SoS Players United, a group of State of Survival players who fight for the rights of State of Survival players have recently filed a lawsuit against the developers FunPlus International AG and Kingsgroup Holdings on September 2 in the United States District Court for the Northern District of California. The group alleged that the State of Survival app is using false advertising of price discounts for in-game purchases. The lawsuit has been filed by Pollock Cohen LLP in court.
FunPlus and KingsGroup are facing a lawsuit for alleged false advertising
The complaint claims that the freemium game State of Survival provides players with “fabricated” discounted prize packs that include a red-strike through line that makes it appear as though the prices have been cut down significantly.
There were no discounts, however; these were the regular prices that players would have to pay. Millions of players may have purchased the deceptive limited-time offers for up to $99.99 each till now.
The lawsuit goes on to list bogus offers, such as those that promised a bonus of “3960%” or “2800%” and were frequently displayed in red, eye-catching bubbles with the intention of tempting and misleading customers.
The complaint also lists other deceptive practices, such as using the warning “Only 1 remaining!” to emphasize a product’s high scarcity and encourage gamers to grab the product fast, but there was no such supply restriction in reality.
“These advertisements have run for years. But at no point, let alone within three months of the advertised discounts, have these in-game items ever actually been offered at a non-discounted price–i.e. without their “limited time discounts,” a part of the 33-page long lawsuit states.
State of Survival also allegedly requires the players to pay to strengthen their buildings in their bases such as headquarters, upgrading buildings, or training a large number of troops. According to the lawsuit, if a player does not make any purchases in the game, it would require close to 16 months of playing two hours each day of the year to gather the necessary resources to upgrade their Headquarters to level 30.
According to the lawsuit, the developers allegedly know that players would not be prepared to pay the excessive amount to reach this specific level, therefore they never disclose to a player the complete cost of the materials necessary to proceed.
To counter this, the developers used an incremental upgrade mechanism to divide gameplay costs among “29 different upgrades, all while keeping consumers in the dark,” according to the class action.
“Since its inception in 2019, State of Survival has grossed over a billion dollars in revenue, primarily through in-game microtransactions whereby players can acquire hero “badges,” speed-ups, and other valuables,” the lawsuit says. This type of false advertisement is prohibited under the California act as per the claim of the plaintiff.
Plaintiffs are represented by attorneys Raphael Janove and Adam Pollock of Pollock Cohen LLP and Karl Kronenberger and Kate Hollist of Kronenberger Rosenfeld LLP. In a recent but different lawsuit event, Riot Games sued MLBB developer Moonton Games for allegedly stealing League of Legends’ skin ideas.
What are your thoughts as the developers of State of Survival are being sued for false advertising? Let us know in the comments below!
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