A Steam Early Access game won’t be updated for 3 years because its developer is going to jail

A developer has put further development of their Steam Early Access game on hold because they’re going to jail for three years.

Fortune’s Run was released on Early Access in September 2023 and has since earned a ‘Very Positive’ rating among its reviewers.

The game was placed in Early Access because its developer, who goes by the name Dizzie, wanted to “develop the game side-by-side with the community”, with the initial plan being to finish the game by 2026.

That plan will now no longer happen, because in a new update – as spotted by PCGamesN – Dizzie has informed players that they will be going to prison soon.

“I’ve been sentenced to prison for the next 3 years,” they wrote. “It’s a long story, but I’ve lived a very different life before I was a game developer, and I wasn’t living very well.

“My case is about 5 years old now, I have been going through the legal process the whole time I’ve been working on this. I have finally been found guilty and sentenced, and I’m going away next month.

“It’s a shame, but it’s the consequences of my actions. I was a very violent person and I hurt a lot of people in my life. Unfortunately, the sentence isn’t going to help with that at all, but I guess we all know that.”

Dizzie was developing the game alongside their wife, who was hospitalised last year due to illness. However, she won’t be continuing the game’s development in their absence.

“Once she recovered, she decided that she was no longer interested in game development,” Dizzie explained. “She was in charge of QA and a few level segments, all of which has been abandoned and I’ve been forced to get by on my own for the past while.

“It’s been very difficult to do alone but I actually managed, by basically not sleeping, to complete all of the work in time so that it could be released before I’m sent away. Since we decided to part ways, development will be completely interrupted until I’m released.”

Dizzie claimed that the game sold well enough to potentially enable them to finish it once they’re released from prison.

“I know many of you will be upset and disappointed but please understand that there’s absolutely nothing I can do, these wheels were in motion long before I started making this game and it’s just been slowly unraveling in my face the whole time,” they wrote.

“I want to underline that I’m no longer in financial dire straits since our game actually sold OK, so I should be able to afford rent once I get out, so there’s a chance that if you wait a few years I’ll be able to cap off the release. In fact, there’s not very much content left to work on, I’ve been making stubs and prototypes of the missing levels in my spare time.”