The past few weeks of videogame publisher drama have been for the most part dedicated to the dispute between Tecmo and their former Rockstar/Director Tomonobu Itagaki, however Tecmo will need to move over and make room for another old school publisher.

German videogame site 4players.de claims to be involved in apparent legal battle with Atari stemming from the sites review of “Alone in the Dark”, a multiplatform horror/action game published by Atari due to hit US store shelves on June 24th, 2008.

Keeping in mind that the original article is in German, and it is well beyond the “normal” business hours we would utilize to obtain a comment from Atari, we were able to loosely interpret the following information from the public complaint aired on the German gaming site:

• Atari pulled advertising from site after receiving a less than satisfactory review.
• Atari tried in some way to influence their reporting (review) of the game.
• Atari is claiming that their review is not based on a final copy of the game.
• Atari is claiming some sort of illegal download of the game took place.
• Atari is seeking damages in the form of a monetary value (50,000 euros).
• Site claims in P.S. format that Ubisoft did not pull advertising despite Haze receiving a 66% overall.

Not sure what that last point has to do with the current issue at hand — maybe the website is attempting to show their maturity by kicking a little dirt in the direction of Atari.

Tags: alone-in-the-dark, Atari, german review, lawsuit

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