the developer of the AI generated ARG
game on Steam has declared war on me and
other YouTubers through filing false
dmca takedown notices just when we
thought that this guy couldn't get any
scummier he had to take it to the next
level hello I'm John and on this channel
I share my opinions on video games that
are lazy cash grabs or scams a few
months ago I released a video covering a
very suspicious game on Steam unhappy
that I showed proof that his game is
nothing but a deceptive cash grab and
borderline scam the developer decided to
file a dmca takedown in an attempt to
get the video removed since I don't want
this video that you're watching right
now to also be taken down I'm not going
to show any footage from that video as
the copyright counter notice is still
pending and just to be super certain
that this scumbag doesn't copyright
strike this video too I won't even say
the name of his game but in summary that
video just consisted of me playing the
game explaining what it is and then
giving my opinion as to why you
shouldn't waste 15 on it nothing
copyright infringing obviously since
it's my own gameplay footage voice and
editing to reiterate some of my points
from that video though the game in
question does not contain any visuals
and is less than 100 megabytes in size
playing this game if you can even call
it that involves staring at a black
screen and listening to some Google
translated AI generated voices giving
you instructions such as press forward
two times or press right six times these
instructions are nearly impossible to
follow though since the AI generated
voices are so bad you can barely
understand what they're saying there's
also a bunch of other sound effects
included in the game which the developer
just downloaded straight from
freesound.org and other places on the
internet they also use a camera feed on
their website which is stolen from a
Turkish government website but they just
covered up the logo so you don't know
that they stole it the point of this
game is for you to solve this blind
Puzzle maze as they call it and then go
into the game's Discord server and enter
the code that you get at the end of the
puzzle but since the developer is so
incompetent they just left all of the
game files open so you could just go in
there and copy the code and put it in
the Discord without ever having played
the game so the main draw behind this
game is that there is a mystery in the
form of an alternate reality game or ARG
that takes place in the game's Discord
server and you actually don't even need
to buy the game on Steam to participate
in the ARG so the fact that this game is
even for sale at all is kinda strange
however there is one fatal flaw with
this ARG
first step of the mystery cannot even be
attempted until the developer has sold
at a minimum 3024 copies of the game and
even then it's still going to be
impossible to complete this very first
step that is because the very first step
of the ARG involves having
3024 people that all purchase the game
online in the Discord at the exact same
time once everyone is online they then
must send
3024 unique codes in the Discord server
within a 10 minute window now that
sounds impossible because it is without
even talking about the improbability of
coordinating 3 000 people on the
internet to do anything at the same time
we also have to consider that Discord
can barely handle 30 people chatting in
a server at once so there's no way it'll
be able to handle three thousand so
needless to say this ARG is physically
impossible to complete and because of
the way that it's set up it's almost
like a pyramid scheme people who spend
money on the game are incentivized to
recruit others to also get the game
since the only way that the puzzle will
ever be solved is if 3024 people buy the
game and then to add on to this pyramid
scheme nature at one point the developer
was paying streamers to recruit their
viewers to buy the game so they would
give the streamer a cut of the revenue
they collected which kind of just seems
more like a pyramid scheme nonetheless
the developer probably wasn't proud of
doing this and they took down any VOD or
any video or reference of any streamer
having that deal the only evidence of
that happening is actually in my video
which is now copyright claimed so that's
the backstory on the game and what the
developers been up to recently so let's
get into what's happening to my YouTube
channel and actually another YouTuber's
Channel anyone who has uploaded video
footage of this game received a dmca
takedown notice from the developer of
the game last week for me they were kind
enough to give a seven day warning
before the copyright strike was applied
but that wasn't the case for the other
YouTuber I spoke with after I put posted
about this copyright strike to my
Twitter another awesome YouTuber named
Sid Alpha saw my tweet and he did a
video of his own on the situation as
part of his dirty devs series The thanks
to Sid signal boosting my video a lot of
attention was brought to the game and
the nefarious behavior of its developers
because of this increased interest many
people began leaving comments on the
game's discussion forum on Steam calling
out the dev for abusing the dmca
takedown feature on YouTube of course
most of these discussion threads were
deleted almost immediately and anyone
who commented in them was permanently
banned from the steam forums of the game
in case you don't know what a dmca
takedown is it's a compliance activity
that YouTube must do to maintain
adherence to the Digital Millennium
Copyright Act this act was designed to
protect copyrighted work from being
re-uploaded to the Internet so think of
things like illegally uploading music or
movies in their entirety and the example
of a video game review though we're not
seeing any violation of this act
everything in my video is protected
under fair use guidelines Not only was
all the video recorded and edited by
myself I'm not sure that you can
copyright a black screen since that's
all that this game includes instead what
the developers are trying to do is
simply get my video removed as it was
one of the first results on Google when
you search the name of the game since my
video exposed it for the dishonest scam
that it is that was hurting their sales
so they figured they could just file a
dmca takedown and silence my criticism
but unfortunately for the developer he
doesn't understand what the purpose of a
tmca takedown is he even admitted this
not only on the game's theme forums but
also in an email that he wrote to me on
the day that the copyright strike was
applied I'll read the email in its
entirety hi John they didn't even spell
my name right what a great start this is
Aisha from scam developer game studios
yeah I'm sure that's your real name it's
definitely not the developer pretending
to be a different person I am
responsible for the general
communication of the studio it is my
responsibility to forward the message
below to you when we look at your
YouTube content we do not take the
content you made for our game personally
but we had to Quest removal even if we
didn't want to because the users gave
false information we say we didn't want
it because contrary to what you think we
were able to get more interaction and
sales thanks to your video we can call
it the Streisand Effect okay so the
developer themselves just admitted here
that they had to remove the video
because of false information first of
all that's not what the dmca takedown is
supposed to be used for it's for
copyright infringement not false
information and second of all which part
of my video was false information
because maybe if it was you could have
released a statement of your own
dispelling the false information instead
of filing a frivolous copyright takedown
anyway they continue this was a
situation we made a difficult decision
as a team whoa yeah English is obviously
not their first language so this is a
tough read because your video arouses
people's curiosity and they try the game
that's why we requested to remove your
video without getting a warning from
YouTube and we gave you seven days if we
were wrong about the dmca YouTube
wouldn't allow it in this process they
approved by asking us for trademark
registration information they don't ask
why we demand this they just want our
trademark registration information this
is the funniest part of the email
basically they're saying if it was a
crime then nobody would have let us do
it now I'm not so sure how the legal
system works in Turkey which is where
this developer is from but I'm pretty
sure that even there the police don't
just sit at your door all day waiting
for you to commit crimes just because
nobody stopped you from committing said
crime doesn't mean that it's illegal to
do whatever crime you just did
continuing in the developers words we
think that we will not encounter content
that does not reflect any other truth
made by you or helped by you in the
future on any platform if this continues
we will have to protect our brand and we
will Resort to Legal means albeit
unwillingly we keep a backup video for
proof we have a larger community that
already owns the game plays and shares
game related posts with each other and
has no issues with the game it is our
duty to protect this community as well
we would like to point out that this
game is had eligible to be released
after passing the approval period from
all three stores the process for each
store took at least one month in case of
a policy violation the game would have
not been released anyway again they're
basically saying if it was wrong then
somebody would have stopped us but it's
well known that the quality control
measures in place for the major game
Distributors are lacking to say the
least steam just once their 100 fee and
their 30 cut they don't really care if
your game is full of stolen assets
unless someone causes us think about it
which for a perfect example we can look
at the game only up when it was removed
from Steam the game was on Steam for a
period of time with no problems but then
it was revealed that it had some stolen
assets only then was it taken down until
the stolen assets were removed you could
say that these platform operate with
reactive punishment not proactive which
makes sense because of the sheer volume
of games being uploaded every day they
don't have time to play every single one
of them as you know if you feed a
society with evil evil grows if you feed
it with good good grows this depends
entirely on the leader's preference your
audience who takes action with your
misdirection is committing a crime by
unintentionally disparaging the company
we take note of those who continue this
we will initiate the judicial process
when necessary I mean this part's just
hilarious I'm the evil one for exposing
your scam definitely if you have a
question about the game of the situation
you can ask without hesitation again
this is funny to me since I emailed them
multiple times before they sent this
trying to prevent this whole situation
and they completely ignored me and then
I went into the Discord and asked to
speak to the developer only to find
myself getting banned and blocked
sincerely than the fake name again so
far we've confirmed at least one of the
YouTuber who has been affected by the
developer filing these fake takedown
notices and the craziest part of this is
that that guy didn't even have any
commentary on his video his channel is
just strictly no commentary gameplay
footage of a ton of games on Steam so
this makes me think that the developers
don't want anyone to see what the game
actually looks like because otherwise
nobody would buy it like I said the game
has no visuals and it's just a black
screen with some terrible AI voices so
it's no wonder why they wouldn't want
people to see what it looks like before
they buy it the developers seem to be
getting more and more desperate for this
scam to pay off which is highly unlikely
at this point since they've lowered the
price from the original fifty dollars
all the way down to just three dollars
and fifty cents although like I said
earlier they removed the need to
purchase the game to play the ARG so
there's literally not a reason anyone
should ever purchase the game at this
point if it wasn't a scam before it
probably is now not only is the guy
behind it trying to hide any criticism
of his game he's also trying to get
Sympathy by bringing up the earthquake
in Turkey as some sort of Defense when
people call this a scam from the
developer himself you complained about
the price of the game and you are right
we made the first prices with the
recommendation of steam and we learned
from you that this recommendation is
high we lowered the price to your
suggested price but you're still finding
it high right now and we're listening to
you we will discount the price according
to the countries but we can't offer big
price reductions because steam doesn't
allow High discounts as well as not
being unfair to those who bought it
before interesting because after you
said this Mr developer you went and
lowered the price of the game four more
times we appreciate your disliking of
the game it's impossible to please
everyone and if you don't like it you
have the right to refund it and comment
as you wish really people like you
developed this game full-time work for
two years and nobody tried to do the
worst we always tried to do the best it
is very sad to see the offensive
comments as you know there was a big
earthquake in Turkey some of her friends
lost their relatives let's not upset
more people with comments like this if
you don't enjoy the community you are
welcome to leave come on bro don't use a
natural disaster that resulted in a lot
of death and damage as some sort of
sympathy play for your sorry attempt at
a get rich quick scheme evil in evil out
right after my video was taken down the
other day some of both mine and Sid's
subscribers took to the steam discussion
forum for the game to raise awareness of
the developers abusive practices since I
can't because I'm banned one user posted
warning dev's covering up things this
won't be here long the devs were
removing posts that expose their BS but
warning to anyone wanting to get this
don't it's a scam plain and simple then
the developer responds hello we are not
covering up things we just want to
prevent the spread of misinformation
this misinformation also consists of
incomplete information and abuse of it
some influencers hey I'm an influencer
degrade the game due to incomplete
information you should know that this
game is not an nft game Steam doesn't
allow nft games anyway it takes at least
one month for a game to qualify for
release on Steam this game has passed
all processes successfully the other
thing most of you are stuck with is the
impossibility of the Discord puzzle it
is said that it cannot be be done
without trying it yet if we really try
and think that the time is insufficient
we will extend the time simple as that
by the way anyone could join Discord
puzzles without buying the game you will
always have the right to refund the game
we will release the demo of the game
soon the video below has a dislike ratio
of 264 dislikes to 42 likes and every
single comment calling the game a scam
was deleted and I know this because I
looked at it earlier and there were
comments saying it was a scam and now
they're not here but I didn't take a
screenshot so you'll just have to
believe me another user then responds
basically saying that dmca does not mean
misinformation or slander or anything
like that it just means copyright
infringement so even if I was lying in
my video it wouldn't be the proper legal
route to file a dmca takedown the
developer's response to this is almost
an exact copy of the email that they
sent to me although there is this one
extra paragraph which I'll read this
game was released on February 3rd 2023
and since then our player community has
been growing no one thinks they have
been tricked or deceived please do not
allow other people to direct your
thoughts question it yourself and try it
I love that they say no one thinks
they've been tricked or deceived every
review on steam that wasn't made by a
bot says that this is a scam and not to
buy it hey maybe I should dmca him
because he's spreading misinformation so
this discussion post was then locked so
nobody could add any more comments and
the developer deleted every other thread
which was just calling the game a scam I
didn't get any screenshots of these
posts though but maybe someone archived
them so if you did please feel free to
comment a link and I'll pin it and
that's the story so far I just wanted to
put this quick video together to explain
the situation and why the video is no
longer on my channel in case you haven't
seen the video in question yet a mirror
of it exists on my Odyssey Channel which
I'll link below in the description go
subscribe to me there if you haven't
because it'll serve as a permanent
backup of my entire YouTube channel if
this ever happens again and while you're
at it Go and subscribe to Sid Alpha on
YouTube his channel is not only super
similar to mine as far as exposing slimy
devs goes but he did me a massive favor
by boosting my channel to get me the
support that I need the fight this claim
and to the dude behind the game I am
awaiting your lawsuit if you are so
desperate for money that you're willing
to reduce the price of your game tenfold
just to sell an extra four copies then
I'm not so sure that you have the
financial means to file an international
copyright lawsuit which is going to
immediately be thrown out also you're
committing perjury by filing a false
dmca takedown request which is a crime
in both turkey and the United States so
yeah good luck with that one buddy
you've got a copy of my video and I have
screenshots of you admitting to perjury
and not only were you stupid enough to
admit this in the private email you've
literally pinned it to the steam
discussion forum of your game like you
said nothing good comes to evil people
so let's see how this situation ends
censoring discussion around your game
and trying to manipulate the review
score on Steam sounds kind of evil to me
but hey what do I know anyway that's all
for today if you've made it this far and
you're not already subscribed then
you'll probably like some of my other
content since I talk about dishonest and
scummy developers in just about every
other video on this channel and to my
regular viewers and subscribers thanks
as always sticking with me and fighting
the good fight goodbye