Shortly after the Steam Machine was first revealed, accessory company Dbrand tried to ride the wave with the announcement of its Companion Cube mod for said Steam Machine. It turns out, as the company often does, it forgot to ask permission, this time from Valve. So the short version of the story is that the mod no longer exists, beyond the annals of history anyway.
In a post on Reddit – which the previous product page now redirects to – the company provided a surprisingly detailed explanation as to what happened. It’s basically as I alluded to above – the company went nose first into putting up its concept render to gauge interest for the Companion Cube mod. And when “it went moderately viral”, the brand went straight into R&D without asking Valve if it could make use of something from the latter’s Portal IP in the first place.
So when the Steam Machine officially launched, alongside its monster price tag, Dbrand followed with the sale of the mod. Not too long after, Valve’s legal team reached out, and asked that all plugs related to the product be pulled. The accessory maker did try asking if it could now get permission, with it being “properly licensed, with their blessing, on their terms”. Considering that permission was being asked retroactively, it’s mostly understandable that Valve said no. In this case at least, it probably would have been easier to ask for permission than forgiveness after all.
Compared to previous spats that Dbrand has had with other brands – PlayStation comes to mind – the company looks to be very uncharacteristically gracious with this defeat. In the aforementioned Reddit thread, one fan sharply criticised the company for its lack of foresight, to which the only response was a simple “yes”. Compared to its previous cringe-inducing defiance, this response is surprisingly solemn. But for what it’s worth, in the short time that the Companion Cube mod was for sale, the company claims that it was its second-fastest selling product in its 15-year history.
(Source: Dbrand / Reddit)
