Cryptocurrency mining, overheating Switch consoles, and a mysterious pull from the Nintendo eShop - there’s a lot of drama surrounding Cooking Mama: Cookstar. But in the span of 48 hours, a lot’s been cleared up, and we can firmly say this is likely the end of this crazy story.
In an exclusive interview with ScreenRant, an anonymous developer has spoken up about all the controversy surrounding this game. As it turns out, the reason Cookstar was pulled from the eShop has nothing to do with blockchain or DRM. Instead, they reveal that Cooking Mama Ltd. (also known as Office Create) is trying to strongarm the developer into releasing a more polished game. Turns out, Mama’s licenseholders aren’t too happy with the state of the finished product.
From the sound of it, Office Create grew upset with the quality of the game. Planet Entertainment went ahead with the agreed-upon release, only to have Office Create flex their muscle and get the game pulled. All the while, 1st Playable tried their best to make a polished game against what sound like pretty dire circumstances.
At one point the japanese official create clients came to oversee development. An argument started and the clients were told to go home if they weren’t being “constuctive”. Once they found out that planet entertainment released the game, they used their nintendo contacts to pull it from the e-shop and stop production of cartridges.
Office Create, from the sound of it, sabotaged the release of the game until the quality was up to their standards. Planet then went ahead with the planned release, against Office Create’s wishes, which resulted in the Japanese developer using their contacts to scrub the game. Planet Entertainment then sued them for not holding up their end of the licensing agreement, as well as for money lost on development. Now, there’s a good chance the game may never come out.
We were told the game was coming out in March. That’s all anyone knew. The boss at 1p, tobi, keeps that kind of thing to herself mostly stating she doesn’t want to stress us with the details… Advertising was blocked by office create too. There were youtube ads, websites, and even tik tok ads that never came out.
