-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
-
We have made minor adjustments to how the search bar works on ResetEra. You can read about the changes here.
Tequila Works (Rime) Has Pointed out Theft of Tree Assets by Developer Behind "KUMO" Up: Dev admits fault, see threadmarks
- Thread starter Dancrane212
- Start date
In a word, yes.
In more words, Kickstarter have taken some measures to limit abuse/scam projects, but it really is a platform that relies on reputation and 'buyer beware' for backers to determine for themselves if a person is likely to deliver.
If they take the money and run, backers can maybe try and report the person for fraud if they can do enough online sleuthing to find out the persons details, and Kickstarter can refuse to host another project by that person. Other than that, if they took your money and spent it, you could be S.O.L.
I've backed over 50 Board Game kickstarters and they've either all delivered or are still on-track to deliver, but I stay well clear of video game projects now (only ever backed Broken Age, and that wasn't worth it) because there are just too many unknowns and ways for a project to fail. Board Game production is a somewhat standardised process, video games are not. If a person hits a coding roadblock, that could sink the game no matter how well-intentioned the person trying to make it is.
When it comes to a specific Kickstarter project and backer security, basically no. Its ultimately the backer's responsibility to look into if the project looks risky or not, and if he/she wants to support a project. Kickstarter.com warns about that projects can run into problems, and that people shouldnt threat Kickstarter as a store with pre-orders. I guess that theres some protection through Kickstarter to stop the same people to run new projects though. Otherwise for the backers, they have to take it through the legal system if they think that a project was a scam, and they want a chance to get their money back.
This has also been my experience. If I had seen the kickstarter for this game, it would have raised a lot of red flags for me as it's done by a solo creator who claims to have had 10 years of experience but I can't find any information on any of his past projects. Video game projects, especially from unknown creators, are much more likely to fail than other kickstarters. There are a few exceptions, like Undertale, but given my risk tolerance I would not have backed it either.
so he'll copy of off this, maybe Filip Miucin will hire'em for his channel
Interview with Kumo dev
I've been following the dev for about 5 years now, honestly just for entertainment purposes. Dev claimed to have 10 years of industry experience, but no previous work or references to be found anywhere. Besides, an experienced dev would not have:
Meanwhile, the game was just an endless stream of iteration with no clear scope or planning. A telltale sign of inexperience and overambitiousness. When I saw the KS was successful, my heart sank, because so many people were fooled by a hot air trailer and promises.
Just a thick air of insecurity throughout it all. Mimicking whatever he perceived as successful: art style, character design, gameplay mechanics, and turns even being more direct with 3D models. Even if the trees weren't a straight copy, they would have been remodelled to match, because they're proven to be "good".
Would have panned out so much better if he went his own direction and believed in it!
I guess he decided to disappear from the internet now. Understandable, if you feel like the world's coming down on you, but unsurprisingly immature.
Dev appeared in an interview to "set the story straight" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaY9egL93gI&feature=emb_title. Believe what you will!
- Announced a kickstarter, launched it, removed it after 24 hours and called it a "test" (source: podcast interview)
- Announced a kickstarter, launched it, removed it after a week and pretended it never happened (source: deleted lol)
- Announced another "first" KS and copy-pasted the text from another successful game KS (Omno)
- Redesigned the art style, character, gameplay and name to match that of said other successful game
- Promised the game would launch on all consoles, despite having zero porting experience or access to dev kits. Not to mention Switch keys aren't free to generate.
- Passive aggressively called out publishers in general for rejecting the game, coincidentally shortly after releasing a demo
- Splurged 8k in KS funds on conventions and a Wacom tablet, best put in porting because that doesn't even cover half the cost
- Complained about how unfair it is that successful games keep getting attention, and his game isn't getting a chance (like… ???)
- Retracted every claim after an ounce of negative feedback, or backed it up with another false promise.
- Launched two fundraisers for struggling devs, with no clear indication of where the money was going
- Called out a private legal dispute on social media to gain backup, that's real professional
Meanwhile, the game was just an endless stream of iteration with no clear scope or planning. A telltale sign of inexperience and overambitiousness. When I saw the KS was successful, my heart sank, because so many people were fooled by a hot air trailer and promises.
Just a thick air of insecurity throughout it all. Mimicking whatever he perceived as successful: art style, character design, gameplay mechanics, and turns even being more direct with 3D models. Even if the trees weren't a straight copy, they would have been remodelled to match, because they're proven to be "good".
Would have panned out so much better if he went his own direction and believed in it!
I guess he decided to disappear from the internet now. Understandable, if you feel like the world's coming down on you, but unsurprisingly immature.
Dev appeared in an interview to "set the story straight" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WaY9egL93gI&feature=emb_title. Believe what you will!
Last edited:
I'm listening to this interview and I have no clue what he's talking about, implying that it's normal in game development to have "reference files" that he "accidentally" left in. Never in my life have I ripped someone else's model files as "references" to put into my commercial game. That isn't normal, is it? I don't know any developers who rip other games assets and use them as templates? Just sounds like a super weak lie, just apologise dude, tell the truth
edit: gotta love these interviewers for noticing the lies and nonsense and calling it out, and he keeps saying it was a reference to learn from the texture, but the texture was changed? it was the 3D model he stole and retextured himself
Last edited:
Yeah he sounds entirely like he's trying & failing to think on his feet/talk out of his ass. The excuses are super weak, it's painful to listen to.
Especially your proof of him previously trying to get files this just falls flat. Also, what does he mean by GDC being the new E3? Is that true? I'm confused as heck by some of the things he claims. Either way, I don't think I could ever convince our financial manager to let me spend 6000 euros in hopes of pitching to some publishers. At least in my experience with publishers its been free via discord or email
edit: now he's saying that I was picking up on the fact that he made a claim of physical cartridges for the switch, and that it was Kickstarter exclusive. Greggy I have access to the switch dev kit too and have done the exact process you have and I still have no clue how you were gonna do it. You can't have only 3 commercial physical cartridges made for the switch, that's clearly not feasible?
Last edited:
While petting his dog, of course. No person can be bad if they have a nice doggo.
Its one thing to be unsure. Its a whole other thing to immediately shit on one party with very little info which is Era's MO. You'd think after the infamous 'Fortnite Skin Plagiarism' thread people would learn to chill. Really embarrassing considering a lot of developers visit this place and read the comments.
www.resetera.com
Fornite skin based off an artist's design (UPDATE: It was actually a fake stunt by the artist)
Final update: kid faked the whole thing. Crow was served that night, everyone hated it. art date september 3rd, skin revealed mid november. It's not clear if epic straight up copied this kid's design but I'm reporting in UPDATE: TOS 4. Copyright DeviantArt is, unless otherwise stated...
www.resetera.com
I have absolutely heard of reference files being accidentally left in a video game before. Sometimes you put in a placeholder, like a painting, that you intend to replace, and it gets missed. I think Uncharted 4 had this happen.
That does not at all account for how blatant this is. The guy only had so many tree models. The way we saw them at first, reasonably it was hard to tell they weren't just going for a single style. But like, he's the developer. He knows his game is populated by these trees. It's absolutely absurd to say "oh this happens all the time." when the thing he is talking about is usually just a single placeholder asset left in a game from prototyping that got missed. That's not what he did.
It's just not analogous at all and I find it impossible to believe that's the reason this happened.
That does not at all account for how blatant this is. The guy only had so many tree models. The way we saw them at first, reasonably it was hard to tell they weren't just going for a single style. But like, he's the developer. He knows his game is populated by these trees. It's absolutely absurd to say "oh this happens all the time." when the thing he is talking about is usually just a single placeholder asset left in a game from prototyping that got missed. That's not what he did.
It's just not analogous at all and I find it impossible to believe that's the reason this happened.
They're the exact same model with a mildly different texture.
This forum has a weird trend of taking the most minute differences and treating it like an entirely different design; this isn't the first thread I've seen it in.
It's a tree man. Even knowing what it looks like now, looking at the original pictures, you cannot tell.
EDIT: and you're aware the OP was updated right? It did not have all those pictures originally.
Last edited:
Are you laughing based on the gif being there? The original post only had the two pictures at the bottom, which is hard as hell to make out similarities.
Ah, this explains it then, I did assume the GIF was there initially.
The two pics at the bottom are such bad points of comparison though, that jumping straight to "they're completely different trees" is very premature regardless, because you can't make that assessment with any certainty one way or the other in regards to how different they actually are with just those crappy pics. (I mean 'premature response' basically sums up the first two pages of the thread in general.)
And it's still quite funny in hindsight when the model turned out to be identical.
This forum man.
As a dev and an artist i dont know which people depress me more, the ones jumping into conclussions suoer fast something that happens on era all the fucking time, or the guys that were "well its just a tree, even if its stolen the devs that created it can go and fuck off" lile if this shit was easy.
And hippo's post is so depressing to read because in every dev community ive been, theres always a guy exactly like ben.
Like, people on era would be surprised how much shady one man team or small teams of people are in this bussiness sadly.
The thread title rrally needs to be changed, mods
As a dev and an artist i dont know which people depress me more, the ones jumping into conclussions suoer fast something that happens on era all the fucking time, or the guys that were "well its just a tree, even if its stolen the devs that created it can go and fuck off" lile if this shit was easy.
And hippo's post is so depressing to read because in every dev community ive been, theres always a guy exactly like ben.
Like, people on era would be surprised how much shady one man team or small teams of people are in this bussiness sadly.
The thread title rrally needs to be changed, mods
I'm another indie dev from the community who fell victim to Ben's nonsense. He got in contact with me on Discord asking for some shader help. I'm pretty open to sharing techniques and info on what I've made, but i never simply screenshot my code or send them the actual asset. I usually link them to tuts/docs that helped me figure stuff out or just give them a rather detailed technical explanation of how to do it... no hand-holding.
At first, Ben seemed to be fine with that and appeared to follow what I told him... you know, 10 years in the industry and all that, only to come back an hour later complaining how it's so hard for him to hand paint a custom mask in Photoshop because he's not an artist but a level designer. This went on for a while... but he eventually gave up. But every time I share something new on twitter, He kept coming back on Discord praising my work, then slithers into asking me to show him what the code looked like. Again, I explain it to him, he goes off to try and then comes back ranting as usual. This went on for a few months but I never gave in.
he claims he's been a freelancer prior to Kumo... he shared with me that he was doing an art test for a role at another small indie studio... and I actually knew someone there (Ben did not know this). And guess what, he kept on complaining about it and started asking me for help on the test.
He also had this habit of boasting about who all he "knew" on twitter and made it sound like they were all buddies. That's when he mentioned Hippowombat and guess what, I wasn't the only one who was annoyed with Ben's behaviour... of course Hippo has been dealing with him longer and had it worse. Things started to heat up when OMNO had a successful KS campaign and when he pretty much copied his campaign outline, and both OMNO and Hippo called him out on it, he threw a tantrum and started ranting about it to me... that was when I just blocked him and kept my distance.
From what I can tell after dealing directly with the guy, he is not a developer, he's more of a salesman... and should probably go back to being an Advisor at GAME (probably counted that in his 10 years in the GAME industry). He has this illusion that he's able to make something unique and simply draws inspiration from other games like Rime and Journey. But the guy cannot see when he's blatantly copying something... and gets defensive when you point it out.
At first, Ben seemed to be fine with that and appeared to follow what I told him... you know, 10 years in the industry and all that, only to come back an hour later complaining how it's so hard for him to hand paint a custom mask in Photoshop because he's not an artist but a level designer. This went on for a while... but he eventually gave up. But every time I share something new on twitter, He kept coming back on Discord praising my work, then slithers into asking me to show him what the code looked like. Again, I explain it to him, he goes off to try and then comes back ranting as usual. This went on for a few months but I never gave in.
he claims he's been a freelancer prior to Kumo... he shared with me that he was doing an art test for a role at another small indie studio... and I actually knew someone there (Ben did not know this). And guess what, he kept on complaining about it and started asking me for help on the test.
He also had this habit of boasting about who all he "knew" on twitter and made it sound like they were all buddies. That's when he mentioned Hippowombat and guess what, I wasn't the only one who was annoyed with Ben's behaviour... of course Hippo has been dealing with him longer and had it worse. Things started to heat up when OMNO had a successful KS campaign and when he pretty much copied his campaign outline, and both OMNO and Hippo called him out on it, he threw a tantrum and started ranting about it to me... that was when I just blocked him and kept my distance.
From what I can tell after dealing directly with the guy, he is not a developer, he's more of a salesman... and should probably go back to being an Advisor at GAME (probably counted that in his 10 years in the GAME industry). He has this illusion that he's able to make something unique and simply draws inspiration from other games like Rime and Journey. But the guy cannot see when he's blatantly copying something... and gets defensive when you point it out.
Readt the thread. The Kumo developer is completely full of shit.
Yeah I said to someone before, that even if you don't know shit about assets, you should at least be aware that you probably don't know shit. And when you don't know shit, and when all you have to judge the issue by is a crappy image having completely different angles and colors, and when a developer claims they are the same, maybe give some benefit of doubt to the developer claiming an asset theft and trust at least a little that just maybe they know something about assets that you don't. And if they're for whatever reason trying to bully the other developer (I'm not sure if there's ever been a case with a developer trying to bully by claiming an asset theft), you didn't lose anything by waiting a little until further details.
And besides, the Kumo developer's reaction in the first place was pretty damn weird. Calling the company out publicly would be pretty much the last thing to do after querying why they're claiming an asset theft and after asking them to do proof and showing them the proof.
It just keeps piling up. Thank you for sharing.
It worked for Bright Memory didn't it? Replaced the assets afterwards after getting some money selling the game.
There are some priceless quotes in that interview... so cringe worthy, yet gold!
"Tree generator which i coded in Houdini" I like how he took complete credit for that despite tweeting about how he followed LucenDev's in-depth tutorial. Knowing Ben, he probably just renamed a node in Houdini and calls it his own code
I'm a dev myself (lead artist at respectable studio) and I have never seen anyone using actual 3D models as a reference. Much like character artists don't using tracing paper! Real-life photos or concept art, yes, definitely. That's where an artist translates something into their own style or following an art direction, and that takes skill.
I also find it preposterous to think you're in the clear when using ripped game assets, simply because you found them online, and didn't rip them yourself.
This dude tends to proclaims his "experience" as fact, and generally anything you say with conviction and confidence people tend to take as the truth. And he has a knack for convincing himself of his own bullshit. This is also apparent in how he claims conventions such as GDC are vital for a game's success. In reality, it costs way more money than it returns and is more of a company outing and a milestone to work towards a working demo.
Oh wow, health issues huh? He really went there, didn't he? Sudden health issues when being caught is one of the oldest tricks in the scam artist playbook. I've seen this soooo many times before. It's used to attempt to make any detractors appear bad and mean for picking on someone who's sick, effectively placing them in the victim role. Don't fall for it!
That first gif nailed it. Its a 1:1 copy. Not sure if its posted later but all these comments that say its not the same has me wondering if a few of you aren't overdue for a visit to specsavers.
I think the issues come in when backers treat Kickstarter like a preorder. That if the kickstarter doesn't deliver then "I didn't get my product". But if you back something with the mindset of "i'm making a donation to this project, in hopes it gets finished", you'll probably be more careful on what you back.
It was edited after, you can see what the OP was after the big words saying 'Original Post'.
Man, this post need more attention. Thanks for sharing, definitely establishes the pattern of behaviour. I kind of feel bad for this dude.
He defends himself so confidently... I've NEVER heard of any dev using an actual model as reference in engine. He'd make a better argument for himself if he said he used it as reference in Blender, which is still a poor shot at defence in his case. Someone mentioned an image in Uncharted 4 being left in as a placeholder... just because Naughty Dog did it doesnt make it standard practice or just fine. Also there is a difference between "reference" and "placeholder"
Im curious if we know each other at all since we both seem to have personal experience with Ben. I first met him in the UE4 slackers group. I know hippowombat and I'm mutuals with the omno developer. Anyway for you guys to DM your twitters so I can follow you if I'm not already?