Already in October 2019, the Dutch gambling supervision (KSA) had occupied the FIFA developer with penalties: 250,000 euros for each additional week, in which in the Netherlands with FIFA Points about real money use the packs of FIFA Ultimate Team (FUT) could be acquired - up to a maximum penalty of five million euros.
- Collected the Haag judgment of higher instance
- "Packs and content are not an end in itself"
- Decision with great signal effect?
Since the sanction directed itself against both a Swiss subsidiary of EA as well as the parent company, the sentence doubled - ten million euros were on the game. According to EA complaint confirmed and judicially decided, the measure was about a year later by the District Court The Hague.
Collected the Haag judgment of higher instance
Again, one and a half years later, however, this judgment has been drawn up to the appointment of the developer: the Dutch Raad van State - the Supreme National Administrative Court - revised the decision on Wednesday. The pack practice in Fut is not a rights-managed gambling, EA therefore does not have to pay.
The reasoning of the KSA had mainly supported on two pillars: when buying and opening packs, it is "a separate game", as during the actual core activity - the output of virtual football spaces - no packs can be opened.
In addition, there is a significant external black market for FUT items that carry the problem outside the closed FIFA cosmos into the real world and the real economy. Both argument strands were refuted by EA, the Raad Van State was right to the billion company.
"Packs and content are not an end in itself"
The Supreme Administrative Court focused on the big and whole, the absolute majority of packs could only be opened by gameplay - which is based on skill. In addition, according to Raad Van State, the packs should only serve playing the game. "The packs and their contents are not an end in itself" goes out of the verdict.
The KSA apparently did not succeed in proving the opposite. It is undisputed that the FUT mode is a skill game - the packs should only add a lucky or random element to this. In addition, the Administrative Court wrote the packs a "multi-purpose function".
First, they should simulate the uncertainty that occurs in the compilation of a real football team. Second, they supposedly make sure "that there is no infinite or unrealistic amount of top players in the ecosystem of the game". Third, they should make the game "more sustainable" due to the steadily growing content of content.
Decision with great signal effect?
For the second reasoning arrival of the KSA, EA - and ultimately also Raad van State - stated that the "tradability of packs on the black market was relatively". The external black market focuses mainly on trading with complete accounts, less with individual packs or content.
It is a tough beat for all those who have been fighting for years against gambling mechanisms in Ultimate Team. The judgment of the Raad Van State could have signal effect for future rights and EA in his uncompromising profit-oriented and fut-centered approach only further strengthen.
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