Valve in Legal Hot Water in New York Over Loot Boxes and Gambling

The State of New York’s attorney general, Letitia James, has officially taken gaming giant, Valve, to court in a state court in Manhattan, alleging that the combination of games like Counter-Strike, Team Fortress, and Dota, wherein players can earn and use real money to buy loot boxes, and Steam’s Community Market, where rare skins and items can be sold, often for exorbitant prices, amount to “quintessential gambling.” There are reports of Counter-Strike: Global Offensive skins selling for as much as $2.5 million, with the game touted as having the biggest in-game economy of any video game. Valve previously adjusted the way it presented loot boxes and their rewards to players, seemingly specifically to avoid EU gambling regulations.

Case file: https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/27417060/new-york-v-valve.pdf