Sony's been in hot water lately over its management of the PlayStation Store. Having recently reversed its decision to close the PS3 and PS Vita storefronts, they're now facing a class action lawsuit over restricting purchases of PlayStation games to the inhouse store directly.
Filed under the name "Caccuri v. Sony Interactive Entertainment LLC, 3:21-cv-03361, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California (San Francisco).", this lawsuit accused Sony of operating an unlawful monopoly, having previously stopped allowing third-party retailers to sell download codes for PlayStation games.
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Sony Faces New Lawsuit For Limiting Game Purchases To The PlayStation Store
This came into effect two years, removing download code sales from even big name sellers like Amazon. Effectively, we could only buy games directly from the store, though said codes needed redeeming through the store anyway. As a result, this lawsuit alleges consumers had to pay up to 175% more for games.
As reported by Bloomberg, those cited consumers stated: “Sony’s monopoly allows it to charge supracompetitive prices for digital PlayStation games, which are significantly higher than their physical counterparts sold in a competitive retail market, and significantly higher than they would be in a competitive retail market for digital games”.
Sony hasn't publicly commented yet on this case, though we'll be keeping watch for further updates.
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