I just got an email from dBrand cancelling the Steam Machine companion cube shell.
They posted the rationale on reddit, /r/dBrand but for the good folks who don’t do reddit anymore, here’s their post:
"RIP Companion Cube
🚨 Announcement 🚨
As you’ve probably noticed, the Steam Machine Companion Cube was eviscerated from our website, YouTube, and other social media platforms last week.
The blunt version is that we made the Companion Cube without a license from Valve. Everyone who purchased a Companion Cube will have their refund issued by end-of-day. Everything else beyond this is just detail. If you want the full story, keep reading.
On November 12th 2025, the day the Steam Machine was announced, we put up a concept render and sign-up page to see if anyone would be interested in a Companion Cube enclosure. It went moderately viral, with over fifteen thousand people signing up to be notified in the first day. In the months that followed, we built the idea into something real without ever asking Valve if we could.
We’re going to regret that decision for a very long time.
Over the next seven months, we poured our souls into this project. More than a thousand hours went into engineering from our industrial design team. Forty-four sets of injection molding tools were developed, one for each of the cube’s sub-components. The entire product was redesigned from scratch more than once, just to get the way it cradles the console exactly right. We literally rented out a university campus to film the launch video. By the end, we were losing money on every $99 Poverty Cube sold, but it didn’t matter. This had turned into a passion project for the entire organization.
Unfortunately, being proud of the thing we made did not give us the right to make it.
We launched around 3am on Monday, June 22nd. Overnight, it became the second-fastest selling product in our 15-year history, behind only the Switch 2 Killswitch.
Shortly after, Valve’s legal team reached out. They stated that the Companion Cube is Valve intellectual property, for which dbrand does not have a license. They requested we take down the product and launch film immediately. This was entirely within their rights, and they were direct, fair, and respectful throughout.
We took everything down and made an appeal. We asked Valve whether there was any way to keep the project alive: properly licensed, with their blessing, on their terms. They said no. Given our backwards approach of building first and asking permission later, it was a fair answer.
That’s basically the whole story. We made something a lot of people were excited about, then incinerated our shot at bringing it to market. It’s a hard lesson to learn publicly.
It goes without saying, but we’ll say it regardless: Valve didn’t do anything wrong here. They built a game franchise a lot of people love and they alone get to decide how it’s used.
To everyone who was as excited about this project as we were: thank you, and sorry. Refunds are being issued today. If it hasn’t landed in your account by the end of this week, you know how to reach us.
To Valve: thank you for Portal, and sorry for the headache. We should’ve asked first."
The blunt version is that we made the Companion Cube without a license from Valve.
Well… that was pretty damn stupid, now wasn’t it? Were they under the impression that they could capitalize off of one of Valve’s biggest IPs without getting some kind of license or consent first? Who do they think they are, an AI company?
They did hold peoples money. If they invested it before returning it. They could have made a fair chunk of change. Perhaps that was the plan all along. Risky play though.
That’s literally what happened with the black PS5 shells. They used Sony’s trademark without permission, got a cease and desist, and didn’t learn a fucking thing from it. I’m sure they had the best intentions, but doing it twice was monumentally stupid.
If I had a nickel…
Off-brand PS5 shells should have been fine, unless they were dumb enough to copy Sony’s logos and whatnot. It’s just swoopy inert shapes and it’s only designed to work with official hardware.
Darkplates vs Darkplates 2.0:
Dbrand ignores Sony’s legal objections and releases Darkplates 2.0 side plates for the PS5 - Notebookcheck News
Sony has taken issue with Dbrand selling Darkplates side plates for the PlayStation 5. In response, Dbrand has released Darkplates 2.0 in three colours.
Also…
At the launch of the Darkplates, Dbrand was so sure that it would not face legal action from Sony that it goaded the company into bringing legal action anyway. Specifically, Dbrand included the message ‘Go ahead, sue us’ on its Darkplates product listing, which are 1:1 replicas of the PS5’s stock side plates.
So they humiliated themselves as a marketing tactic, to later promote fugly knockoffs.
We really are a month away from the Heavy Friendship Box with a pink thumbs-up on the side.
What is it, just a case for it? Does it provide any functionality, or is it purely aesthetic?
Honestly if they just called it something else there wouldn’t be an issue, right? Just call it some other type of cube and in the description list the compatible hardware, which is just the steam machine.
Not sure why Valve would care so much, as it’s not like this would take away from their sales. I’m guessing it’s mainly a representation thing. They don’t want to allow a precedent where anyone can use their product’s name in an unofficial capacity, where their company’s reputation might be affected by consumers not realizing there’s no affiliation
It’s a case that looks exactly like the companion cube from Portal. So you’re kinda stepping on their feet in more than one way.
It’s an intellectual property thing. If someone can prove that you didn’t defend an intellectual property in one case then they can argue that their utilization is fair use.
Oh, I didn’t realize that Valve already had a product called a companion cube which already looks and functions the same way as this one. That’s the context I was missing.
Yeah, in that light, what dbrand did seems pretty asinine.
Oh, I didn’t realize that Valve already had a product called a companion cube which already looks and functions the same way as this one.
They don’t. The Weighted Companion Cube is a virtual item in Valve’s Portal series of games.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weighted_Companion_Cube
It is not an actual product in real life. Even in the game, it does not “function the same way as this one” at all. It arguably has no function. In game, it is a glorified paperweight.
With that said, it is trademarked (or copyrighted or whatever) all the same, so other companies are not allowed to make something that even resembles it without permission. That is just how the stupid US trademark/copyright/patent/bullshit system works.
Oh, I see. Yeah, it’s kinda stupid that a company would try to replicate that without license.
That being said, taking an item from a game and turning it into a real object that fans can enjoy is kind of a cool thing. It sucks they didn’t go through the proper channels to make it legit though.
Yeah… I really don’t know what they were thinking. I guess that’s what happens when a company is made entirely of designers? I can’t imagine anyone from a legal department would be allowing them to do straight ip theft against a billion dollar corporation.
Why am I not surprised they didn’t get a license
Why am I not surprised they didn’t get a license
Why am I not surprised they went ahead without even asking to get a license?
This company sounds like a mess.
Solid phone cases, though.
Ayyyy at least they didn’t blame the would be buyers
Did they not learn from the PS5 dark plates? Why do they keep developing things without licensing or approval from rights holders? This seems like an easy lesson to learn. I imagine the engineering time and injection molds cost them a huge chunk of cash.
You would think the people in charge of production would have pressed management on it:
“Hey, did we get permission this time? Or is it the Dark Plates all over again?”
There is no need to ask for permission, if you can simply pray. It’s an old trick and sometimes it even works.
Sometimes it’s best to ask for forgiveness rather than permission. They made a different dark plate later on that was different enough, they’ll do the same thing here. We’ll see “Friendly Cube” before the year is over.
Plus huge marketing win. They probably got a bunch of new users to visit their website and saw a huge uptick in overall sales.
Sometimes it’s best to ask for forgiveness rather than permission.
Ah, yes, the Christian way
Also the Python way (programming language).
Aka “buisness as usual”
tank you for spelling it rite
U wot mate
… then incinerated our shot at bringing it to market.
Did they also incinerate all the Companion Cubes they already made?
Well that was dumb. But their handling of the fallout means I can point and laugh but also not feel any hesitation to buy other stuff from them if they release stuff I want.
Their whole Ghost case debacle, which I did buy into, was similarly handled well, I’ve been happy with the free replacement I got from them for that and it’s been working great for a few years now.
Dumbasses. But refunding and owning up is commendable, at least it seems to be from how they’ve framed it all.
I wonder how much they’ve lost in total. So many hours, injection molds, and presumably good chunk of the production. Surprisingly careless!
They mentioned they had 15,000 people sign up on day 1. With a $100 and a $130 option.
Let’s say 80% picked the $130 choice and 20% the $100 choice:
15,000 * .80 * $130 = $1,560,000
15,000 * .20 * $100 = $300,000And that’s just day 1. They had 7 months of sign ups before ordering started.
Edit: According to this site they had over 100,000 orders:
https://www.engadget.com/2204117/dbrand-companion-cube-case-for-the-steam-machine-was-a-lie/
100,000 * .80 * $130 = $10,400,000
100,000 * .20 * $100 = $2,000,000So about 12.5 million in lost revenue not counting the engineering hours, prototyping, injection molding, etc. etc.
Could be $15 million total. Dumbasses!
Not that I want to give dbrand any credit but this also seems like a stupid move for Valve.
Why didn’t they just offer a license agreement if dbrand was willing to accept?
Seems like a missed opportunity which the steam machine desperately needs right now.
Even dumber, you’ll probably be able to find this on ali express or temu in a couple of weeks after some chinese brands make knockoffs anyway.
Unless they already had some poor history with dbrand, seems kind of off character for Valve.
Would you want to have a business relationship with someone with a “do things first, ask for permission after” attitude?
The real answer is boring. Think about the legal precedent that would be set, this would be seen as condoning anyone to go out, market and accept money for a representation of their IP without asking for permission beforehand, no legal team worth their salt is going to allow that. They don’t want to reward someone for doing things the wrong way from a legal standpoint. There’s also probably a potential fraud liability here, the same way trademark owners are required to legally pursue copycat brands to prevent customers from being defrauded
It wouldn’t set a legal precedent. Valve would still be well within their rights to shut down any other products that did something similar. If they signed a license agreement now everything would be fine and above board, and valve would still be able to do this exact thing to any other brands who did the same thing if they so chose.
I think they just meant precedent, like it sets an example of how they treat copyright infringement.
Shooting from the hip: The enclosure could have been a thermal nightmare that valve didn’t want their name on.
Based on this video, they neglected to do something as basic as an air filter. I doubt thermals are top of mind for them:
I mean it’s already throttled so much if anything Valve was over concerned with thermals. But yea, I could see the modding aspect making things even worse.
If you let me put my tinfoil hat on for a moment, it may be because now they can gauge the community response and decide if they want to launch their own or “change their mind” and look like the good guys
Then let them play off of what Beetschnapps said and back room ask Dbrand to fire off sets for them to test for thermal issues then if it doesn’t need any modifications come out swinging. Valve gets more money and looks like real aces.
Y’know when this was first prototyped I considered asking whether was licensed, but thought, “Nah, dbrand wouldn’t be that stupid, I’m sure they worked it out with Valve”. Heh. Too much faith on my part I guess.
Dbrand and not getting a license name a better duo
It’s cool that they copped to it as well as they did. I wouldn’t have expected that.
Yeah. This is the kind of response (as far as i can tell: open, honest) that makes me want to buy something from that company in the future. Like, you legitimately can’t buy this kind of public relations. It sucks for the business, but doing the right thing by your customers gets you repeat customers. You can’t get brand loyalty through a commercial.
Yeah, but this isn’t the first time they have done the exact same thing.
This is true. Above is my initial reaction and I’ll leave it to show what it looks like when you get more info and reassess. Not so sure I trust the company, but I do appreciate the openness about them not getting the license.
There’s a part of me that thinks they’re hoping their fans lean on steam, but steam is so much bigger, and both of them behaving reasonably at this juncture isn’t likely to get a witch hunt started.
Further proof that the D in Dbrand stands for “douchey.”
Sucks… good on D-brand for handling it with class though.
Handling with class? They just tried to get away with something that clearly doesn’t work that way. You don’t make a product based on a known franchise without contacting the franchise owner about it.
Remember that guy who tried to Kickstart a Game of Thrones card game?
https://www.reddit.com/r/HobbyDrama/comments/bm81ez/kickstarter_man_launches_a_hilariously_bad/
Yeah, nice to see companies taking ownership of mistakes. Shame they didn’t ask first.
Look at Dbrand’s history before giving them any sympathy. Thanks to @[email protected] for pointing it out.
Ouch… Getting injection moulds made is really REALLY pricey. That’s an expensive lesson.
But really good marketing. They got the emails of a bunch of people interested in Steam hardware, they got their name out there to folks like me who’ve never heard of them. They put out a sincere sounding apology, gave automatic full refunds, and in 18 months I’ll probably remember them as a trustable brand but forget it was because they did a dumbass copyright infringement.
You forget, many of the target audience also celebrate copyright infringement as a virtue.
Prefacing this by saying I know nothing about injection moulding. Couldn’t they still use the molds for when they do get a license just different designs?
for when they do get a license
We asked Valve whether there was any way to keep the project alive: properly licensed, with their blessing, on their terms. They said no.
Valve’s refused to sell them a licence.
There is no ‘when they do get a license’.
Beg forgiveness instead of ask for permission is a gamble. dBrand lost the dice roll.
