Fortnite maker to refund players $245 million over ‘confusing’ purchases

FTC accuses Epic Games of ‘digital design tricks’ to boost sales revenue

Fortnite is one of the most commonly streamed games on Twitch (Alamy/ PA)

Fortnite creator Epic Games will have to pay back players who made unwitting purchases in the game following a ruling from US regulators.

The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) announced that the video game maker must pay $245 million to consumers after using “dark patterns to trick players” into spending money.

“Fortnite’s counterintuitive, inconsistent, and confusing button configuration led players to incur unwanted charges based on the press of a single button,” the FTC wrote in a statement.

“The company also made it easy for children to make purchases while playing Fortnite without requiring any parental consent.”

The regulator’s complaint also claimed that Epic Games locked the accounts of customers who disputed unauthorised charges with their credit card companies.

The FTC order also prohibits Epic Games from blocking customers who dispute unauthorised charges from accessing their accounts.

It follows a separate settlement announced in December in which Epic Games agreed to pay $275 million penalty to settle FTC allegations that the video game company had violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act Rule.

The gaming giant has also previously been accused of using techniques found in gambling to trick children into making purchases.

“Game monetisation schemes have become increasingly sophisticated and have been featured more prominently within popular online games,” wrote the authors of a 2018 study published in the journal Addiction. “In our view, some of these schemes could be considered predatory.”

The refunds ordered by the FTC are available to any parents whose children made unauthorised credit card purchases on the Epic Games Store between January 2017 and November 2018, as well as Fortnite players who were charged the in-game currency V-Bucks for unwanted in-game items between January 2017 and September 2022.

Any players whose Fortnite accounts were locked between this same time period are also eligible for a refund.

Fortnite players who want to claim a refund can do so by going to the FTC’s ‘Fortnite Refunds’ page.

Epic Games did not respond to a request for comment from The Independent.