Take-Two Interactive, a major player in the video game publishing realm, has been accused of “theft.” As reported by Axios, the lawsuit against the company seems to revolve around NBA 2K‘s microtransactions, a flagship series alongside Grand Theft Auto, Borderlands, and BioShock.
The lawsuit, filed in a federal court in California on November 17 by a minor represented by their mother, focuses on Take-Two’s sale of “virtual currency” for purchasing in-game items in NBA 2K and other sports games, as well as the inability to transfer that currency to newer game versions.
The lawsuit alleges that Take-Two’s approach is “unfair, unlawful, and greedy,” especially when coupled with the claim that the company shuts down servers for its older sports games relatively quickly after launching new editions. Once a game’s servers are shut down, the virtual currency acquired within becomes inaccessible.
The lawsuit accuses Take-Two of unfair business practices and violating California civil statutes regarding theft, stating that “by withdrawing the virtual currency from the Plaintiff and Group members, Defendants took and stole their personal property, or fraudulently appropriated property that had been entrusted to Defendant.”
NBA 2K24, the latest installment of NBA 2K, is currently the second lowest-rated game in the series on Steam. With “extremely negative” reviews and only 14% of them being positive out of over 10,100 reviews accumulated, the game released on September 8 hasn’t been faring well.
It’s quite surprising, yet not entirely unexpected, when considering the average score NBA 2K24 holds on Metacritic: a 68. It’s a dreadful score (matching that of NBA 2K21 in its time) for a franchise that historically has maintained ratings above 80.
