One of fifteen lawsuits against companies that make a distribute video games has just been dismissed for having a “straw” plaintiff. The caretaker of a teenage boy seems to have made up some of the facts of her case against the game companies, and that was a no-go in court. Will the other cases survive?
A ‘World-wide Epidemic’
Cynthia Jimenez lives in Southern Illinois, where she has been taking care of her now-14-year-old grandson, who the court refers to as I.C. to preserve his anonymity. When I.C. was seven, he began playing video games. In 2016, he started playing Fortnite, Roblox, and Minecraft, and since then, he’s continued to play video games at what Jimenez describes as “an increasing and uncontrollable pace.” He often downloads them through Google Play or Nintendo eShop and plays them through his Nintendo Switch console or on his Samsung smartphone, though sometimes he uses discs to play on his Xbox 360.
Jimenez is one of many that claim that video game addiction is a “world-wide epidemic” that’s increasing in people like her grandson due to the availability of streaming and online games that give minors like I.C. “unfettered access to ‘free’ games that target those consumers to purchase products within the game to keep playing or for other game perks.” Video game addiction (sometimes called “internet gaming disorder”) is allegedly characterized by “severely reduced control over gaming habits” and “increasing priority given to gaming over other activities.”
Strained Family Relationships
Jimenez argued that video game addiction brings dire consequences for both the affected person and their loved ones. She claimed that it adversely affects cognitive processes, including “multi-second time perception, inhibition, and decision-making.” This affects various aspects of a person’s life, not just school and work, but also self-care and relationships.
She claimed that addicts “often stop interacting with friends and family, exhibit excessive rage, and no longer enjoy other hobbies or activities outside of their video games.” She alleged that when minors or young adults suffer video game addiction, it causes rifts between them and their loved ones, “rifts beyond that normally experienced between children and their parents or other family members.” As a result, she said he now requires medication, counseling, and an individualized education plan at school.
Jimenez claimed that she’d seen the affects in her own grandson, who she said displayed “severe emotional distress, physical injuries, diminished social interactions, lack of interest in other hobbies and sports, withdrawal symptoms such as rage, anger, and physical outburst, and diagnoses of attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) and Depression.” Jimenez said she herself has been the recipient of I.C.’s rage and game-withdrawal symptoms, and that she feels scared of him at times.
Games Addicting by Design
Jimenez didn’t accept that young people like her grandson are merely inevitable casualties of the videogame market. According to her, they were targets of an industry intending to make gamers addicted to their products. The games she claimed that I.C. was most affected by were created by some combination of the companies Epic Games, Roblox Corp., Mojang Studios, Nintendo, Google, and Microsoft. She claimed that these companies made, advertised, and sold video games that were specifically designed to cause the addiction experienced by people like her grandson. She said that they use “traditional game tactics” such as feedback loops, reward systems, and “patented designs containing addictive features and technology to ensure its users keep playing longer and spending more on ‘microtransactions’ within the game.
These microtransactions, she claimed, are used to increase the companies’ profits from individual games. The microtransactions often occur as a result of companies using “deceptive tactics” like “friend” characters or targeted ads so that the more times a player comes back to play a game, the more times they are affected by those tactics and thus more likely to spend more money within the game in order to keep playing.
Jimenez said that there was no question that these companies were aware of exactly what these tactics would do, because they consulted professionals. She says that these companies enlisted the help of behavioral psychologists and neuroscientists to conduct state-of-the-art research and collect data that they then used to design their games to be as addictive as possible and keep consumers playing and spending. She claimed that by targeting young people, the companies can addict them early and ensure future engagement to secure their profit stream.
Jimenez and Others Bring Lawsuits
All of this is prioritized over the safety of the people who play these companies’ games, many of which are kids like I.C. Jimenez says that she is a victim of the games, too, claiming she personally experienced “emotional distress, pain, suffering, mental anguish and loss of money” as a consequence of the companies’ dangerous tactics. Jimenez filed a lawsuit in St. Louis federal court against all the video game companies together, seeking damages for her and her grandson’s suffering as a consequence of the companies’ “intentional, negligent, deceptive, fraudulent, willful, immoral, reckless, and unlawful acts.”
But Jimenez was just one of many. At least 14 other similar lawsuits were also filed by other plaintiffs, some presumably by guardians of children similarly situated to Jimenez. These suits were brought across the Midwest and South, from Arkansas to Minnesota to Florida. Although the cases filed to be consolidated into a multi-district litigation suit, the request was declined due to the suits’ “lack of common factual questions.” This means that each plaintiff would have to bring their suits individually, which would probably make it harder to prove that the companies’ knowingly did what they did or acted in cahoots with one another.
Jimenez’s Case Nipped in the Bud
In Jimenez’s case, though, her lawsuit recently got curtailed when some fishy facts surfaced. Epic Games, one of the defendants in her suit, said that when it checked its records, it found that I.C.’s gaming account was created three days before his grandmother filed the lawsuit. They allegedly said that this account was used to play Fortnite for less than one hour, and hasn’t been touched in the four months that have passed since.
Epic’s lawyers not only filed to dismiss the suit, but also asked the court to make Jimenez pay their legal fees for wasting their time and money and sanction the plaintiff’s attorney for filing a disingenuous lawsuit. They wrote that “[t]he false premise that I.C. continues to play Fortnite uncontrollably is the basis for all claims against Epic,” but an “alleged ‘addiction’ requires more than a single brief instance of gameplay.”
After the judge dismissed the suit for Epic, Jimenez’s lawyers also withdrew their claims against the other defendants with leave to re-file. The others, more than a dozen lawsuits, still remain. Assuming their plaintiffs are being honest, they may yet be able to hold video game manufacturers accountable. But without being consolidated as a class action or multi-district litigation, their claims may be difficult to prove.
Related Resources:
- Can I Sue A Video Game Creator or Company? (FindLaw's Learn About the Law)
- Game, Set, Match: Dating App Company Sued for Playing With Your Head (FindLaw's Law and Daily Life)
- Can I Sue Addictive Online Games? (FindLaw's Learn About the Law)
