AN indie game developer has been forced to cancel a project after discovering his business partners had blown the budget on booze and strippers.

But what made this outrageous story even more scandalous was the fact the money spent had been donated by faithful contributors on global crowd-funding platform Kickstarter.

Lead programmer Eric Tereshinski had hoped to create Ant Simulator, a game in which players manage a colony from the ant’s perspective, through the venture ETeeski.

He and his then-business partners were able to raise just under $4500 on Kickstarter to get the project up and running, with it supplemented by income from preorders of the game.

Everything was going as planned until Mr Tereshinski discovered his two business partners had allegedly been having a little too much fun with company’s bank balance.

“They had secretly spent the overwhelming majority of both our Kickstarter money and the Ant Simulator investment money on liquor, restaurants bars and even strippers,” he said in a YouTube video.

As Mr Tereshinski and his ex-business partners created a Limited Liability Company — a business where owners are not personally liable for the debts and liabilities of the LLC — he was left with no option but to resign and cancel development of the game.

The lead developer said because of the agreement, his former partners and childhood friends had informed him they were going to sue him if he released the game without them.

“I trusted them and they had been my friends for 11 years. That means that resigning, and therefore cancelling the development of Ant Simulator, is really the only option available to me right now,” he said.

When asked about sourcing legal advice in regards to the issue, Mr Tereshinski said it wouldn’t be worth his time or money.

“They went over the contract line by line with me and I reviewed the whole thing twice. I just didn’t realise they had protected themselves,” he wrote.

As part of the agreement, Mr Tereshinski is also legally obliged to remove any online assets created during his time with the LLC.

“It’s a setback, but it’s not the end,” he said. “I am very pissed off I lost money, lost over a year of work and lost a game I loved, was proud of and was really looking forward to releasing on Stream and PS4.”

Mr Tereshinski said he would email backers of the project to offer them refunds for their donations.

According to the company’s website, the partners in question were director of finance Tyler Monce and director of operations Devon Staley.

News.com.au has contacted them both for comment, but is yet to receive a reply.