FTC issues over 620K refunds to Fortnite players ‘tricked’ by Epic Games into making ‘unwanted purchases’

Payments from the FTC are finally coming for Fortnite players after a settlement the American government agency reached with Epic Games almost two years ago.

The FTC and Epic reached the settlement to the tune of a couple hundred million dollars after allegations claimed the company “used design tactics known as dark patterns to trick players into making unwanted purchases, let children rack up unauthorized charges without any parental involvement, and blocked some users who disputed unauthorized charges from accessing their purchased content,” according to the FTC. The agency announced yesterday it was sending out the first round of payments from this settlement, which amounted to roughly 630,000 payments. The FTC says “about half” of these payments will be distributed via PayPal, while the other half will be physical checks.

The total amount of refund payments that will be sent out to affected parties will amount to $72 million USD, while the average individual payment is $114. In addition to the settlement, the FTC said Epic will need to create stronger default privacy settings for younger players and turn off voice and text communications as a default, which the agency called a “first-of-its-kind provision.”

It’s been a tough year in the courts for the Fortnite developer and game behemoth, with similar lawsuits and fines occurring in places like the Netherlands. Decisions like these also send a clear message to other game developers and publishers who have a clearly younger audience: Practices that can deceive children and other players into making purchases will come at a cost.

Given just how much money Fortnite seems to make and the record numbers the game has seen as recently as a couple weeks ago, that settlement likely stings for Epic but probably won’t derail too much of what’s to come in the game, including a new FPS mode and serious overhauls for LEGO Fortnite.

But for the players and parents that were affected by this lawsuit and applied for a refund on the FTC’s website, Christmas might be coming a little early this year.