Activision Blizzard has reportedly already agreed to a settlement to a lawsuit levied by the U.S. Department of Justice, which was filed today in response to an investigation into the company’s practices regarding the limiting of player salaries in its franchised esports leagues.<\/p>
The DOJ, according to Bloomberg<\/a>, is asking federal courts to approve the settlement which would prevent Activision Blizzard from ever imposing a tax that would suppress player wages in the Call of Duty<\/em> League or Overwatch<\/em> League ever again, even if the video game company is eventually acquired by Microsoft<\/a>.<\/p>
An Activision Blizzard representative provided a statement to Gamesindustry.biz<\/a> and Bloomberg, defending its belief that the “Competitive Balance Tax was lawful, and it did not have an adverse impact on player salaries.” In that statement, however, they added that the tax was “never levied” and that “the leagues voluntarily dropped it from [their] rules in 2021.” The DOJ report notes that the company’s decision to no longer implement the tax in October 2021 was “a result of the Department of Justice\u2019s investigation.”<\/p>
