

Yes, yes it is! On what world would stealing someone’s intellectual work and booting them out of their own company for the sole purpose to keep all of the money for yourself not be evil? Funnily enough, making people sign unfair contracts is literally the most devilish thing ever. It’s the one thing demons and devils do in pretty much every interpretation they appear in. This is why we need more people like Luigi!
Not everyone is literate in contract law, so most people won’t notice these kinds of hidden clauses that allow this. In this case it was a combination of signing over the IP to the developing company which they coowned. because that’s pretty standard procedure. Together with the investors managing to get a majority share of the company and forcing the original devs out by vote.
Just one of the reasons why smart people just license out their IPs. This way no one can take it from you. But again, you have to know quite a bit about contract law to know how this works.