisher of PUBG, entered an unwanted legal battle with the original developers of Subnautica, which started as a beautiful plan to create Subnautica 2 with cooperation but is now a complete disaster turned legal case.

Krafton vs Subnautica Creators: Everything You Need to Know

It all goes back to 2021, when Krafton, the company behind PUBG, decided to buy Unknown Worlds, the studio that created Subnautica. At the time, things looked pretty hopeful.

As part of the deal, Krafton promised the original creators, Charlie Cleveland, Ted Gill, and Max McGuire, a bonus that could go up to 250 million dollars, but only if Subnautica 2 hit certain goals before the end of 2025. Everyone seemed to be on the same page, and work on the game started at a good pace.

Then, sometime in the middle of 2025, things got weird. Suddenly, Krafton went ahead and removed the founding team and appointed Steve Papoutsis as the new boss. Steve was just another guy who worked on The Callisto Protocol. The excuse was that the game was just not ready.

There was also a need for some key things missing from their end: some additional biomes, vehicles, and story content so that it could have gone for Early Access. But some internal documents leaked, painting a drastically different story.

The game already had over 2.5 million wishlists on Steam, and even within the team there was a sense that it was in a pretty good place. This is when the original creators decide to pursue legal action. They filed a lawsuit saying Krafton was purposely delaying release for the purpose of avoiding paying the original creators their contractually promised bonus.

They stated in their claims that Krafton curtailed the marketing, halted development support, and even laid plans to fire the team if they tried to launch in 2025. Of course, Krafton did not accept the allegations. They have denied all of it.

Apparently, to them, the game needed more development time, and the changes were ultimately bringing the game up to a better level for the potential consumers, not cheating any money. They also said the original team did not handle things well. Later, Krafton then went on to extend the bonus approach to 2026, but they insisted that it did not have anything to do with the lawsuit.

Right now, people are left asking what is happening. Was this about quality? Or was Krafton trying to get out of an enormous payout? The courts will no doubt eventually settle that. But to those watching from Subnautica's perspective, that is disconcerting.

Written by: Ashish Jha, India Today Gaming                                                                                                   Edited by - Probaho Santra, Sub-editor