Disco Elysium creators continue their fight against ZA/UM: "Paying back stolen money does not undo the crime"

Robert Kurvitz and Aleksander Rostov, original creators of Disco Elysium, have shared an update on their legal dispute with ZA/UM. Both stated that they didn’t drop their unfair dismissal claims.

A joint statement was provided to GamesIndustry.biz by Disco Elysium lead designer and writer Robert Kurvitz and Sander Taal. The latter is an alias for Aleksander Rostov, the game’s art director.

They called ZA/UM’s recent press release, in which the studio claimed that the developers have dropped their “unfair dismissal” claims due to lack of evidence, “deeply misleading.” As Kurvitz and Rostov pointed out, “We see our dismissal as part of a larger campaign against us and will pursue legal options accordingly.”

They claimed to remain minority shareholders of ZA/UM.

The developers also commented on a separate claim from Disco Elysium producer Kaur Kender, who eventually dropped his lawsuit against the studio in December and, according to ZA/UM, repaid all his debts and divested his shares in the company.

Quick reminder: Kender initially claimed that ZA/UM majority shareholders, Ilmar Kompus and Tõnis Haavel, took over the company by buying a story draft and four sketches made for the Disco Elysium sequel and reselling them back to ZA/UM for €4.8 million.

In their latest statement, Kurvitz and Rostov noted that they won’t be silenced in the ongoing legal dispute, even though Kompus paid back the money back to the studio. “Paying back stolen money, however, does not undo the crime; here, it does not undo the majority that Kompus and Haavel have illegally gained in ZA/UM,” the developers said, adding that Kompus and Haavel “have no power on us.”