Niantic Settles 'Pokémon GO' Fest Lawsuit for Over $1.5 Million USD
The class-action lawsuit was filed by disappointed fans.
App developer Niantic has settled a Pokémon GO class-action lawsuit for over $1.5 million USD with an official settlement website slated to arrive by May 25. The case, brought forth by Pokémon GO fan Jonathan Norton, regards a botched Pokémon GO Fest event that took place at Chicago’s Grant Park in July 2017. The festival didn’t live up to expectations when poor connectivity and server problems prevented over 20,000 players — many of whom traveled long distances to attend the event — from logging into the app, thus rendering the game “unplayable.”
While Niantic quickly announced after disastrous event that they would refund all ticket costs and offer an additional $100 USD of in-game currency to attendees, some fans were still unsatisfied, citing various additional costs such as airfare, hotel costs, parking fees, car rental, mileage, etc. Thus, Niantic has agreed to pay out $1,575,000 USD to reimburse attendees for the accrued costs, as long as receipts are provided.
According to TechCrunch, Niantic has also stated that the remaining money left after all claims and lawyer fees have been paid for will be donated to the Illinois Bar foundation and nonprofit organization Chicago Run.
See below for the full court filing and share your thoughts in the comments below. For related app industry news, Bumble is suing Tinder’s parent company for $400 million USD for accused fraudulently-obtained trade secrets.
