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Tag: Epic Games

  • 13 Years Later, Gears Of War 3 Multiplayer Is Still Divinely Disgusting

    13 Years Later, Gears Of War 3 Multiplayer Is Still Divinely Disgusting

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    In September 2011, I was a college junior very willing to waste away the early days of her fall semester playing Epic Games’ new third-person shooter, Gears of War 3. I pre-ordered the highly anticipated title so I could guarantee I got the gold Retro Lancer skin for my multiplayer battles, and threw myself into the beta earlier that year with more energy than I put into my entire undergraduate coursework combined.

    Firefight’s Back In Halo! What Is Firefight?

    The following year, my fondness of Gears 3 grew and absorbed the place once reserved in my heart by the Halo franchise after the disappointment of Halo 4.

    But, like all multiplayer games with finite resources trying to keep the attention of a fickle fanbase, Gears 3 eventually faded away. I focused more on Call of Duty releases, then eventually on Overwatch 2 and the battle royales that began popping up like lanternflies on New York City vegetation in the early fall.

    Read More: A PS3 Version Of Gears Of War 3 Is Now Available

    Occasionally, my mind would wander to Gears of War 3 and its unique, somewhat disorienting camera angle, the satisfying crunchiness and weight of its gameplay, and all those gleefully gross executions. Nothing ever felt remotely like Gears 3, not even the sequels (which came after long-time game lead Cliff Bleszinksi left Epic Games) that followed in its wake. Recently, those occasional daydreams of Epic’s third-person shooter became more frequent and, finally, I downloaded it via Xbox Game Pass and booted it up again.

    Screenshot: Microsoft / Kotaku

    Gears of War 3 online is a 2011 time capsule

    Several things shock me in the seconds after I start up Gears of War 3. First, the Xbox 360 online interface greets me, like I applied a retro theme to my Xbox Series S in a fugue state. When the old pop-up appears to let me know that I am, indeed, online, I do the Leonardo DiCaprio pointing meme alone in my living room. My old profile picture is there (my Xbox avatar wearing an Optimus Prime helmet), and so is all the information about the 360-era games I played. It’s a lovely little detail that threatens to derail my Gears gameplay, as I get lost in the old menu for far too long.

    Then, as Gears 3 loads up and the familiar horns of the opening theme fade in, I’m shocked by the memory that the score stirs in me. Suddenly, I am 21 years old and very stoned, likely wearing a pair of leggings and a t-shirt I’ve cut the sleeves off of to make a muscle tank—maybe I’m even wearing my Gears 3 one—and I’m waiting for my friends to meet me online so we can run a five-stack in Team Deathmatch. Time flattens into a circle, just like the one Rust Cohle warned us of, and I am briefly, blissfully unaware of how my rent will be going up in my Brooklyn apartment, because I’m in upstate New York, living off my student loan.

    The final thing that shocks me is that I can actually play Gears 3 online. The menu says “0 players online worldwide,” but it’s lying—I load into a Team Deathmatch game in seconds, filling in for a bot Locust (the beefy, scaly bad guys of the Gears universe) upon its death. As I step into the huge shoes of this subterranean (and for some reason bipedal) beast, I realize I’m gonna need a second to get my sea legs.

    Read More: Gears of War Creator Thinks Series Needs ‘A Bit Of A Reboot’

    Gears of War doesn’t feel anything like the games I play now—aside from when I choose one of the heavier, tankier Overwatch 2 characters, most of the time I’m playing as someone who’s lithe and lightning-fast. When compared to modern games like Apex Legends or Modern Warfare III, Gears 3 is gluey and clumsy, like someone mixed a shooter with Ambien and a glass of wine until everything got a little wavy. It takes several gory, squishy deaths (Gears of War 3 is probably best-known for its violent multiplayer executions which include swinging your gun like a golf club and taking off someone’s head in a spray of brain matter) before I remember how the controls work.

    Once I get my active reload down (a mechanic by which your weapon damage or fire rate increases if you time your reload correctly), I really hit my stride. I split a snub-nosed grenadier in half with a Gnasher Shotgun, I pop the head off of a peeking Carmine brother with a Boltok Pistol from halfway across the map, I impale Marcus Fenix on the end of a Retro Lancer. I remember that the cover-based shooter has tons of movement tricks and hacks, and soon I’m gliding around the map like my character isn’t wearing a ton of heavy armor and boots that sound like they’re made of steel.

    Gears 3 multiplayer’s visceral audio brings back the same intense wave of nostalgia as the starting menu’s soft horns. There are the gushy, mushy sounds of shotgun shells embedding themselves into flesh, the nerve-wracking rev of the Torque Bow winding up its shot, followed by the high-pitched, heart-stopping audio cue you hear when one of its arrows sinks into your leg. The horrid, wet gurgling that bursts forth from Locust characters stomping about the map and the metallic clangs of menu sounds whisk me away to a simpler era. For the entire time I’m playing Gears of War 3, I am in 2011.

    But it is, alas, 2024, and the other people still playing Gears of War 3 are either newcomers who can’t tell their incendiary grenades from their Boomshots or seasoned veterans who are a nightmare to play against. Matches end fast, and there’s little room for the weak in them. Despite quickly remembering how to make the most of the game’s movement mechanics and gunplay, I am still repeatedly owned by players who have no problem picking up my downed body and miming humping me against a wall.

    In that way, and in many others, Gears of War 3 is a perfect 2011 time capsule, full of blood and guts and badly behaved boys, and, of course, Cole Train expressions.

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    Alyssa Mercante

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  • Rock Band Devs Announce No More DLC, Focusing On Fortnite Now

    Rock Band Devs Announce No More DLC, Focusing On Fortnite Now

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    Harmonix, the Epic Games-owned studio behind the popular rhythm game franchise Rock Band, has officially announced that it is wrapping up its weekly DLC releases for 2015’s Rock Band 4. It will now focus on supporting Fortnite Festival, instead.

    Dead By Daylight Devs’ New Game Is Fortnite Meets Doom

    Rock Band 4 was released nearly a decade ago in October 2015, and was a return for the franchise five years after the release of Rock Band 3 and the crash of plastic instrument games like Guitar Hero and DJ Hero. While Rock Band 4 wasn’t able to rebuild the once large plastic instrument genre of rhythm games, it ended up with a dedicated community of players who kept enjoying the game and buying DLC songs for it even as it became harder and harder to track down replacement instrument controllers. Now, eight years and nearly 3,000 DLC songs later, Harmonix is moving on.

    In a January 17 post on the official Harmonix blog from Rock Band 4‘s product manager Daniel Sussman, the studio revealed that the DLC music released on January 25 will be the last ever for Rock Band 4. Sussman’s post did clarify that all other live services, including Rivals seasons and online play, will continue as normal. But there will be no new tracks coming to RB4 after this month.

    Sussman also made it clear that all the songs players own in Rock Band 4 will not be going anywhere, adding that you’ll be able to keep rocking out to your previously purchased songs “for as long as you like.”

    Fortnite Festival is the future

    As for what Harmonix is working on now, well, that’s clear if you’ve been paying attention to Fortnite lately. Epic’s popular battle royale juggernaut expanded in December with the addition of three new games built inside Fortnite. One of those is Fortnite Festival, a controller-based rhythm game featuring popular songs from different genres. Harmonix is the team behind that game and it’s what the studio will be focusing on post-Rock Band 4.

    Epic Games

    “Looking ahead, the Harmonix team has been hard at work over the last two years to develop Fortnite Festival,” said Sussman. “[It] brings rhythm action gaming (and more) to the Fortnite ecosystem. It’s free to play, we have a rotating selection of songs that you can play (for free) anytime. If you are a fan of the rhythm game category, Fortnite Festival is the place to be.”

    And Sussman once again confirmed that support for RB4 instruments is coming soon to Festival, so you don’t need to “hang up your guitars just yet.”

    “Working in support of the Rock Band community has been a high point in my professional life,” Sussman explained.

    “We deliberated long and hard about how to frame the last blast of RB4 DLC of this era. The last two weeks will feature some tear-jerkers that sum up our feelings about this moment. We thank you for your commitment to and passion for this wonderful game. Long Live Rock and Roll.”

     .

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    Zack Zwiezen

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  • Epic plans to contest Apple's 'bad-faith' compliance with court ruling over App Store | TechCrunch

    Epic plans to contest Apple's 'bad-faith' compliance with court ruling over App Store | TechCrunch

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    Fortnite maker Epic Games is not happy about how Apple intends to comply with a district court’s injunction that permitted app developers to direct users to their own websites and payment platforms — a court order that came into effect following the Supreme Court’s decision to not hear the Apple antitrust case, leaving the current ruling to stand. Though Apple had largely won the case, as the court decided it was not a monopolist, a judge ruled that app makers should be able to steer their customers to the web from links or buttons inside their apps, something that forced Apple to change its App Store rules.

    But Apple’s compliance doesn’t give app makers the victory they had hoped, as the tech giant aims to still charge commissions on purchases made outside of apps — a decision Epic aims to challenge in court.

    According to statements made by Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney, shared on X, Apple’s “bad-faith” compliance undermines the judge’s order that would have allowed buttons or external links “in addition to [in-app purchases.”

    The Ninth Circuit District Court had ruled on one count of out ten in favor of Epic in its decision, finding that Apple violated California’s Unfair Competition law. The decision meant Apple had to remove the “anti-steering” clause from its agreement with App Store developers. This clause for years had prevented app developers from directing their customers to other ways to pay for in-app purchases or subscriptions from inside their apps, leading to confusing screens or broken features, where customers would have to figure out on their own how to make the necessary purchases from the developer’s website.

    Apple updated its App Store Guidelines following the Supreme Court’s decision but with a lot of caveats. It said that developers would still have to pay a 27% cut on purchases, instead of 30%, and developers in Apple’s Small Business Program or auto-renewing subscriptions in their second year would be reduced to 12%, instead of 15%. This 3 percentage point discount is similar to what Google is offering through its User Choice billing pilot program, which counts Spotify and Bumble among its early adopters. In Google’s case, it reduced the required commissions by 4%. But these small discounts aren’t enough to make alternative payment processing worthwhile for most developers who have to pay at least that much in payment processing fees, many have argued.

    Sweeney agrees, noting in his post today, shared on X, that developers aren’t able to offer their digital items “more cheaply on the web after paying a third-party payment processor 3-6% and paying this new 27% Apple Tax.”

    In addition, he points out that Apple is strictly controlling how the new links and buttons must appear. In addition to forcing developers to apply for permission, the links can’t be in the app’s ordinary payment flow but must be in a separate section of the app, Sweeney explains. The links also open to a generic web browser session, forcing users to log in again to the developer’s website — an additional point of friction in making a non-App Store purchase. And then customers will have to initiate a search to find the item they wanted to buy, after logging in.

    Apple will also “front-run competing payment processors with their own ‘scare screen’ to disadvantage them,” Sweeney says, meaning that Apple will warn users about the issues that may arise when transacting with a developer outside its App Store. For instance, users won’t be able to cancel their subscriptions within Apple’s App Store or request refunds  — they’ll have to do this through the developer’s website.

    Sweeney says Epic will contest Apple’s compliance in District Court.

    The developer lobbying group, Coalition for App Fairness, which also includes Epic, issued its own statement on Apple’s new App Store rules.

    “Apple’s approach to ‘compliance’ with the District Court’s decision will not benefit developers and consumers. The new 27 percent commission on payments it does not process defies the intention of the District Court’s injunction and undermines competition,” said Rick VanMeter, Executive Director of the Coalition for App Fairness. “These changes do nothing to enhance consumer choice, lower prices for in-app purchases or inject competition into Apple’s walled garden. It is precisely this type of abusive, monopolistic behavior that makes it imperative for Congress to pass the Open App Markets Act,” he added.

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    Sarah Perez

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  • Why Fortnite is getting into cozy gaming | TechCrunch

    Why Fortnite is getting into cozy gaming | TechCrunch

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    When it comes to figuring out a formula for a hit game that keeps players coming back year after year, Saxs Persson would know. Now at Epic Games overseeing the Fortnite ecosystem, Persson previously spent 12 years at Mojang building Minecraft into the stratospheric success it is today.

    Persson hopped over to Epic in 2022 to work on the Fortnite maker’s roadmap, shepherding Lego Fortnite from a press release last year into a polished, ambitious standalone experience designed to draw new audiences to Fortnite’s free-to-play world.

    We spoke with Persson about Epic’s grand plans for Lego Fortnite and its two other new games, Rocket Racing and Fortnite Festival. Knowing Fortnite’s penchant for maximalism and a steady drip feed of fresh content, the trio of games is only just getting started — but here’s a glimpse of where they’re going.

    Questions and answers have been edited for brevity and clarity.

    TechCrunch: With the three new games, and particularly Lego Fortnite, is the goal to broaden Fortnite’s appeal to new kinds of players?

    Persson: Battle Royale has been extraordinarily popular. And from a Battle Royale perspective we understand our players quite well. We’ve done our very best for the last six years to always make a game that feels fresh, evolves, never stands still, constantly updates and sets us apart from the competition by not taking itself too seriously. That’s always been the goal of Battle Royale.

    The next ring that developed from that was when we put out Fortnite Creative and subsequently when we launched UEFN [Unreal Editor for Fortnite] in March this year – that is very much realizing that Fortnite players want to play more games, not just Battle Royale. And the more content they have, and the better content they have and the more varied content they have, the happier they are.

    So if your only goal is to say, if you came to Fortnite, we would like you to consider all these different options, and to stay as long as you want to because we hope you’re going to have fun.

    TechCrunch/Epic Games

    Our creators have done a phenomenal job of broadening, already, who plays Fortnite. Battle Royale is really important – it’s like an anchor tenant, whatever you want to call it. But if you asked players like ‘what do you play in a week,’ I think the average island played in the week is about seven, seven different islands. And they’re varied in style, aesthetics, genre… We ask our creators what they would like to create. If they want to create it, we bet there’s going to be players that want to play it. That’s been the strategy up until this far.

    …In order for us to make really good tools, we have to use them ourselves. And we know that in order for us to really extend deep tools and new genres, our best bet is that we need to make some first party content that really stretches what Unreal Engine can do. And then take those tools and turn them over to creators and say now you have these capabilities.

    So with that in mind, the three games we announced, Lego Fortnite, Rocket Racing, and [Fortnite] Festival all have different goals of extending the toolset in a particular direction, but also attracting new players to say ‘oh I guess Fortnite is not just Battle Royale. Really, we just need to get them over the hump of installing 54 gigabytes… and once you’re there, there should be a lot for you to do.

    What do those sets of tools look like and what can people build with them?

    “[With] Lego Fortnite… we’ve worked a lot on [procedural generation], we’ve worked a lot on different styles – like adding the Lego styles so you can both play as Fortnite style and as a minifig, as Lego style. And down the line we fully expect creators are gonna have access to that too.

    The procedural world is really fascinating. Again, like we’ve always operated on a very static play playing field, but Lego is pioneering a whole lot of procedural tools that hopefully we can extend to creators, and a much bigger island – like we’re 20 times bigger than a Battle Royale island. So it is a massive island that we’re still working to expand. That again should benefit creators.

    Rocket Racing is adding credible racing mechanics to our creators and track design editors and that sort of thing. So the game is important because it comes from Rocket League, and it’s an excellent game. And we really believe in that game. The secondary effect is creators get great vehicle tools.

    And finally [Fortnite] Festival. A ton of effort has gone into music generation tools and music editing tools and music making tools and gameplay with music. And a lot of those devices, as we call them, have already been extended to creators.

    So that’s the goal. Music attracts a new audience. Racing attracts a new audience. Lego attracts a new audience. Even though we know it appeals to current Fortnite players, it’s certainly going to appeal to audiences that are not interested in Battle Royale.

    What about expanding Fortnite to younger players, is that part of the objective here?

    We had introduced separately from LEGO but in collaboration with Lego a new ratings paradigm in Fortnite, where every piece of content is rated. That streamlines really nicely with our parental controls.It feels like if you’re a parent when you let your kid come into Fortnite, you don’t have to just slam the door wide open… you can still have at a granular level control over what your kids play.

    And you can see what. So yeah, like, Lego is an E10 game, so mechanically, that opens a new audience. But I think underneath that, again, is there’s a whole suite of new features, just to be able to rate islands on an individual level. And just to really focus on like, how do we make a great experience for all ages that is age appropriate and safe?

    Lego Fortnite seems to smartly dip into some genres and gameplay loops that people already love in other games. Animal Crossing, Minecraft and Valheim all come to mind, but there are quite a few.

    I think all games should be inspired by something. What do we all enjoy? We really enjoy Zelda, really enjoy Minecraft, really enjoy Animal Crossing, Stardew Valley. All four of them are absolutely, in and of themselves, excellent examples of games that just have just have stood the test of time. That really, really resonate emotionally with people and we would love to add to that genre and be part of that genre.

    I don’t think we’re anything in particular. Like we have aspects of Animal Crossing and a social sim… as it turns out, there’s nothing as cute as building a building with minifigs that all have jobs, and they all want to be part of your village and can [help out] with the harvest and go on adventures with you. The social sim design is very much focused on realizing the Lego fantasy, but it does feel like it has the cozy gamer aspect of it for sure, of homesteading and building and village building and investing in your people.

    TechCrunch/Epic Games

    In a procedurally generated survival game — when you play something like Valheim or Minecraft — you have a big moment when you first open the map. It’s exciting, and you don’t know what’s around you and how dangerous it is. Lego Fortnite has that same feeling.

    I think a key part of what Fortnite is is ‘what’s around the next corner?’ When we started working on procedural, procedurally generating these landscapes, there was just a lot of just wandering and just making these amazing looking things and then adding like more and more and more into it and sort of doing a true crossover between Lego and Fortnite and trying to find like what is it that would satisfy Lego players and would satisfy Fortnite players – really feeling like we understand these two IPs. And the landscape is littered with that.

    I think the internal model was that Fortnite is the canvas and Lego is the paint. Basically anything you touch becomes Lego as you play, and the more you play, the more Lego-ized you make the world. I really liked that idea of landing on a Fortnite planet mysteriously transformed into a Lego figure and then, like making that into a survival sandbox — a true sandbox where anything can happen.

    I love that genre is I really think it speaks to all of us, like in a very simple way that you get to set your own stakes and really the job is to not die. But everything else like thriving is completely up to you.

    TechCrunch/Fortnite

    People who don’t follow Fortnite and don’t know about its user-generated content probably still think it’s just a zany battle royale game where 100 people fight to the death. How do you get the word out that hey, Fortnite is an ecosystem filled with lots of different things, now including these three major games we developed?

    There’s nothing like YouTube videos showing the shenanigans of Lego Fortnite or your favorite streamer spending time in it. Because we think it has enormous storytelling potential for YouTubers and for and for Twitch streamers. It’s a sandbox that is made for you to essentially tell stories.

    It is very much what has made Minecraft very, very successful. It is what you make it, meaning the more creative you are the better your videos and we really, really feel like the streaming community and YouTube is gonna help us tell that story for us.

    Now it’s on to updates. If there is one thing Epic knows and the Fortnite team knows it’s players want content, they want updates and that is very much what the team is focused on.

    All of us agreed that the best chance we have of retelling the story of Fortnite is to go overboard with content. And really show like, when Epic puts his mind to it, we have done our groundwork and we believe that Fortnite is the place that you would want to be and to spend time in, no matter what age you are, no matter what you’re interested in. There should be content that will resonate with you.

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    Taylor Hatmaker

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  • Lego Fortnite's debut builds momentum with 2.4M people playing at once | TechCrunch

    Lego Fortnite's debut builds momentum with 2.4M people playing at once | TechCrunch

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    If you still think of Fortnite as a colorful, cartoony battle royale game, you might be surprised to learn the extent of Epic’s true ambitions.

    Fortnite’s big, chaotic fight to the death matches may still get top billing, but Epic has steadily been expanding the horizons of its marquee game to be more of a game platform than a simple standalone game. Fortnite’s psychedelic live events, kaiju Ariana Grande concerts and its endless user-generated sandbox worlds were all hints about its final destination.

    X may never be an everything app, but Fortnite is already an everything game. And it just got a lot bigger.

    Rapid fire over consecutive days last week, Epic launched three new games within the game, starting with the survival title Lego Fortnite on Thursday. Fortnite Festival, a rhythm game from the studio behind Rock Band, and Rocket Racing, a fast-paced racing game from the makers of Rocket League followed quickly thereafter.

    While Fortnite’s regular modes like Zero Build and classic Battle Royale racked up respectable numbers over the weekend and people also dipped their toes into the other two new games, Lego Fortnite debuted on a whole different level.

    Epic and Lego’s new Minecraft/Animal Crossing hybrid (more on that in our review later) peaked at 2.45 million concurrent players shortly after launch. Over the weekend it consistently floated around those same lofty peaks and by Monday sat around 1.1 million players — itself an epic tally that would put plenty of hits on the Steam charts to shame. The live “Big Bang” event that introduced the trio of new games a little over a week ago saw 11.6 million concurrent players, attendance in the ballpark of Fortnite’s live shows for artists like Marshmello or Travis Scott.

    Lego Fortnite is just one corner of Epic’s multiverse, but it’s clearly the hottest one at the moment. Fortnite’s grand total of concurrent online players sits somewhere way above that (combining all Fortnite Creative modes, ranked play, Battle Royale, etc.) but mostly it’s noteworthy that a family-friendly game in an entirely different genre is bringing in this much buzz. If Lego Fortnite can maintain its momentum with a steady drip of compelling content that deepens the game, its free-to-play, fun for the whole family multiplayer experience may have nowhere to go but up.

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    Taylor Hatmaker

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  • Google Loses Epic Antitrust Court Battle | Entrepreneur

    Google Loses Epic Antitrust Court Battle | Entrepreneur

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    Epic Games, the maker of Fortnite, won a Battle Royale over tech giant Google late this afternoon.

    After a month-long trial but just over three hours of deliberation, a nine-person federal jury in San Francisco ruled in favor of Epic, concluding that Google held an illegal monopoly over the Google Play Store and engaged in practices that undercut Epic Games’ ability to compete fairly.

    The jury concluded that Google’s conduct not only affected Epic Games, but potentially harmed many developers dependent on the Android marketplace for their business.

    “Victory over Google!” Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney said on X. “After four weeks of detailed court testimony, the California jury found against the Google Play monopoly on all counts. The Court’s work on remedies will start in January. Thanks for everyone’s support and faith! Free Fortnite!”

    Related: Android System Case: Supreme Court To Hear Google, CCI Appeals From October 10

    What this means

    The decision is a major loss for Google, which has consistently been able to withstand legal attacks from other game makers. Google may now have to change its Play Store rules, opening up the possibility for an alternate app marketplace on the Android platform. It may also affect the rates Google charges developers for in-app purchases, currently set at a substantial 15-30%.

    Presiding Judge James Donato is expected to define the specific remedies of the Epic Games case early next year, but the decision carries significant implications for the industry. Other Big Tech companies may now be vulnerable to challenges on how they control pricing and payments on their platforms. It’s also bad news for Google, which is also embroiled in another high-profile antitrust trial in Washington, D.C., over its search and advertising sectors.

    Ruled a monopoly

    Google’s lawyers argued that the company couldn’t possibly hold a monopoly because it competed with Apple’s app store, the largest in the world. But that didn’t sway the jury, who saw pages of internal Google documents and emails. At one point during the trial, the judge issued a stern reprimand to Google for deleting chats that could have been pertinent to the case.

    Today’s ruling came two years after Epic mostly lost a similar case against Apple — a ruling that both sides are trying to appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.

    But the repercussions of this case are expected to be felt widely, standing as a stark reminder that even the seemingly untouchable Goliaths of the tech industry are subject to the law.

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    Jonathan Small

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  • Massive Game Microtransaction Company Sounds Super Shady

    Massive Game Microtransaction Company Sounds Super Shady

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    The live-service video game economy runs on microtransactions, and Xsolla is one of the companies that helps process them. The payment platform works with Epic Games, Unity, Roblox, and others to collect money from players all over the world. Now a new lawsuit alleges that Xsolla has mishandled $40 million and fired the whistleblower who disclosed the crimes to his bosses.

    The Top 10 Most-Played Games On Steam Deck: August 2023 Edition

    Emil Aliyev, the former VP of global accounting at Xsolla, filed a lawsuit in Los Angeles Superior Court on November 22 claiming wrongful termination and retaliation against a whistleblower. The lawsuit says Aliyev discovered $40 million was missing from two accounts back in May of this year and that he later found the money had been dispersed to a Goldman Sachs bank account that belonged to Xsolla founder and chairman, Aleksandr Agapitov. Aliyev also alleges that Xsolla hasn’t passed an IRS audit since 2017.

    The lawsuit continues:

    In or around May 2023, Mr. Aliyev reported his findings to the Chief Financial Officer, Leon Perry (“Mr. Perry”). Mr. Aliyev made a complaint to Mr. Perry that it was illegal for Xsolla to provide Mr. Agapitov with monetary loans without charging a standard interest rate, which Xsolla had not done. Mr. Aliyev also made a complaint that Xsolla failed to report the approximately 40-million-dollar loan to Mr. Agapitov to the Internal Revenue Service (“IRS”). Mr. Perry responded and acknowledged the deficiencies and the monetary disbursements, but ultimately brushed off Mr. Aliyev’s complaints and stated, “It is not your problem.” Mr. Aliyev responded, “This is my job.”

    Aliyev claims he was later called into a meeting with Agapitov on July 28, explained why he thought the transactions violated finance rules, and was fired a few days later. Xsolla apparently fired Aliyev for violating company policy, but wouldn’t say which one, and the lawsuit alleges he was actually “unlawfully terminated for reporting financial mishandling.”

    Aliyev and Xsolla did not immediately respond to requests for comment.

    If Xsolla sounds familiar, it might be because cofounder Agapitov laid off 150 of his employees for spending too much time looking at their email. “Work your fucking ass off or get your fucking ass out,” he wrote on X (formerly known as Twitter) back in 2021. Agapitov even boasted of using AI surveillance to monitor which employees were being lazy before deciding who to cull in the mass layoff.

    Earlier this month, Ukraine called on Epic, Ubisoft, and Valve to stop working with the payments platform, claiming Xsolla’s business in Russia helped fund that country’s ongoing war machine. Xsolla interim CEO Chris Hewish told Axios the company had already relocated hundreds of workers out of Russia, though it still facilitated transactions for players there. In the meantime, Xsolla has been using its lucrative business to launch funding initiatives for indie games and snatching up smaller gaming tech companies to provide additional services beyond payment processing, like backend multiplayer support and creator content tools.

    Update 11/30/2023 5:37 p.m. ET: Xsolla owner Agapitov told Kotaku in a phone interview that the $40 million loan did not run afoul of any regulations and that Aliyev tried to blackmail the company after being fired. “We hired a liar and fired a liar,” Agapitov said.

            

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    Ethan Gach

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  • Is It The End Of A Marijuana Era

    Is It The End Of A Marijuana Era

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    If there is one thing you can count on it is change.  But is it the end of marijuana era?  Today on X (formerly known as Twitter), Snoop Dogg announced he was giving up smoke.  The assumption is he is giving up all marijuana use. He asked to be allowed privacy for him and his family during this time.

    Snoop has been iconic for the cannabis industry, and one that has reached into a younger audience as mainstream consumers have increased with legalization. One of his most notable ventures was his partnership with Martha Stewart – it benefited them both and gave the general public a glimpse of marijuana life which was fun and palatable.

    RELATED: Is It Safe To Smoke Weed Daily

    Also this week, Snoop Dogg and his son Cordell Broadus announced the video game scene is about to have another company added to its roster.  Their new company, Death Row Games, aims to help diverse creators publish content on Epic Games’ online game “Fortnite” via its Fortnite Creative tool set and the editing app Unreal Editor for Fortnite. The company, Broadus said, will likely be based in Los Angeles.

    It has been some week, launching a company with his son and losing something which has been iconic with his personality.  Snoop Dogg has been the subject of memes, videos and references about the cannabis industry.  It is the end of a marijuana era.

    Aside from his promotions and appareances which rake in revenue, he also owns a brand. Leafs By Snoop is a cannabis brand owned and produced by Canopy Growth Corporation.

    RELATED: People Who Use Weed Also Do More Of Another Fun Thing

    In 2008, he told the story to Esquire, saying, “The first time I got high off marijuana was in the ’70s, with one of my uncles. They had these little roaches on the table — these part-way-smoked marijuana cigarettes — and there was some Schlitz Malt Liquor Bull. I went in there and sipped the Schlitz, and my uncle asked me did I wanna hit that roach. And I was like, ‘Yeah.’ He put it on the roach clip for me and lit it up, and I hit that motherf*cker. I was about eight or nine years old.”

    It seems you can still get the Schlitz, but not toke with the Dogg.

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    Terry Hacienda

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  • Devolver Digital Just Set A Precedent More Studios Should Follow

    Devolver Digital Just Set A Precedent More Studios Should Follow

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    Image: Devolver Digital

    Occasionally, in times of crisis, gaming studios and publishers have worked to raise funds for people in dire need of humanitarian aid. Last year, for instance, Cyberpunk 2077 developer CD Projekt Red contributed to a fund for victims of the war in Ukraine, and Fortnite publisher Epic Games funneled the proceeds of all purchases made in the popular battle royale for a two-week period to humanitarian relief for the region as well. Now, Cult of the Lamb publisher Devolver Digital is donating funds to aid Palestinians affected by Israel’s attacks on Gaza, and it is encouraging others to follow suit.

    In Eternights You Press R2 To Hold Hands Just Like IRL

    On October 18, Devolver Digital announced that it was supporting relief efforts in Gaza on its official Twitter account, saying:

    We’ve donated to United Nations Relief and Works Agency who are providing humanitarian aid to Palestinian families, we ask you to consider donating if you’re able.

    While much of the gaming industry has thus far remained silent on recent events in Israel and Palestine, Game Developer notes that the organization Work with Indies has pledged to donate 100 percent of its October revenue to relief organizations like Palestine Children’s Relief Fund and World Food Program. Meanwhile, Oak Grove Games founder Esther Wallace is working on an itch.io-based Games For Gaza bundle benefitting Medical Aid For Palestinians.

    As protests and rallies in support of Palestinians continue around the world, many others are also raising money for relief efforts. Political commentator and occasional gamer Hasan “Hasanabi” Piker and his Twitch community have raised over a million dollars to help Palestinians in less than a week. Hopefully, other companies will follow Devolver Digital in issuing their own call to action.

       

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    Isaiah Colbert

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  • Fortnite Brings Back ‘Share The Wealth’ Emote On Same Day As Mass Layoffs

    Fortnite Brings Back ‘Share The Wealth’ Emote On Same Day As Mass Layoffs

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    The video game industry is still reeling from Epic Games’ September 28 announcement that it will lay off nearly 900 employees. If developers at the Fortnite money-printing factory aren’t safe, nobody is. In perhaps the worst-timed microtransaction ever, Fortnite’s “Share The Wealth” emote went back up for sale on the battle royale’s in-game shop later that day.

    Dead By Daylight Devs’ New Game Is Fortnite Meets Doom

    It didn’t take Fortnite news accounts like Guille_GAG long to discover the emote had returned to cap off the a day full of grim news. “Epic has brought back the Share the Wealth Emote just after firing 900 of their employees…,” they tweeted. “Epic Games is under fire for selling the ‘Share the Wealth’ Emote in today’s Item Shop rotation – just hours after 830 employees were laid off,” the FortniteBR Instagram account posted.

    It appears the emote, which was added to the game earlier this year in Chapter 4: Season 3, was only on sale for a brief period before being removed. According to FortniteBR and others, the emote was removed when Epic took down the entire Daily Rotation tab from the store shortly after the emote went live.

    A company spokesperson told Kotaku in an email that the “Share The Wealth” emote was pre-scheduled. “The emote was taken down when we realized the mistake roughly one hour after going live,” they wrote. Epic Games acknowledged the missing feature on Twitter and said it would return during the next item shop refresh.

    “We’ve been spending way more money than we earn,” Epic CEO Tim Sweeney wrote in an email to staff announcing the layoffs. It was a peculiar invocation of of the royal “we,” considering the executive then proceeded to list acquisitions, expansions, and other business initiatives, like growing Fortnite as a metaverse-inspired ecosystem for creators, that most of the people laid off probably had no say in.

    It’s unclear what sort of salary Sweeney and other executives at the company draw. Epic remains a privately owned company, so it doesn’t have to disclose any of that information. Sweeney has pushed back again the concept of a wealth tax in the past, claiming that it would penalize people like him by forcing them to sell equity in their companies anytime they become more valuable. While the larger company remains a black box, we do know that Fortnite made $9 billion in its first two years, and Epic continues to rake in “billions of dollars a year in revenue from player purchases.”

    The news around Epic’s layoffs renewed questions about how companies handle cost-cutting, and who feels the pain first when economic gambles don’t pay off. People often recall the late Nintendo president Satoru Iwata’s symbolic pay cuts when his companies’ products would underperform, like the 3DS and Wii U. Some other gaming CEOs have undergone similar compensation cuts in recent years, including Ubisoft, Electronic Arts, and Activision. Relative to the millions earned in company stock, however, the salary haircuts often seem like a pittance in comparison.

    “The reality of being laid off by Epic while being treated for skin cancer has hit me and woken me from a not sound sleep and I don’t think there are words for how furious I am at the company, the leadership, their greed…all of it.” one former Epic employee tweeted overnight. In the meantime, Epic is still burning money on things like Epic Games Store, its Steam competitor, showering players with free games. The latest freebie is the action RPG Soulstice, which is normally listed at $40.

    “Saying goodbye to people who have helped build Epic is a terrible experience for all,” Sweeney wrote in his email to staff. “The consolation is that we’re adequately funded to support laid off employees: we’re offering a severance package that includes six months base pay and in the US/Canada/Brazil six months of Epic-paid healthcare.”

               

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    Ethan Gach

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  • Fortnite Has A Museum Dedicated To Teaching About The Holocaust

    Fortnite Has A Museum Dedicated To Teaching About The Holocaust

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    Fortnite, Epic Games’ crossover meme of a video game, is once again becoming the stage for some historical education, as a group of developers has used Epic’s Unreal Editor For Fortnite program to create an in-game museum dedicated to the Holocaust.

    Dead By Daylight Devs’ New Game Is Fortnite Meets Doom

    As absurd as that might sound in premise, Fortnite did this in an official capacity for Martin Luther King Jr., and it was a well-intentioned if incredibly jarring tribute to a civil rights figure’s legacy. However, unlike that display, which was done as part of an official Epic Games partnership with the DuSable Museum of African American History and the Estate of Martin Luther King, Jr., this is from Luc Bernard, who directed The Light and the Darkness, a free historical game meant to educate players on the events of the Holocaust.

    Bernard posted about the in-game display on Twitter, saying bringing something like this to Fortnite’s millions of players can bring museums and all their information to people, as a vast majority of people never visit these places in-person. According to a study, around 80 percent of people have never visited a Holocaust museum, so a digital alternative may at least reach some new people. In an interview with Euronews, Bernard said this was especially to reach Fortnite’s younger audience.

    If you want to see the museum for yourself, it’s not live yet. But when it is, the code for the map is 4491-8501-3730.

    All UEFN projects go through Epic, which has veto power over anything that comes through the system. So between the people making it and the big corporation approving it, I’m willing to give it the benefit of the doubt that this will be informative and respectful, even though Fortnite feels like a strange platform for this kind of thing. The game’s scale and reach makes it ideal for creators and historians to use it, but all the best intentions won’t make it any less ridiculous when you see Rick from Rick and Morty and Master Chief reading about one of the most heinous acts of human cruelty known to man. All that being said, kudos to the team, and I hope this reaches people and proves Fortnite can be more than just a meme.

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    Kenneth Shepard

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  • The Ladies Of The Witcher Are Storming Fortnite

    The Ladies Of The Witcher Are Storming Fortnite

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    Epic Games’ battle royale shooter Fortnite has some new characters joining in on the quest for the W: The Witcher 3’s Ciri, Geralt of Rivia’s adopted daughter, and his love interest Yennefer of Vengerberg are now available in the game’s item shop.

    The Witcher 3 Meets Tense Roguelike PvE Card-Battling In Rogue Mage

    The popular ladies of The Witcher franchise storm Fortnite with two islands of their own: Ciri’s Escape and Yennefer’s Battleground, both of which can be accessed through the game’s Discover tab. Or, if you’d rather land on the islands immediately, you can enter code 2776-4034-8400 for Ciri’s and 2862-9616-5689 for Yennefer’s. Completing either Ciri’s or Yennefer’s islands will net you emoticons of each, while finishing both of them will reward you with a fancy banner to show off. The two islands will be live until July 4.

    The real draw here are the equippable skins, though you’ll have to shell out some V-Bucks for them. Currently Yennefer can be bought either on her own for 1,500 V-Bucks (approximately $12 USD) or in a bundle with her Megascope pickaxe, bird skull back bling, and Black Wings emote in which she summons her magical raven for 1,800. Ciri, meanwhile, is only available in a pack for 2,000 V-Bucks, and comes with both back bling and a pickaxe of her silver sword Zireael, as well as a basilisk glider. There are some cool touches to these skins, as well. Ciri’s hands, for example, will glow green when holding her Zireael Sword Pickaxe. And Yennefer’s just a badass. Who wouldn’t want to embody her essence?

    Unfortunately, Geralt isn’t joining Ciri and Yennefer to duke it out for the win this time around, as the White Wolf was previously an unlockable skin Battle Pass owners were able to acquire back in Chapter 4 Season 1. As a result, he probably won’t be for sale at any point, though those who unlocked him can, of course, use him any time. Ah well, if we can’t have him back, then replacing him with two of the most powerful women in The Witcher seems like a fair trade.

     

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    Levi Winslow

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  • Microsoft Fined $20 Million For ‘Illegally’ Collecting Children’s Information On Xbox

    Microsoft Fined $20 Million For ‘Illegally’ Collecting Children’s Information On Xbox

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    The Federal Trade Commission just announced that Microsoft has been fined $20 million “over charges it illegally collected personal information from children who signed up for its Xbox gaming system without their parents’ consent”.

    Dead By Daylight Devs’ New Game Is Fortnite Meets Doom

    The ruling follows a larger one from December 2022, when Epic Games, developers of Fortnite, were hit with a $550 million fine for using “privacy-invasive default settings and deceptive interfaces that tricked Fortnite users, including teenagers and children”.

    In this instance, the FTC says the issue centred around the creation of children’s accounts on an Xbox console, a process that until late 2021 would allow a child to enter a certain amount of personal information before requiring a parent’s assistance and permission. Microsoft had been keeping that data (sometimes for “years”), even if the account wasn’t created, which is a violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule (COPPA).

    Microsoft have already responded to the ruling with a post on the official Xbox blog, with Dave McCarthy, CVP Xbox Player Services, saying the violation was a result of a “glitch”, and that Microsoft will “continue improving” going forwards:

    We recently entered into a settlement with the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to update our account creation process and resolve a data retention glitch found in our system. Regrettably, we did not meet customer expectations and are committed to complying with the order to continue improving upon our safety measures. We believe that we can and should do more, and we’ll remain steadfast in our commitment to safety, privacy, and security for our community.

    McCarthy goes on to explain the details of this “glitch”, and how it led to retention of children’s data despite this being “inconsistent with our policy to save that information for only 14 days”:

    During the investigation, we identified a technical glitch where our systems did not delete account creation data for child accounts where the account creation process was started but not completed. This was inconsistent with our policy to save that information for only 14 days to make it easier for gamers to pick up where they left off to complete the process. Our engineering team took immediate action: we fixed the glitch, deleted the data, and implemented practices to prevent the error from recurring. The data was never used, shared, or monetized.

    The FTC’s statement, meanwhile, says:

    Microsoft will pay $20 million to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that it violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA) by collecting personal information from children who signed up to its Xbox gaming system without notifying their parents or obtaining their parents’ consent, and by illegally retaining children’s personal information.

    “Our proposed order makes it easier for parents to protect their children’s privacy on Xbox, and limits what information Microsoft can collect and retain about kids,” said Samuel Levine, Director of the FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection. “This action should also make it abundantly clear that kids’ avatars, biometric data, and health information are not exempt from COPPA.”

    As part of a proposed order filed by the Department of Justice on behalf of the FTC, Microsoft will be required to take several steps to bolster privacy protections for child users of its Xbox system. For example, the order will extend COPPA protections to third-party gaming publishers with whom Microsoft shares children’s data. In addition, the order makes clear that avatars generated from a child’s image, and biometric and health information, are covered by the COPPA Rule when collected with other personal data. The order must be approved by a federal court before it can go into effect.

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    Luke Plunkett

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  • Unreal Engine Videos Give Us A Glimpse At The Graphics Of The Future

    Unreal Engine Videos Give Us A Glimpse At The Graphics Of The Future

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    Epic Games held a little showcase at the Game Developers Conference earlier today, called State of Unreal. Designed as a way to keep everyone who makes games up to date on what’s in store for the industry-dominating Unreal Engine, the highlights are also obviously interesting to anyone who plays games as well.

    Both Epic and some external studios took the opportunity to show off some of the stuff they’ve been working on in Unreal Engine 5. The shortest video, and perhaps most impressive, is this clip from Ninja Theory’s Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II, which highlights some incredible facial animation capabilities (using Metahuman, which we’ve written about previously):

    State of Unreal – Senua’s Saga: Hellblade II | GDC 2023

    It still doesn’t look real, there’s something about the exaggeration of the lips and her teeth that I can’t fully explain, but it still looks amazing.

    Another subject of the technical showcase was action RPG Lords of the Fallen, with a more conventional look at how games are made using the engine:

    Lords of the Fallen – State of Unreal Technical Showcase Trailer GDC | Wishlist: PC, PS5 & Xbox X/S

    Next up is this gameplay demo from Infinitesimals, a backyard bugs game that I’m pretty sure was first announced years ago, but which is still in development. This clip is a little more developer-focused, but still gives you a look at how Unreal Engine 5 handles the scale of a large open world:

    Infinitesimals – Unreal 5 Gameplay Demo | State of Unreal 2023

    And finally we’ve got this driving video, which is not just an ad for Unreal Engine and Epic’s Quixel, but for EV company Rivian as well (their car’s dash screens run on the Unreal Engine). This one is showing off some lovely foliage, along with some impressive driving physics as well (it’s particularly neat how the car will hit small rocks that will then fly away):

    Unreal Engine 5.2 – Next-Gen Graphics Tech Demo | State of Unreal 2023

    While it’s expected to take everything shown at these presentations with a grain of salt, it’s encouraging that three of the four videos here were of actual games currently in development, meaning that the usual “well, your actual games aren’t going to look this good” caveats we normally need on these posts aren’t quite as needed here.

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    Luke Plunkett

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  • Fortnite Fans Say New Skin Is A JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Rip-Off

    Fortnite Fans Say New Skin Is A JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Rip-Off

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    I’m seeing double. Must be the work of an enemy Stand.
    Image: Epic Games / David Production / Shueisha / Netflix / Kotaku

    Recently, Fortnite has become a wacky and eclectic ensemble of the best anime characters of all time with its Dragon Ball Z, Naruto, and My Hero Academia crossovers. However, some fans are calling out the battle royale’s latest original skin for not being so original at all, but rather what they see as an egregious JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure knockoff.

    Yesterday, the official Fortnite Twitter account made a post about its newest character skin, Hana. Hana sports a fashionably short chartreuse hairstyle while wearing a blue suit with an exposed midriff and matching chartreuse patterns. Hana’s also got a ghoul-like “inner demon” outfit named Keleritas. If you’ve watched the Netflix anime JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean, you wouldn’t be remiss in thinking I just wrote a word-for-word description of its titular character Jolyne Cujoh and her ghost-like Stand, Stone Free.

    Read More: Netflix’s Binge-Model Release of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Stone Ocean Ruined The Anime’s Hype

    For those without JJBA brain rot, Jolyne Cujoh is the main character of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure’s sixth part, Stone Ocean. Jolyne utilizes a magical ghost-like being called a stand to assist her in battles. Stone Ocean recently finished streaming on Netflix last month, though the show was poorly promoted online by the streaming service.

    While some fans were more charitable than others when calling out Fortnite’s new character on Twitter for her uncanny resemblance to Jolyne, editing the character into the “Is That A MF JoJo’s Reference” meme and making requests for a future Fortnite x JJBA crossover, others saw it as a blatant rip-off.

    “You gotta love that legally distinct energy,” Reddit user Vera_Verse wrote on the r/TwoBestFriends subreddit.

    “Great Value Jolyne,” wrote one Twitter user.

    “Johnson’s Peculiar Journey,” wrote another.

    Kotaku reached out to Epic Games but did not receive a comment by the time of publication.

    Read More: Netflix Removed A Fan-Favorite JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure Scene To Avoid Disney’s Lawyers

    JJBA is no stranger to battle royale games or wacky crossovers. Prior to the release of JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All-Star Battle R, Bandai Namco released a third-person battle royale action game called JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: Last Survivor in Japan back in December 2019. More recently, JJBA announced a collaboration with the fashion company Bradelis New York for a Jolyne Cujoh-themed lingerie line.

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    Isaiah Colbert

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  • Fortnite’s Plague Doc Skin Is Back After Three Years, Fans Blame COVID

    Fortnite’s Plague Doc Skin Is Back After Three Years, Fans Blame COVID

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    Image: Epic Games / Kotaku

    Yesterday, after 1,410 days (or 3 years and 10 months) the Grim Medicine cosmetic set—complete with the popular Plague Doctor skin—returned to Fortnite’s in-game store, letting players buy it for the first time since the start of the covid-19 pandemic. And many believe it was the pandemic itself that kept the plague-themed items and skins out of the game for such a long period of time.

    I doubt I need to explain Fortnite to you, but just so everyone’s on the same page: Epic’s Fortnite is a free-to-play battle royale PVP shooter available on nearly every modern platform out there. It supports crossplay across all of them and for the last few years has been one of the most popular games in the world as it continues to expand and include more characters from other franchises, like Star Wars, Dragonball Z, and Street Fighter.

    But Fortnite also has plenty of its own original skins and cosmetic items too, like Peely and the previously mentioned Plague Doctor. But until yesterday, these plague-related items hadn’t appeared in the game since March 1, 2019, making them extremely rare, as the only people who could use them were folks who bought them back when they were last available. Meanwhile, most other skins appear again and again in the store every few weeks or months.

    Fans had theorized that the Grim Medicine cosmetic set had been blacklisted and retired by Epic due to the covid-19 pandemic. This makes sense, as including those skins during the height of the deadly pandemic that has killed over 6 million people worldwide as of January 2023 would have been a bad look.

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    The working theory is that the skin popped up in the store on March 1, 2019. Then before it could appear again in the store, covid-19 was detected in Wuhan, China in December 2019 and eventually spread around the world, officially becoming a pandemic according to the World Health Organization on March 11, 2020. It’s not unreasonable that Epic saw this happening and decided to pull the plague-themed items from the store’s rotation in order to avoid any controversy.

    The thing is, Epic has never officially confirmed this theory at any point. Kotaku has reached out about the skin and the long gap in time between it showing up, but didn’t hear back from the company. Still, even if Epic hasn’t officially confirmed the reason for the Grim Medicine items going missing for nearly four years, the covid-19 theory doesn’t seem unreasonable to me. And regardless of why, many players were excited to see it return, even if only to make a joke about its long absence. Or to point out that covid-19 is still a thing in 2023, which it is, and it’s still deadly and dangerous, too.

    “One of my friends IMMEDIATELY dropped money into the game upon getting this notification. He’s been waiting since it was last in the shop,” tweeted one person. “LETS GOOOO! I finally got PLAGUE!!! I wanted him for 2 years,” tweeted another player upon seeing the news of the Plague Doctor’s return to Fortnite. Of course, there were other players who found it funny everybody was excited over the skin, and others who owned it already and were now sad to see their once rare skin become common once more.

    Personally, I’m not excited about the Grim Medicine skins as I don’t really like how they look. And besides, I only like to buy the most cursed and bizarre skins in Fortnite, like Mr. Meeseeks from Rick and Morty.

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    Zack Zwiezen

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  • Fortnite players are getting $245 million in refunds — here’s who qualifies

    Fortnite players are getting $245 million in refunds — here’s who qualifies

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    Epic Games, creator of the massively popular video game Fortnite, was hit with the Federal Trade Commission’s biggest penalty ever for a rule break this week.

    The developer was ordered to pay $520 million for violating the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act as well as for tricking millions of players into making unintended in-game purchases using a technique called “Dark patterns.”

    Fortnite is free to play and makes billions of dollars from in-game purchases such as digital skins for players’ characters and seasonal “Battle Passes” that provide useful items as a user spends more time playing.

    In a release breaking down Epic’s violations, the FTC said that the game’s “counterintuitive, inconsistent and confusing button configuration led players to incur unwanted charges based on the press of a single button,” including while players thought the game was in sleep mode or in a loading screen.

    “These tactics led to hundreds of millions of dollars in unauthorized charges for consumers,” the FTC said.

    Fortnite allowed children to purchase its in-game currency “without requiring any parents or card holder action or consent.” Parents complained that their kids “racked up hundreds of dollars in charges before they realized Epic had charged their credit card without their consent.”

    “The laws have not changed, but their application has evolved and long-standing industry practices are no longer enough,” Epic said in a statement in response to the penalty. “We accepted this agreement because we want Epic to be at the forefront of consumer protection and provide the best experience for our players.”

    Of the $520 million fine, $245 million will be set aside for customer refunds.

    Are you eligible for a Fortnite refund?

    Three groups can expect to receive money back:

    • Parents whose kids made unauthorized purchases in the Epic Games Store between January 2017 and November 2018
    • Players who were charged Fortnite’s in-game currency for items they didn’t intend to buy between January 2017 and September 2022
    • Players who disputed unauthorized charges with their credit card companies and, as a result, had their accounts locked

    When will the FTC’s Fortnite refunds be paid out?

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  • ‘Fortnite’ Maker Fined $520 Million For Invading Kids’ Privacy And Tricking Players

    ‘Fortnite’ Maker Fined $520 Million For Invading Kids’ Privacy And Tricking Players

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    Fortnite creator Epic Games will pay a record $520 million to settle allegations that it illegally collected children’s personal information and used “dark patterns” to encourage accidental in-game purchases. What do you think?

    “I hope they have a creepy way of making that money back.”

    Cliff Zarley • Unemployed

    “I blame parents for letting their kids have personal information.”

    Mandy Lee • Chief Enunciator

    “We let these companies babysit our kids for free, and they betray us like this?”

    Skyler McManus • Excuse Investigator

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