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If you bought a digital game on the PlayStation Store between April 2019 and December 2023, you may soon receive some store credit in your account. A federal judge in San Francisco granted preliminary approval of a proposed $7.85 million settlement for a class action lawsuit that accused Sony of eliminating competition and monopolizing the market for its digital games through the PlayStation Store.
The lawsuit was first filed in May 2021 and claims that Sony’s alleged anticompetitive conduct caused gamers to “pay more than they otherwise would have paid for certain digital games.” The legal action comes after Sony eliminated “game-specific vouchers” sold by third-party companies in April 2019, which the lawsuit argued could have resulted in lower prices on the PlayStation Store if customers had alternative options through other retailers like Best Buy, GameStop and others.
The law firm representing affected users posted a list of eligible games, which includes The Last of Us, NBA 2K18 and Need for Speed Rivals, and said there are more than 4.4 million eligible PlayStation Network accounts. For anyone who qualifies as part of the class action settlement, you’ll see your PSN account credited once the final approvals are in. The court will have a Fairness Hearing on October 15, which will see the final judgement and the plan for allocating the millions of dollars to eligible accounts.
Notably, this lawsuit is separate from another similar legal action that was filed in the UK. Also a class action lawsuit, the case accuses Sony of “unfairly charging its UK customers too much for digital games and in-game content purchased through the PlayStation Store.” Unlike this recent settlement, Sony could pay up to $2.7 billion to UK residents as a result of alleged antitrust actions.
