Last year, we reported that Sega used the British Police to recover a selection of dev kits and consoles it had "negligently disposed of" from a business owner who claimed to have a legitimate claim of ownership.
Described as a "preservation disaster" by some within the retro gaming community, the raid included undumped GBA, DS, DSi, and 3DS games, as well as a selection of dev consoles, which, it is alleged, had been negligently disposed of – hardware that is bound by strict copyright and confidentiality agreements.
The business owner in question has now taken to social media under the account name 'Sega Stole My Consoles' and is threatening to "expose everything" via a new documentary with the YouTube channel GamersNexus, which has almost 2.6 million subscribers.
Another post appears to hint that the story will soon be picked up by a "major" UK newspaper.
In a post from December of last year, the account suggested that "the CEO of a major Japanese gaming company will resign in the near future owing to a governance scandal he chose to ignore that led to human rights lawsuits. You heard it here first."
The accounts adds:
"I would also like to publicly reiterate that I have done everything possible to avoid legal and reputational impact. SEGA is a company that shaped my childhood, I would very much prefer to resolve this without any further escalation. However it should be noted that case law precedent suggests that my claim is extremely likely to survive the permission stage. After which the possibility of having my name attached to potentially multiple legal precedents may outweigh any desire to resolve outside of the judicial process.
The stupidest part of this entire situation is that all SEGA had to do was contact me and explain that the consoles were disposed of incorrectly/mistakenly and we could literally have had a laugh and resolved this with absolutely no headache for anyone."
While many within the community have rallied behind the business owner – even going as far as to establish a (now removed) GoFundMe page to support his legal costs – others have cautioned against supporting the legal battle to regain the hardware, such as the Video Game History Foundation's Frank Cifaldi, who, back in September, advised people not to engage with the fundraiser.
We've approached Sega for comment.