Tactics game Mecharashi is pulling a Dark and Darker - in the sense that its developer is being sued for allegedly using assets originally made for another company's game.
Square Enix had been trying to revive its mech-stuffed series for years when it announced Front Mission 2089: Borderscape in collaboration with BlackJack Studio in 2022, months before cancelling the project for unknown reasons. Years later, in October 2024, that same studio released Mecharashi in China and Japan, a very similar sounding turn-based tactics game featuring - you guessed it - lots of mechs.
Square Enix is now claiming that Mecharashi was developed using copyrighted materials BlackJack Studio had already made for the now-cancelled Front Mission 2089, while on Square Enix's payroll, in a lawsuit filed earlier this month in the US. The Final Fantasy publisher is now pushing for the courts to stop the game from releasing in the US until it removes all "protected content" attached to Front Mission, which is allegedly most of it, in addition to $150,000 per copyright infringement. (Good spot, Polygon.)
The lawsuit also includes 11 whole pages full of screenshots comparing Front Mission 2089's trailer to stills from Mecharashi. Squeenix managed to find similarities in everything from cutscenes and mech designs to generic top-down, grid-based gameplay.
BlackJack itself didn't shy away from comparisons while hyping up its game, either. "The game adopts a Front Mission-style combat system where you can assemble mechas however you want, equip a wide selection of weapons, and choose your favorite pilots to engage in battle," Mecharashi's Steam page boasts, alongside a vague 'Coming Soon' release date.
Mecharashi might not release until all the legal dust settles, so why not check out some other new games releasing in 2025 and beyond.
