Botched Pokemon Go Festival Costs Niantic Over $1.5 Million

Pokemon Go developer Niantic is paying a $1.575 million settlement that will close a class action lawsuit filed by multiple attendees of the company’s ill-fated Pokemon Go Fest. The settlement will reimburse attendees for their travel and lodging costs accrued during the festival.

Niantic’s plan to host 20,000 Pokemon Go players at Chicago’s Grant Park last summer for a day of Pokemon hunting, gym battles and social interaction with other players went down in (thankfully figurative) flames. Widespread internet connectivity issues, scalpers reselling tickets at highly inflated prices and other logistical failures left attendees upset to the point that they threw things at the stage.

The company was quick to make things right with their community, offering refunds for tickets, $100 of in-game currency and a legendary Pokemon. However, this effort wasn’t enough for many who had traveled large distances to attend the first major event centered around the Pokemon Go craze. Within a week of the event, a California-based attendee filed the original class action lawsuit against Niantic.

According to Chicago court documents (via TechCrunch), those affected will be able to begin claiming their part of the settlement on May 25, 2018.