At the end of March, Nintendo announced that it would release the official Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom Switch OLED model. While it was supposed to be a surprise moment for fans, the unit has actually been leaked online.
Now, in an update, it has been revealed that one of the individuals who played a role in this leak has been fired from his job. According to Kotaku, the individual known as “Mike” was a GameStop employee who shared a photo of the company’s inventory database after the initial leak in December — and speculated that the system would be revealed before Nintendo’s new gameplay demo for TotK.
Almost two weeks after the show, Mike was fired on April 11th. Of interest is Nintendo’s claim that it traced the leak to Mike via Reddit and its associated social media accounts and “forced the company’s hand, demanding that the employee end the leak.” Another employee reportedly confirmed Mike’s account to Kotaku.
Mike apparently didn’t think he was going to get in trouble, so he “wasn’t” trying to cover his tracks along the way. During the phone call to finish him off, Mike’s manager tells him “This is your favorite company and now they hate you”. Ouch!
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