Online social games providers Big Fish Games has once again been slapped with a class action lawsuit that is questioning the legality of its social casino gaming products in the state of Washington. The lawsuit which was filed at the US District Court of the Western District of Washington at Seattle and is being led by Plaintiff Manasa Thimmegowda named the Big Fish Games and Aristocrat Leisure, its owner, as the defendants.
According to the plaintiff, Big Fish Games and Aristocrat Leisure have violated Washington State gambling laws by operating Big Fish Casino as well as a number of other similar social casino games. As of this writing, online gambling is still illegal in the state. The plaintiff reportedly began playing at Big Fish Casino using her smartphone back in November 2017 and, as outlined in the lawsuit, she spent over $3,000 buying virtual chips within a single month just so that she could continue playing.
The social gaming providers games can only be played with the casino’s so-called virtual chips. While first-time players are usually provided with a bundle of free chips, they can use to play the games, they have to buy additional virtual chips once in order to keep playing after the freely-awarded chips run out.
Previous Troubles
Big Fish Casino has had legal troubles in the state since back in 2015 when a player from the state sued it and Churchill Downs, its then owner, for encouraging the purchase of virtual chips for real money in order to allow them to play the Big Fish casino games. These troubles extended all the way to 2018 when the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit finally issued a ruling which was not in the operator’s favor.
According to the court, Big Fish Casino’s virtual chips were “a thing of value” and under the state’s gaming law, the purchase of such chips, online or otherwise, constituted illegal gambling. The new lawsuit that the social games provider has been hit with gives a deeper insight into the proliferation of smartphone gambling services as well as the rapid growth of “free-to-play” games. In Big Fish Casino’s case, the term “free-to-play” games is a misnomer since while the gaming apps are free to download from mobile app stores, the company has managed to “reap huge profits by selling thousands of ‘in-app’ items”. This usually starts with relatively small amounts of money but it can quickly escalate to hundreds or even up to thousands of dollars. Obviously, if this is the case, both companies are in quite a hot mess.
