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Video game maker Bethesda Softworks and its parent company have been accused of misleading consumers about the downloadable content (DLC) available to Fallout 4 Season Pass holders.
The lead plaintiff, James Devine from California, says Bethesda induced gamers like him to purchase a $30 Season Pass by advertising the availability of a “lifetime” of DLC. He says he purchased the game at a GameStop in 2019, but quickly found out he did not have access to the content he thought he was purchasing.
“I bought the first season pass, and I was like, cool. That’ll give me all access for the rest of the game, right,” Devine told GamesBeat. “Then they dropped that new batch. I’ll go check it out, just to find out I had no access at all. And I had to buy another season pass basically to have access to it. I was just disappointed. I felt like I was ripped off.”
The class action lawsuit cites a number of representations made by Bethesda about the DLC it was offering to Season Pass holders.
“We’ve always done a lot of DLC for our games. We love making them, and you always ask us for more,” Bethesda allegedly stated in a blog post. “To reward our most loyal fans, this time we’ll be offering a Season Pass that will get you all of the Fallout 4 DLC we ever do for just $30… we know that it will be worth at least $40, and if we do more, you’ll get it all with the Season Pass.”
The plaintiff says that, instead of offering Season Pass holders access to all content, the company took a double dip, removing DLC and renaming it “Creation Club” content. Users could access the Creation Club, but only if they paid for another pass, claims the class action lawsuit.
Bethesda is accused of violating Maryland consumer protection laws, as well as breach of contract, fraud, and breach of express warranty.
“It’s a multibillion-dollar lawsuit, depending on the factor of the punitive damages,” a lawyer representing the plaintiff told VentureBeat. “Even a conservative multiplier of four or five times the damages would yield multibillions of dollars in damages. We can’t reveal the exact number of people that bought the season pass, but you know that it is a substantial portion of the people that bought the game.”
Though the original class action lawsuit was filed in 2019, the litigation may affect a pending deal with Microsoft to buy the company for a reported $7.5 billion, bringing its claims, and potential liability for Bethesda, back into the limelight.
Did you purchase a season pass for Fallout 4? Do you think Bethesda misled consumers about its DLC? Tell us your thoughts in the comment section below!
The lead plaintiff is represented by Filippo Marchino and Thomas Gray of The X-Law Group.
The Fallout 4 Downloadable Content Class Action Lawsuit is Devine v. Bethesda Softworks LLC et al., Case No. 8:19-cv-02009, in U.S. District Court for the District of Maryland.
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16 thoughts onFallout 4 Maker Faces Class Action Lawsuit Alleging Lies About Downloadable Content
2019 please add me
Add me please
I per order Fallout 4 and the season pass, So yes I was angry and event felt ripped off when I herd about the Creation Club. At some point after the Creation Club went live I noticed some of my favorite mods where no longer available, but ironically very similar items appeared for sale in the Creation Club. So I gave in and purchased a few Fallout 4 items from the Creation Club while logged in on my Xbox One. Later when I attempted to download my purchases on my PC version I discovered CC purchases are NOT cross platform. Bethesda does not inform the customer that CC purchases are console specific, but rather implies CC purchases are Bethesda account specific by allowing cross platform Creation Club credentialing, as well as no warning to the contrary. Creation Club was simply intended to milk even more money out of the loyal fan base, and that’s really disappointing.
2020 purchase add me please
Add me purchased 2019
Added please 2019 purchase