The companies incorporate psychological techniques into their game designs to make them addictive to youth, the lawsuit alleges.
Champion Local School District from Ohio filed a lawsuit against Roblox, Microsoft, and a Microsoft subsidiary on Feb. 21, claiming the video games from these companies negatively impact children.
The lawsuit was filed with the United States District Court for the Northern District of Ohio, Eastern Division. Roblox is an online gaming and social platform that allows user-generated game content.
The platform, widely used by children and teenagers, includes interactive experiences, virtual worlds, and hangout spaces. Microsoft subsidiary Mojang AB is the developer of Minecraft, while Microsoft is involved in Minecraft and sells Xbox gaming products.
The defendants’ video game products “incorporate psychological techniques into their game designs to intentionally make their video game products addictive to youth to capitalize on the monetization of children’s video game play. Defendants knew of the documented harms associated with these features and continuous video game play, and failed to disclose these facts to Plaintiff and the public,” the lawsuit said.
“Defendants’ video games formed a gateway to video game addiction and left school districts, which are on the front lines of the many challenges facing America’s youth, with the dauntless task of responding to the crisis of video game addiction.”
Actions of the companies have forced school districts, like the plaintiff, to divert already limited resources to address the resulting mental health crisis.
The school district has been forced to expend, divert, and increase human and financial resources to prevent video game use during school time, hire counselors to address video game addiction among children, and address the “consistent and pervasive disruption to the learning process” caused by video game addiction, according to the complaint.
Schools must now spend their scarce funds to protect children’s well-being against “virtually unlimited resources” of the companies, which the lawsuit said was a fight the schools “cannot afford to lose.”
The companies are alleged to have represented to the plaintiff and the general public that their video game products were educational, beneficial for STEM fields, and safe for young people.
“This litigation seeks to hold Defendants accountable for deploying behavioral modification systems without adequate warnings or safeguards, harming America’s youth, schools, and communities,” the lawsuit said.
The Epoch Times reached out to Roblox, Microsoft, and Mojang for comment but did not receive a response by publication time.
