Many fans were delighted at the arrival of Pixel Factory’s Parasite in City on Steam just over a week ago. Unfortunately, in a recent blog post by the developer, it was reported that this listing was not created by them at all.

[UPDATE 12/18/2018] The group who initially uploaded Parasite in City as their own haven't stopped their deception. Currently, the Steam store page is for a game called Poor Sakura Fight 2. Also, the release date was changed to April 22, 2012 to further cover their tracks. Unfortunately for them, this page still details the full history of what they've done. Anyone mentioning the developer's dirty deeds is being banned. [/UPDATE]

In the wake of Tumblr’s recent “exodus of adult content,” Sony blocking boobies, and all sorts of other gaming-related catastrophes, we are reminded once again that Steam is still not a flawless storefront. Another opportunistic non-developer has taken it upon himself to upload a game he didn’t make. This time, Pixel Factory’s Parasite in City was targeted for this all-too-common crime. Pixel Factory made the following post:

2018年12月05日 22:01 We are sorry that we 've been disappeared for a long time , and came back with a scam incident. We have recently learned that someone has uploaded our game "Parasite in the City"on steam without our consent. After discussing with the team we found that the person who uploaded the game on Steam is not one of us . Please do not pay any money to this scam . We will discuss this issue with Valve and take this fraud down quickly . Thank you. 最近、誰かが私たちのゲーム「Parasite in the City」をチームの同意なしでSteamにアップロードしたことを知りました。 チーム内で話し合った結果、私たちのプロジェクトが誰かに盗まれたことが分かりました。 この詐欺にお金を払わないでください。 私たちはValveと相談してこの問題に対応する予定です。 https://store.steampowered.com/app/985120/Test_Build/

It would seem that the would-be thieves have realized they were caught. At the time of writing, they have completely nuked the store page in an effort to cover their tracks; however, thanks to the help of SteamDB, we can see the various changes that were made along the way. Below are some screenshots outlining the store page’s information when it was created, and when it was modified later on. Also, while the non-developers have wiped the community hub clean, we can still see the incriminating title at the top of the page.

If you've been following recent developments on Steam, you may be aware that this isn’t the first time someone uploaded a title they didn’t own onto Steam. One such case is when 2ndUp Studios’ Red Alliance was illegally submitted to Steam Greenlight back in 2015. Aside from having to suffer the headache of filing a DMCA claim, there was also a secondary problem. The game’s name was filed in Steam’s database, which initially prevented the real developer from submitting it legitimately. Another case was when SakuraGame created a store page for a game, despite not having the rights to it. You can read more about that here.

On the bright side, the real developers were able to contact Valve before this game fully launched. Hopefully, if Pixel Factory ever does decide to put Parasite in City on Steam, they will be able to without much of an issue. For now, you can still buy their game legitimately on DLsite for $14.33. If you're interested in our thoughts on this title, you can also check out our review.

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