I'm back with another standalone Skullgirls post. Also, as you can see, it has been a year since my father died and will soon be a year since I attended at my father's funeral at my old stomping grounds. But let's not talk about that and move on to something very interesting. Anyway, let's get right into the post.
Autumn Games has owned the rights of the Skullgirls IP from the get-go. For years, they have worked behind the scenes as the unwavering backbone of Skullgirls, ensuring its grouth. They have been working with multiple teams like Reverge Labs, Lab Zero Games, Future Club and Hidden Variable, before they quit Skullgirls development or course. Now, before I tell you what happened to Hidden Variable and why they quit Skullgirls development, I like to rewind back to the point where Hidden Variable took over for 2nd Encore's development.
Back in 2020, the developers had left Lab Zero Games because of Mike Z's behavior and went on to form their own development studio dubbed thee Future Club. This is a development studio they formed and it's basically the same people without Mike Z. They also stepped up for the development of the Skullgirls IP with Hidden Variable because they stated that they planned to work with the people who left Lab Zero, which is a great thing. Back in 2021, the next chapter of Skullgirls development has began with the Season 1 Pass that contains four new characters. Back in 2024, the Season 1 Pass containing Annie, Umbrella, Black Dahlia and Marie is complete and the update for the Nintendo Switch and Xbox ports were done and dusted so that they would double their efforts on the general balance patch. Originally, they wanted to bring in the additional voice content, but they decided to release it in 2025 for quality so that there wouldn't be problems. But what happened?
Well, let's get to what is factual on what we heard on the grapevine of things. In November 1, 2024, the payments have rolled in and Hidden Variable stated that Autumn owes them that much money. But Autumn refused to make a single payment they owed, not one.
Because of Autumn's refusal to make payments, Hidden Variable has quit Skullgirls development because of the legal dispute with Autumn Games for alleged breaches of contract, implied covenant of good faith and fair dealing and for goods and services rendered according to the court papers and for $1.2 million in unpaid fees. That explains why we haven't gotten a roadmap in January. They also added that they wouldn't make further comments until the dispute is resolved. But we haven't heard from Hidden Variable yet because they are still having a legal battle with Autumn for eight months.
It wasn't just Hidden Variable that is no longer involved in Skullgirls development, but Future Club as well, the same people minus Mike Z as they were working on their first original indie title, Part Time Hero: I'm Broke, but I'm Here to Save the World. But it did not reach the funding goal. It fell way short from it. And now, they are on hibernation, but they'll be back at some point. With no developer in sight, there's no way Skullgirls can continue active development... until one glimmer of hope came.
Jason Donnell of Autumn Games had released a statement saying that Skullgirls is more than just a game, it's a passion project. They are stepping up to reinvest in the IP. To make it even more groundbreaking, Guilds are coming to Mobile later this year and we're getting close to their release as they are in the final stages. That is nice, but that's only just a taste on how Autumn would usurp Skullgirls development. Since Autumn is taking over, left over pieces of content such as the third Guest Star being Roxie, additional VO for the Season Pass characters and the second season of the Webtoon adaption are still on the docket. Skullgirls is about to be taken into the next chapter and the Mobile release is going strong that we're getting more Silver Variants every month and Guilds are getting closer to launch.
How is that possible? Well, Hidden Variable has said that they gave Autumn until January 21 to make payments to them. However, when Autumn made none of the payments, Hidden Variable has provided Autumn with all of the account login information required to continue providing community support for the game so that it wouldn't cause a single damage to it so that Mobile and 2nd Encore would continue active development regardless. They done that before quitting Skullgirls development and suing Autumn.
Speaking of 2nd Encore, this brings me to my point. Remember what I said that additional VO for the Season Pass characters are still on the docket? I don't think that we're get the additional VO for the Season Pass characters this year Hidden Variable had originally planned before they quit Skullgirls development, so I have thought about this for a while and believe that Autumn is not gonna pick up where Hidden Variable left off during the development of 2nd Encore this year because they got to get the extraordinarily long promised feature being Guilds out of the way first before taking over 2nd Encore development. But that's just me speculating and spitballing. But it can be true because if we go back to Jason for a second here...
"However, it has become especially clear that we have not been delivering on our promises to you the fans; to bring new characters, stories, features, and game modes in the way you deserved. To be blunt, that is why we're making changes now."
Now, this is something you need to hone in on. This means Autumn is making changes to guarantee us to bring in new characters, stories and all that to not just Mobile, but 2nd Encore as well in the way we wanted, so Roxie and the Season 2 Pass are thankfully still on the docket and this is considered as big. Just so you know, I don't think that Autumn is gonna poke the bear when it comes to Skullgirls that they wouldn't release new characters or pick up where Hidden Variable left off with development of left over content like additional VO for the Season Pass characters in 2nd Encore until the Guilds are released as Guilds are an extraordinarily long promised feature being the most important one and fair enough. While Autumn taking over Skullgirls' ongoing development is a great deal, there is one thing that could've happened that serves as a silver-lining of all this.
Now, if I remember correctly, Naughty Dog and Sony had worked together under a licensing deal from Universal to make Crash Team Racing after Sony negotiated between the companies after Universal treated Naughty Dog poorly by turning off the air conditioning to the building, right? So, if Future Club was still involved in Skullgirls' development while Hidden Variable is still having a legal dispute with Autumn, then maybe they could negotiate between the companies, meaning that both Hidden Variable and Future Club would work together under a licensing deal from Autumn so that Hidden Variable would have the least amount of contact with Autumn as possible.
But rest assured that this will be a good difference that if they get Guilds out of the way in November or December, the new chapter of Skullgirls development on both 2nd Encore and Mobile can REALLY begin in 2026. They will not make a lampoon out of themselves in both sections like they did to get themselves wound up getting sued by Hidden Variable for breach of contract and $1.2 million after their refusal to pay what they owe.
Speaking of making a lampoon out of themselves in both sections, did you know that moderators of the Skullheart made a lampoon out of themselves with their pig slop low content post penalty smear, on both the Beta thread and the visual issue reporting thread? I have the link to the post that covers all of that if you're interested.
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