Surgical Scalpels’ space-based astronaut shooter, Boundary, is poised to disappear from Steam in just a few days at the “end of June” amid a developer/publisher disagreement. The publisher Skystone Games first made the announcement on Steam on June 19th blaming the team for delays in delivering content but Surgical Scalpels followed up that same day explaining that they are due past compensation from Skystone. Both announcements — Surgical Scalpel’s translated from the Chinese platform BiliBili — follow:
We have an important update regarding the future of Boundary. After careful consideration, Skystone has decided to relinquish the publishing rights for Boundary, effective at the end of June.
Over the past few months, there have been significant delays and a noticeable absence of content updates for Boundary. Despite our best efforts and support, the developer has been unable to deliver the necessary updates and improvements to keep the game thriving. This has led to growing concerns within our community, and we share your frustration.
Starting at the end of June, the developer will resume the publishing rights for Boundary. Unfortunately, the developer has made the difficult decision to cease all services for the game instead of continuing to run it in its current state.
We understand this news is disappointing for many of our dedicated players who have supported Boundary through its journey, and we are as sad as you are that Boundary will not see its full potential.
We want to thank each of you for your passion and patience. Your support has been invaluable, and we are deeply grateful for the community we have built together.
Thank you for your understanding and support.
Steam Announcement – June 19, 2024
Lancet Studios (“we” or “the studio”) has received a unilateral notice from SkyStone, the publisher of Borderlands, that it will cease operating Borderlands in July 2024. All network functions of Borderlands will be stopped after June 30. Please stop purchasing all Borderlands products (including but not limited to Steam , HeiBox and other platforms) immediately.
SkyStone’s unilateral decision to cease operating Borderlands was extremely sudden, and was unreasonable and unfair to the studio and players. We immediately negotiated with SkyStone after receiving the notice, but unfortunately, we were unable to change SkyStone’s unilateral decision to cease operating Borderlands.
In response to the current situation, the studio is striving to regain the rights related to the operation of “Border” and is doing its utmost to retain the account data of “Border” to create conditions as much as possible for the subsequent re-launch of “Border”.
At the same time, the studio is continuing to fight for the revenue it deserves from Borderlands through negotiations and legal means, as it has not been able to recover the revenue it deserves from SkyStone so far.
※ important hint:
All players who have purchased Frontier are requested to log in to the game at least once before the end of June to complete the file creation (only players who have logged in at least once since the launch can be recorded by the current system).
Operations at the border may be suspended as a result, but they will not stop forever.
The studio is a stronghold on the border. As long as the stronghold is there, we will stay and we will never give up the border.
Announcement on BiliBili (Google Translated) – June 19, 2024
Regardless of the eventual outcome it seems likely that Boundary will still disappear at the end of the month as the situation is unlikely to be settled before then. As such we’ve added the 30th of June to the Watch List calendar and will have a page up on the site later.