TLDR
- A federal lawsuit filed March 27 claims Roblox, Epic Games, Microsoft, and Mojang deliberately designed games to addict children using psychological manipulation techniques.
- The plaintiff, an 18-year-old from Michigan, says he began playing at age 9 and was eventually gaming up to 16 hours a day with withdrawal symptoms.
- The complaint points to variable reward schedules, battle passes, and manipulative matchmaking as core addictive mechanics.
- The lawsuit follows a separate class action against Valve alleging loot boxes in Dota 2 and Counter-Strike 2 amount to illegal gambling.
- A Los Angeles jury recently found Meta and YouTube liable for designing addictive platforms harmful to children.
A new federal lawsuit claims that Roblox, Fortnite, and Minecraft were deliberately built to hook children on gaming. The complaint was filed on March 27 in the Northern District of California.
The case was brought on behalf of Jordan Duncan, an 18-year-old from Michigan. Duncan says he started playing Roblox and Minecraft at age 9 and Fortnite at age 11.
By his teenage years, Duncan was reportedly spending up to 16 hours a day playing games. The complaint says attempts to stop him from playing led to anger and refusal to sleep.
The lawsuit names Roblox Corporation, Epic Games, Microsoft, and Mojang as defendants. It accuses the companies of using psychological manipulation techniques to keep young players engaged and spending money.
The complaint describes specific methods it says were used to drive addiction. These include operant conditioning, personalized algorithms, and variable reward schedules, the same principle behind slot machines.
Season passes and battle passes are also called out. The lawsuit says these require hours of gameplay to unlock time-limited rewards while algorithms deliberately slow player progress.
Complaint Details Matchmaking and Monetization Tactics
The filing goes further in describing how matchmaking systems allegedly pair new players with skilled players who own desirable items. The complaint says this pushes less experienced players toward making purchases.
Roblox’s Creator Hub is specifically named. The lawsuit says it gives developers guidance on monetization strategies and rewards them for keeping premium users in-game as long as possible.
Duncan has diagnoses of ADHD, Persistent Depressive Disorder, Oppositional Defiance Disorder, and a learning disability. The complaint says these conditions made him especially vulnerable to the games’ design.
The lawsuit argues that video game addiction is a recognized clinical condition. The World Health Organization classified Gaming Disorder in 2022, grouping it with substance use disorders and gambling addiction.
Brain imaging research cited in the complaint shows excessive gaming can cause structural changes in regions tied to memory, emotion, and impulse control. The prefrontal cortex, which handles judgment and decision-making, does not fully develop until age 25 to 30.
The complaint also highlights what it calls a gap between the companies’ public safety messaging and their actual practices. Roblox introduced parental controls in 2024, almost two decades after launch. Fortnite’s daily spending limit for users under 13 is $100, which the complaint notes could allow a child to spend up to $36,500 a year without parental consent.
Gaming and Gambling Lawsuits Continue to Pile Up
This case is not the only legal action targeting the gaming industry right now. A class action filed on March 23 against Valve Corporation alleges that loot boxes in Dota 2, Counter-Strike 2, and Team Fortress 2 constitute illegal gambling under Washington state law.
That complaint says about 96 percent of loot box openings result in items worth less than the $2.49 key used to open them. The odds of winning the rarest items can be as low as 1 in 146,000.
The New York Attorney General also filed a lawsuit against Valve in February over its loot box system.
Last week, a Los Angeles jury found Meta and YouTube liable in a case centered on social media addiction. The jury concluded both companies intentionally designed their platforms to be addictive and harmful to children.
Meta and Google plan to appeal the ruling. Lawsuits against sportsbook operators making similar addiction-related claims are also moving through courts in Massachusetts.
