RELEASE DATE ANNOUNCEMENT AND PRICE REVEAL - "Bills Must Be Paid," the indie game cloned and sold in China before launch, releases July 29 - clone now taken down
After a stolen copy of its demo was recompiled, reuploaded to Douyin (China's TikTok) with ads, and went viral, Frankfurt studio Rike Games got the clone taken down - and now ships the real, finished game on Steam (PC & Mac) on July 29, 2026 for $6.99, with a 30% launch-week discount. A free demo is playable now in Steam Next Fest.
After a stolen copy of its demo was recompiled, reuploaded to Douyin (China's TikTok) with ads, and went viral, Frankfurt studio Rike Games got the clone taken down - and now ships the real, finished game on Steam (PC & Mac) on July 29, 2026 for $6.99, with a 30% launch-week discount. A free demo is playable now in Steam Next Fest.
FRANKFURT, Germany - June 15, 2026 - Rike Games today set a release date for Bills Must Be Paid, its first premium Steam game: July 29, 2026, priced at $6.99 (USD) with a 30% discount during launch week. The free demo is live now as part of Steam Next Fest. The launch caps an unusual few weeks, after a stolen build of the game's demo was reuploaded to Chinese platform Douyin, monetized with ads, and went viral ahead of release.
THE STORY SO FAR
Weeks before launch, Rike Games released a free demo for Bills Must Be Paid. A copy of that demo was recompiled into a near-complete build and uploaded to Douyin with ads attached. It wasn't a lookalike or a reskin, it ran on Rike Games' own assets, audio, and skill trees, down to a note handwritten by the developers on the in-game desk. It spread fast: one related hashtag passed 1.98 million video plays, and Chinese creators picked it up.
The biggest problem was that the stolen build was unfinished and unbalanced, broken past a certain point, which put the studio's reputation at risk before the game was even out: players who tried the clone might assume the real thing was just as rough.
The story was covered by Polygon and by creator JustSaySteven, and the studio got support from the community after asking for advice on Reddit. With a Redditor's help gathering information, Rike Games filed an official copyright claim with ByteDance, Douyin's parent company. The clone was taken down.
Now the studio is shipping the finished game, with a stack of content the clone never had.
WHAT IT IS
You're broke, you smash piggy banks, and the bills must be paid. Bills Must Be Paid is a satisfying game: swing a hammer, smash piggy banks for random loot and pay your bills to get debt free. Every smash costs stamina, when your hand gets too tired, the run is over. Bills keep arriving, and if you ignore them you have to declare bankruptcy and try again under a new identity with special rings that give your power ups. Paying bills unlocks perks.
NEW IN THE FULL GAME (none of this existed in the clone)
- Prestige system: earn rings to customize your Hand, each granting unique power-ups.
- New shops with desk gadgets that help you smash piggy banks faster and improve your stats.
- More piggy types and more hammers, each hammer with its own trade-offs.
- An actual ending.
Plus what's already in the demo: a multi-path skill tree, random loot, rare coins and roguelite perks to be chosen from after paying a bill.
RELEASE DETAILS
- Platforms: Steam (Windows & macOS).
- Release date: July 29, 2026
- Price: $6.99 USD / regional adjustments, with a 30% launch-week discount
- Free demo: live now during Steam Next Fest
- Languages: 12, including English, German, French, Spanish (Spain & LATAM), Portuguese (Brazil & Portugal), Italian, Japanese, Korean, Simplified Chinese, Russian.
LINKS
- Steam (wishlist & demo): https://store.steampowered.com/app/4421010/Bills_Must_Be_Paid/
- Trailer (YouTube): https://youtu.be/j2UHRkQI0EE
ABOUT RIKE GAMES
Rike Games is a two-person independent studio based in Frankfurt, Germany, founded by Roxanne Góngora Alfonso and Mike Niclas Gschwilm - Roxy and Mike, a Cuban-German married couple. They met in Cuba in 2016, married in 2017, and started making games together in 2019. Roxy handles art, Mike handles code and the technical side, and they work closely across every part of development. Across mobile and web, the studio's games have passed 500,000 downloads and over 20 million web plays. Bills Must Be Paid is the studio's first premium release on Steam.