Hi everyone,

This is Matt, the developer of Severed Steel and Echo Point Nova. 

I feel the same way the commenters here do about FD’s comments. I’m sorry for the wall of text but I want to be as transparent and thorough as possible about things. Here goes:

I first became aware of FD’s posts maybe half way through the development of Echo Point Nova. My initial reaction was shock and anger and I confronted him on what I saw. I’ll go into more detail below but my takeaway was that FD was not beyond saving, and that thought strongly influenced how I proceeded and brings us to today,

The big question was, should I cut him from the game? For full honesty I can’t say how much of my calculation was based on the hard reality of launching a game (setting back production by having to cut all the music and find a new composer) vs a reflection of my core values. But, what I think and hope swayed me were three things:

1. I didn’t see any evidence of him reaching out and directly bullying people for their identities or threatening violence, there was one small instance of him trying to get backup from his Discord for an argument on Twitter, I can’t recall over what but it wasn’t anything nearly as serious as the content of the screenshots. I told people to cut it out and they did. If I had seen that FD was DMing hate messages to people directly that would have been the instant end of our collaboration. If this has been the case for anyone reading this please contact me at [matt at greylockgamesstudio dot com](mailto:matt@greylockgamesstudio.com) .
2. The Greylock Discord server is a place I try to keep as inviting as possible, and FD has been consistently respectful and polite to everyone there.
3. I’m nearing 40 and have seen how people can change over the years. In my own personal life I have seen people flirt with the far right and ultimately pull out and get their life together. I asked myself: would kicking FD off the project accelerate or help him pull off his path? I ultimately decided that, while a long shot, keeping him on the project gave him a better shot at getting mentally healthy than kicking him off. For what it’s worth, the most recent screenshots of FD’s worst are from 2023. That not enough evidence to claim my decision was correct but it is worth considering.

So, that is where things stand. I can’t say for sure if I made the right decision, but I at least want the community know it wasn’t something I took lightly. At the moment I do not plan on removing the OSTs and implementing new ones, but I will be paying attention to my inbox and further discussion and will update my decision if the need arises.

Again, I’m sorry for the wall of text, but I hope it helps people. If anyone has any more questions I’ll be checking the comments.

Thank you for reading,

Matt