Piranha Bytes - "No longer working with the [Gothic] brand"

World of Gothic has some revealing quotes from both sides of the Gothic split that appear to show Piranha Bytes has ceded the future of Gothic entirely to JoWood.  Here's a snip from their latest newsbit:

For JoWooD's CEO Albert Seidl it is all perfectly clear. In an interview with Börse-Express.com last Friday, he claims the rights to Gothic 4 complete with all derivatives and possible sequels for his company. He also stated to be in close contact with a good and qualified developing studio. He just not mentioned its name.

Today in our forum, Piranha Bytes' art director Ralf Marczinczik referred all fans to direct their questions about the future of Gothic 4, any AddOn or patches straight at JoWooD. Piranha Bytes is "no longer working with the brand" and therefore not in a position to answer any of those questions.

Here's the full post from Ralf on WoG's English board:

Hello to everybody here in the english speaking community!

Sorry that we (from the studio) can´t regulary post here. (Big thanks to Christopher Weckwerth, who is constantly engaged here)

As some of you know, we answer questions quite regulary on the German side of the Forum- but for some reason we rarely post here (even though, most of us are quite fluent in English).
(Maybe I get Kai to check in more regulary too...?)

You propably know allready that the publisher of the Gothic Games, JoWood, and the Studio parted a while ago. Sad story- and I am sure you read the news in the trades.

Any questions you might have about the future of Gothic IV, any AddOn or patches, please contact the publisher via their homepage. It´s not that we don´t want to answer your questions, but all those answers can only be given by JoWood, since we are not longer working with the brand.

And yes- we are not too happy about it too, but the step was necessary to protect our studio.

I hope you understand...

Piranha Bytes itself is still very much alive and of course we are working- allthough, it might take a little while until you will get any official announcements about WHAT we are doing at the moment.

Thanks anyway for your encouragement and welcome criticism about the split.

Best regards

__________________

Ralf Marczinczik
Artdirector
Piranha Bytes