Ternox Halts STONKS-9800 PS Store Release After Access Loss

A planned PlayStation release for the indie stock-market life sim STONKS-9800 has been abruptly halted after developer Ternox lost access to its PlayStation publishing account. The studio says the decision came without explanation and despite repeated contact attempts, and it now expects its existing catalog—13 titles in total—to disappear from the PlayStation Store within days. The developer has since outlined a pivot toward self-publishing on Xbox and Nintendo Switch.

What happened to Ternox and why PlayStation players will feel it

Ternox Games, an independent effort run by a single creator, reports that Sony terminated its publishing partnership on PlayStation. The developer claims Sony did not provide a reason and did not respond to multiple emails. As a result, the planned console debut of STONKS-9800 was blocked, and the developer expects all previously released Ternox titles to be removed from the PlayStation Store shortly.

The impact is immediate for players who were relying on the PlayStation ecosystem for upcoming availability. While the developer’s future plans shift toward other platforms, the PlayStation storefront removal also affects the studio’s back catalog.

Release blocked: STONKS-9800 will not launch on PlayStation as planned.
Storefront removal: all 13 released games under Ternox Games are expected to vanish from PlayStation Store within days.
No stated reason: the developer says Sony ended the partnership without explanation and ignored repeated contact.

Who is behind “Ternox Games” and what’s being pulled from the store

The developer emphasizes that “Ternox Games” is not a large internal team. The work is attributed to one person, Rusłan Salikow, who has been making games since he was a teenager and began with Game Maker. In other words, the dispute is presented not as a corporate-to-corporate conflict, but as a big-platform decision affecting years of solo development.

The PlayStation Store catalog expected to be removed includes:

Nexoria: Dungeon Rogue Heroes
Finger Fitness
Retro Highway
Unichrome: A 1-Bit Unicorn Adventure
O-VOID: Console Edition
Run & Jump Guy
Scrap Divers
Fox’s Zen House
Boned Again: Survivors
Dungeonloop
IN-VERT
Taimumari: Complete Edition
Bullet Beat

Why STONKS-9800 mattered: Steam success, retro design, and an unfinished roadmap

STONKS-9800 is not described as a random release in a long list of projects. The stock-market and life-sim hybrid has been in Steam Early Access since 17 July 2023, where it has accumulated overwhelmingly positive feedback: 95% approval across nearly 2,900 user reviews. The full version is planned for release later this year.

Beyond the numbers, the game’s concept leans into late-1980s and 1990s Japanese financial culture, pairing investment and dividend management with day-to-day pressure that can spiral into health problems. The developer also ties the project’s origin to a 2020 game jam themed “Watch it grow,” with roughly two and a half years spent moving the idea into Early Access.

For players, the bigger issue is timing: the game is already live on PC and approaching its full version, but PlayStation availability has been abruptly cut off before launch.

Developer response: self-publishing elsewhere and a broader storefront risk

With PlayStation access removed, Salikow says the next step is to publish STONKS-9800 via self-publishing on Xbox and Nintendo Switch. Boxed releases for those platforms are also described as being planned.

The situation is framed as an example of how a platform holder can effectively determine a creator’s access to distribution. The developer argues that on PlayStation there are no alternative storefront options to route around a decision, leaving indies vulnerable to non-explained enforcement actions that can erase years of work from a storefront ecosystem.

For now, the practical message to players is straightforward: if you want Ternox titles on PlayStation, the developer warns that the window to buy may close quickly. In the meantime, STONKS-9800 remains available on Steam, where the Early Access version continues to be reviewed and played.