Slightly Mad Responds To Legal Threat News

The legal wrangling between Epic Games and Silicon Knights may have disappeared under the radar in recent months, but it seems that a fresh studio vs. studio battle is brewing ever stronger. A day after SimBin Studios confirmed it was looking into the possibility of legal action against Slightly Mad Studios, for alleged 'certain statements made by Slightly Mad Studios that we [SimBin] find to be incorrect, misleading and has a negative impact on our reputation,' the London-based outfit has responded with a statement of its own.

Released to US industry site Gamasutra, the statement was made by Slightly Mad Studios' chief Ian Bell, one of the founders of SimBin before later setting up Blimey! Games, which went into administration back in January.

Regarding SimBin's Marcus Ling's suggestions as “utterly absurd”, Bell explains over two dozen staff at SMS “...are actually credited in GT Legends and GTR2 including the majority of the core development team...They worked on these titles whilst at Blimey! Games Limited - who was involved in the development of GT Legends and actually developed GTR2 itself.”

He continued, “As you may know Blimey is now in administration but we recently purchased certain [aspects] of its business and assets and took on all the jobs of its excellent team. That team deserves the credit for its work.

Bell ends the statement commenting that, “It saddens me when fellow developers make inappropriate statements like this in public, but I think the fact that the first I heard of it was from a gaming journalist says everything you need to know about the credibility of the claims. Had there been any merit to them I am sure I would have heard sooner.”

TVG contacted Marcus Ling, one of SimBin's Executive Vice Presidents, for further clarification.  In response, Ling confirmed that he's unable to comment further “...until we have finished the discussions with our solicitors.”