Ashes of Creation Investor Alleges Founder Orchestrated a $140 Million Fraud
The collapse of Intrepid Studios has triggered a fast moving controversy around the crowdfunded fantasy MMORPG Ashes of Creation, after YouTuber NefasQS published an interview featuring investor Jason Caramanis alleging a years long fraud orchestrated by Intrepid founder and creative director Steven Sharif. The claims are sweeping, highly disputed, and unproven in court at the time of writing, but they outline a narrative of missing governance, withheld financial records, mounting debt, and a final breakdown that allegedly left staff unpaid and the studio unable to continue operations.
In the interview, Caramanis claims Sharif publicly stated he invested $30 million to $60 million of personal money into Intrepid, but that internal accounting records obtained by Caramanis suggest Sharif did not invest personal capital at all, while he and a business partner allegedly drew substantial compensation during the same period.
Caramanis further claims total funding tied to the project may have approached $140 million once accounting for Kickstarter funds, loans, PPP support, and private investment.
A key pillar of Caramanis’s account is that investors allegedly could not obtain the financial visibility they believed they were contractually owed. He claims books and records, tax returns, and QuickBooks access were withheld for years, and that formal board oversight was effectively absent. In his telling, investor attempts to compel disclosure through legal avenues did not resolve the dispute.
Caramanis also points to operational strain and unpaid obligations as signals the studio had been under pressure well before the public collapse. He references a lawsuit filed by cloud services provider SADA Systems seeking unpaid fees, framing it as evidence that the company had been struggling with core infrastructure costs.
He also alleges Intrepid’s burn rate had climbed to a level that could not be sustained by revenue, including the game’s monetization and the December Steam Early Access launch.
The most explosive allegation centers on what Caramanis describes as a last minute financial move involving Steam revenue and a bank lender. He claims funds intended for payroll were instead redirected through lender action in a way that benefited Sharif personally and left the company unable to meet payroll, effectively forcing shutdown conditions.
This is the section of the story that will likely receive the most scrutiny, because it implies a traceable paper trail across a lender, platform revenue, escrow, and payroll timing.
Caramanis states he has documentation and communications to support his claims and expects multiple lawsuits. However, these are still allegations. The full picture will depend on filings, evidence disclosure, and court outcomes.
Sharif has not provided a detailed public response to the specific claims raised in the interview within the material cited. Caramanis’s account also includes statements about intent and motive, which are particularly hard to validate outside litigation.
If even part of this allegation set proves credible, it becomes a high impact case study in modern game financing risk:
Crowdfunding plus private capital can scale fast without matching governance maturity
Live service expectations can mask structural insolvency until a single cash flow event breaks the system
Early Access can act as both community milestone and financial pressure valve, depending on how funds are controlled
Lack of transparent reporting creates a vacuum where rumors become the narrative
For studios, publishers, and backers, the operational takeaway is simple: when governance and disclosure are weak, even talented development teams can get pulled into a failure mode they did not author.
If you backed Ashes of Creation or followed its development closely, what would you want to see next: full legal transparency via court filings, or a structured plan to preserve the project and protect employees first?
