Tyson Butler-Boschma achieved what most independent game developers dream of when his game became a viral hit on social media this year.
"A Superman Style Flight Experience" was a proof of concept built in just a single weekend, but it was shared widely on social media accumulating millions of views and hundreds of thousands of downloads.
That popularity unfortunately made it a target for scammers who uploaded and sold it on Steam, one of the biggest video games stores.
"About two weeks ago I got a message from someone that follows me online saying, 'hey have you seen this game up on Steam? It looks like your game'," Mr Butler-Boschma said.
"I went to check it out and thought that looks exactly like my game project, and the more I investigated it, I realised that it was exactly my game project."
The sellers had taken the free project, renamed and removed a few files, then put it for sale at prices ranging between $16.50 and $60.
Mr Butler-Boschma was banned from the game's discussion forum when he tried to warn people, so he bought the game, which allowed him to post a review.
In a bitter twist, the sellers then claimed Mr Butler-Boschma was actually an ex-team member trying to steal all the credit.
The sellers then submitted a copyright claim against the original viral videos on Mr Butler-Boschma's YouTube channel.
"[Monday night] I see a little notification pop up on my email, it was a message from YouTube saying you've received a copyright strike, your superman content that you made months ago has been removed," Mr Butler-Boschma said.
"I'm like what, are you serious?"
Game developers authenticate claim
Rami Ismail, a prominent independent developer, saw Mr Butler-Boschma's call for help and decided to step in by asking YouTube and Steam directly on Twitter.
"When I was a younger developer, a foreign studio made a direct clone of a successful title I was working on. It threw my tiny studio and our motivation into disarray, and it was only through the support of tens of thousands of developers that the story reached the world and the companies that could act," Mr Ismail said.
"In this industry, the only way to stop bad things from happening is [by] standing together. If I can be a part of that, I would like to see it as paying it forward."
Mr Ismail said games being unknowingly uploaded to online stores by third parties was fairly common, but unfortunately developers did not always find out. He is calling for the platform holders to do more.
"A functional report system that doesn't require the literal global press and industry influencers to be informed would be nice," Mr Ismail said.
"It's fair to argue Steam can't hand-moderate everything for existence anywhere else, but they can act on it when they get a few reports with evidence attached.
"It took me less than 15 minutes to verify this story as legitimate.
"Steam earns 30 per cent of the sale of every game ever sold through the platform. They can use a fraction of the billions of dollars of revenue to support the industry that makes them that money."
The game was removed from sale and the copyright strikes were rescinded after the story went viral with video games press, YouTubers and on Reddit.
"I feel blessed that people saw my story and decided to help out, but I can't help but feel sad that it took it going viral again for it to be resolved," Mr Butler-Boschma said.
Both Steam store operator Valve Software and the sellers of Heroes City Superman Edition were approached for comment.
