As of now, Star Theory Games is out of business and at least half of the developers that were previously working on Kerbal Space Program 2 were poached by Take-Two in order to develop the game at their newly developed studio called Intercept Games.
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What happened with Take-Two and Star Theory Games?
The Bloomberg report details that after a falling out about clarifying royalty terms, Take-Two canceled its contract with Star Theory Games to develop Kerbal Space Program 2. Then, Michael Cook, an executive producer at Private Division (a publishing label within Take-Two Interactive Software Inc), sent messages to the Star Theory Games’ staff on LinkedIn about what was happening. Of course, telling them before founders Bob Berry and Jonathan Mavor only made Cook’s pitch easier. The goal? To convince the active developers working on the game to join Take-Two. “We are offering a compensation package that includes a cash sign-on bonus, an excellent salary, bonus eligibility and other benefits,” Cook wrote. Berry and Mavor attempted to encourage employees to stay, despite not having a current gaming deal active. However, roughly a dozen employees took Take-Two up on its offer, including the studio head and creative director. Star Theory Games attempted to bounce back by getting the rest of its employees to come up with ideas and prototypes to show off at the Game Developers Conference in mid-March. However, due to the coronavirus, that conference was canceled and Star Theory Games was forced to shut down on March 4. I recommend reading the full report as well as the rest of the quotes from the developers within it. But the biggest takeaway from this report is that the contract fell apart because Star Theory Games were attempting to fight for royalty terms with the company that has a market value of $15 billion.
