Hello, everyone, KnockDownJoe here and today's Joe's Monologues is gonna ruffle people's feathers. I have interesting things to talk about, so read this.
Hidden Variable's Departure:
So that morning was so devastating. When I woke up, X dropped an article telling us that Hidden Variable is no longer involved in the development of Skullgirls. I am going to tell you what happened and why Hidden Variable left development of Skullgirls in any way, shape or form.
Let's start with what happened before Hidden Variable left Skullgirls development. The payments started to roll in on November 1, 2024 with the $131,000 payment. The same amount rolled in on November 15, 2024, December 1, 2024 and December 15, 2024, January 1, 2025 and January 15, 2025. Then the $139,000 payment was announced on February 1, 2025, February 15, 2025, March 1, 2025 and March 15, 2025. But publisher Autumn Games refused to pay any of the following amount they owed.
Now let's go on to why Hidden Variable left Skullgirls development. On March 5, 2025, Hidden Variable released their statement stating that as of January 21, 2025, they are no longer involved in the development of the Skullgirls IP due to their legal dispute with Autumn Games, which is the subject of litigation filed in the Los Angeles County Supreme Court. They are suing the publisher for the total of $1.2 million in unpaid fees in the Hidden Variable v. Autumn Games case.
The post about Skullgirls Top 8 in Frosty Faustings from January 20th of this year from 2nd Encore's X account has turned out to be the final post, one day before Hidden Variable is no longer in the development of Skullgirls in any way, shape or form, which kind of reminded me of the dissolving transition from the Walt Disney Television logo to the Buena Vista International logo, which somehow gave me the same level of chills as the Cartoon Network skull. That explains why we haven't got any news regarding 2nd Encore for so long since the general balance update or this year's roadmap. They also added that they will not make further comments on the matter until the dispute is resolved, including a reason why Autumn refused to make payments they owed by breaching the 12th Amendment repeatedly.
Hidden Variable has thanked us for our endless support on Skullgirls for years and we allowed it to thrive. Other than creating and supporting Skullgirls Mobile, they promoted Skullgirls esports with the SGCS circuit, brought new characters to 2nd Encore through its first Season Pass, expanded 2nd Encore and the Season 1 Pass to Xbox and Nintendo Switch and produced a Webtoon adaptation. From December 2014 to October 2024, Autumn and Hidden Variable had provided a business relationship between them for Skullgirls Mobile. And by the time the lawsuit was filed, their business partnership between them and Hidden Variable's contract with Autumn for nearly a decade have been terminated and it was just a Frankenstein mess of ideas that weren't even fully cooked, because Autumn refused to pay the amount of money they owed Hidden Variable to. But there is one silver lining to this story.
Autumn has released a statement regarding an update on Skullgirls that contains a glimmer of hope. Jason Donnell stated that Skullgirls is more than a game. It is a passion project we poured our hearts into as they became an unwavering backbone and it involved in so many extraordinary ways because of support of various teams from Reverge Labs to Lab Zero Games, Future Club and Hidden Variable Studios.
But to get a small snippet of things, Skullgirls would get approved by Autumn Games to get developed under the Reverge Labs name and under the Konami banner. Then later, the game was removed because of Mike Z's antics, but came back as Skullgirls Encore developed under the Lab Zero Games name. Years later, Lab Zero Games has been dissolved by Mike's sexual harassment practice and others left Lab Zero to form Future Club and development of Skullgirls continued under both names of Hidden Variable and Future Club. And now, where it stands, the contract has been terminated as Hidden Variable is no longer involved in the development of Skullgirls because they are suing Autumn Games. Future Club didn't even bother negotiating between the companies so that the game can continue active development without a contract because according to their X bio, they are no longer involved in the development of Skullgirls, it seems.
Reason being is that they are developing their first original game called Part-Time Hero: I'm Broke, But I'm Here to Save the World. The Kickstarter for their first original game launches in two days, so back it and spread the word about it to anyone to make it happen. If they find a publisher for this game, their project will expand to more platforms because you know, a publisher like Modus formed an acquisition with MANE6 to benefit bringing Them's Fightin' Herds to consoles and wanting a character for BBTAG and using a SEGA vs. Capcom style of showcase was the cherry on top.
Donnell also stated that Skullgirls will continue development despite Hidden Variable's departure and they are stepping up to reinvest the project, so it's possible that they are going to pick up where Hidden Variable left off. Is it also possible that the development of Skullgirls can be much faster? Sure, it can be much faster since Autumn is a massive team of game developers, storytellers and passionate fans as the statement said. To make matters better, they are even planning to deliver on their promise to us fans as they are making changes now. Think of Epic Games. They are a massive team, which is why development of Fortnite took the shortest amount of time. Which reminds me; if we get a Skullgirls character in Fortnite, it can spark frenzy among fans of Skullgirls.
The statement has a hopeful paragraph written in bold. Guilds are coming to Skullgirls later this year and they are now actually in development since they have taken over in the past few months. That is indeed hopeful and it's only a taste as to how Autumn would usurp Skullgirls development while delivering on their promise to us; to bring new characters, new stories, new features and new game modes following Hidden Variable's departure, so this means additional VO consisting of Annie's alternative voice pack, Japanese VO for the Season Pass characters in combat and English (and hopefully Japanese) VO for the Season Pass characters' story modes, the Season 2 Pass, Roxie, the third Guest Star, the later quarters' monthly fighters, the second season of the Webtoon adaptation and more are still on the docket and thank goodness for that. It's because Hidden Variable provided Autumn the login information required to provide community support for the game after they refused to pay $1.2 million before suspending the Services in a way to not cause damage to the IP.
They also told us to stay tuned for updates soon after saying that they can't wait to take Skullgirls into the new chapter together and I am pretty dang excited for this, so updates should involve a detailed roadmap that contains news about the remaining things that are on the docket for not just Mobile, but 2nd Encore as well. In fact, with 2nd Encore being available on all four digital storefronts on Steam, PlayStation, Xbox and Switch, this new chapter is likely to be a fresh one.
Bottom line, if Autumn paid Hidden Variable the money they owed in the first place, then Hidden Variable wouldn't sue them and they would still be involved in the development of Skullgirls so that we can finally get word about what is coming on the docket sooner. In fact, if Future Club is still involved in the development of Skullgirls, they could negotiate between the companies to continue active development without a contract like Sony did to negotiate between Naughty Dog and Universal to make their kart racer without a contract.
But I think it's clear as to why Autumn Games would refuse to pay the total amount of money they owe to Hidden Variable. It's probably because Autumn was interested in pursuing a separate developer for the Mobile release after they failed to seek to sell their business. And to be honest, Autumn refusing to make payments to Hidden Variable is actually a wise decision as they will sell their business if they paid $1.2 million to Hidden Variable.
The Fall of MultiVersus:
Another devastating morning after we came across a tweet that MultiVersus is going to shut down at the end of May after Season 5. Warner Bros. Games has announced that because the game was not living up to its full potential. It was attributed by a relaunch strategy, a ridiculous handling of microtransactions and slow paced gameplay, which was fixed to be buttery smooth. I was able to do a livestream on my gaming laptop to showcase how the game ran well on it. Once May 30th comes, the game will be relegated to local play for the forseeable future, unless if there is enough fan support, the game could come back.
However, that is not gonna happen because weeks later, Player First Games has been shut down, along with other developers. What this means is that MultiVersus will never again see the light of day. As it turns out, the Mightykeef skit regarding MultiVersus shutting down has sealed the deal. I was darn shocked to see Player First Games shutting down, which is why the MultiVersus X account stopped making new posts. It hurts to see them and their game bite the dust despite Warner Bros. acquiring them. I was looking forward to seeing Harry Potter, Godzilla and a host of others make it too. It's just not cool to darn near shut down their platform fighter game prematurely, especially when it is multiplatform. I am planning to do a send off livestream if I don't have plans.
With MultiVersus shutting down soon, they intend to shift their focus to working on their collaborations and bringing them to other games like Fortnite, which is nice, but not as nice as having a platform fighter with Warner Bros. characters. But we are getting something nice from them, and it's a free-to-play hero shooter that is completely similar and akin to Marvel Rivals, but with DC characters. And I believe it can be called... DC Rivals?
Fortunately, there is only one free-to-play fighting game that I know will not take off or have a ridiculous handling of microtransactions, and that's 2XKO.
News Regarding 2XKO:
That's right, we have news regarding 2XKO. Shaun Rivera came with some news on X. The Pulse Fuse is being removed in favor of the autocombo setting each player will toggle on or off with at the character select screen. Fans delivered feedback regarding turning on autocombo while having a different Fuse. Now, I completely agree with having an autocombo setting on the character select screen while equipping a different Fuse. With the Pulse Fuse being removed, we are getting a new Fuse, which is the Sidekick Fuse. It allows the assist character to stay sidelined to support the point character, which gets more HP during the Fuse.
And as for the next Alpha Lab, we got info about it. But it's gonna be much smaller while devs build the infrastructure needed to ensure that they can bring the game to even more players and so that they can gear up for launch. Even if the the next Alpha Lab is gonna be smaller, Jinx is still on the docket to be playable.
Now, I made a suggestion of a new game mode where the assist character gets in battle with the point character on both sides recently. But since we're getting the new Sidekick Fuse, I am also going to make a suggestion of a new Fuse that allows the assist character to get in battle with the point character, so I think it's a Cross Fuse. This can go either way. It's either a new game mode or a new Fuse.
The February update was only just a taste, so the update coming in March will cover what they have been up to.
Crash Bandicoot Brawl:
Canadian Guy Eh recently posted a video about an official and fake game called Crash Bandicoot Brawl. I made a reaction while watching that. Even the page is fake that it showed the wrong ESRB rating of M. Activision's Facebook account shown a fake promotion of a fake game. Activision made that game, but it doesn't exist somehow. That crap was funny, though. He was ticked off at that practice Activision had done just to trick us into filling out the survey and he ended the video by exiting his room and closing the door to get some coffee, like oh my gosh, what a weird way to end the video. His phone rang during the video too.
On the upside, I think we all know that what the fake promotion of Crash Bandicoot Brawl means. Activision could be showing us their interest of maintaining the Crash Bandicoot brand to enlist somebody to make a new Crash game. If the alleged Crash Bandicoot Brawl game becomes real, I am interested in it and I am getting it now that I got a new phone with a bigger space. In fact, if it comes to Steam, I will get it on there if it takes a very small amount of space because I gotta get a 5 TB external hard drive to hold my games that use a lot of space like Mortal Kombat 1, which took a ridiculous amount of GB, and I wish we can play PS5 games directly though an external hard drive.
And speaking of Crash Bandicoot, I have neglected to tell you this on my post about finally being able to revisit my old stomping grounds. During my earlier days at high school in my old stomping grounds, I caused a conversation about how I loved Crash Bandicoot in any way, shape or form. What is special about that is that the franchise taken to a new direction when the 6th generation consoles came out. There was even a cancelled game called Crash Landed. That game didn't see the light of day because of the poor quality and the 4 hour gameplay spanning. I was reminising about the part where I talk about Crash Bandicoot at my high school back in the day on the time before I moved to Arizona too. It's all in good fun since Dr. Heinz Doofenshmirtz. But hey, it was worth it.
Conclusion:
It has been one heck of a year so far with devastating mornings with news and a long string of announcements. Here's to many more.
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