Developer Frogwares has made a name for themselves as a solid midrange developer who specializes in detective games. Their most recent, The Sinking City, is solid Lovecraft-inspired title. Before that, they were largely known for their Sherlock Holmes games, which followed a similar structure to The Sinking City. Now, though, it seems those games could very well vanish, as a dispute with the publisher of those titles, Focus Home Interactive, has seen most of them be delisted from digital store.
In a statement released by Frogwares, they confirmed that all of their Sherlock Holmes titles have been pulled from digital storefronts with the exception of Sherlock Holmes Crimes & Punishments, which will suffer the same fate on September 29th. Apparently, the deal they had in place with Focus ended, and Focus is refusing to transfer rights to those listings to Frogwares, leading to delisting.
“As it stands right now, the only game left is Sherlock Holmes Crimes & Punishments which only has until September 29th,” Frogwares said. “It is possible that it will be taken down at this date or earlier if nothing is done. The players will no longer be able to buy and play the game. We will also lose all our Wishlists on those store pages. As the creators and IP owners of all those games, we have no control and no say in this. The decision of Focus Home left us voiceless.”
The developer is working on new store profiles, but due to the length of time and multiplatformed nature of some of these titles (many were released crossgen on PS3 and Xbox 360), it makes creating listings either costly or impossible.
What’s happened here is very unusual, and it seems as if it’s very possible some of these games, or at least, some versions of those games will never see a downloadable option again. We’ll keep you updated on this with hopes that all of this can be resolved.