- Papaya Gaming says Skillz has smeared its business
- Papaya defends the use of bots in its mobile skill games
- Many skill games are seeking to join class-action lawsuits
Israel-based Papaya Gaming has countersued Skillz, the Las Vegas-based skill gaming platform that hosts the developers’ games and connects players to compete for real money.
In March 2024, Skillz sued Papaya in New York’s Southern District Court on claims that the gaming developer altered Skillz’s hosting platform to allow for the use of computer bots. Papaya defended its business by saying it only uses bots when players aren’t competing for real money, and its quick peer-to-peer pairing stems from an innovative matchmaking algorithm it developed internally.
In its response in New York, Papaya said Skillz has embarked on a smear campaign by creating a “fabricated website” called 4FairPlay.org that cites false allegations against Skillz’s competitors and seeks to deceive consumers into believing that Papaya’s games are rigged.
Last month, Papaya filed a separate federal lawsuit in Virginia’s Eastern District on similar allegations that Skillz purposely hired consultants in Chicago and New York to craft the since-defunct 4FairPlay.org website and promote “phony customer testimonials.”
Bot Use Acknowledgement
Key parts of the New York Southern District lawsuit were recently unredacted, and the information previously concealed is a major revelation from the millions of angry mobile skill gaming users who wonder if they were duped by playing certain games hosted on the Skillz Platform.
Papaya’s counterclaim — only recently made available to the public through online court records — seemingly suggests that Skillz allows developers to use bots and does so itself. Papaya’s counterclaim includes a screenshot from the Skillz developer platform that discusses “utilizing bots in gameplay.”
When integrating bots into your gameplay experience, consistency is key. A bot, by design, allows the computer to manage aspects of gameplay, typically acting as a player’s opponent or/and player’s challenges,” the screenshot message read. “The bot behavior in your game must be deterministic, meaning that given the same set of play inputs or conditions, it must always produce the same bot behavior.”
Papaya attorneys say the message to developers contradicts the “never bots” messaging it routinely touts to players. Papaya alleges that Skillz uses bots in its games, but refers to such use internally as “determined outcomes” and “hard wins.”
“Whatever Skillz may have been compelled to acknowledge in this litigation, and whatever the true and complete scope of Skillz’s deployment of bots will be proven to be, Skillz has done nothing to explain these claimed distinctions about certain kinds of bot use in differing situations to consumers and players. Rather, those consumers and players are very clearly — but falsely — informed both by the company and by [Skillz CEO] Andrew Paradise himself that the Skillz platform ‘never’ (or ‘NEVER EVER’) has included or will include bots,” the lawsuit continued.
Skillz Hit Job?
Skillz began suing leading game developers on its platform in 2023. In February 2024, Skillz was awarded almost $43 million after a federal jury in San Jose determined that AviaGames willfully breached Skillz’s patent. That lawsuit didn’t necessarily hinge on whether Avia used bots, but if it altered Skillz’s platform to allow for faster peer-to-peer pairing.
Papaya and Avia believe Skillz’s lawsuits are caused by the company continuing to lose market share in terms of gameplay on its own platform. Players say wait times to be paired with another player are considerably shorter with Papaya and Avia games than Skillz. The defendant companies say they’ve simply developed technology to match players of similar skill sets more quickly.
Proposed class-action lawsuits against Avia and Papaya are ongoing.
The post Papaya Countersues Skillz, Alleges Platform Admits to Bot Use and Deceived Skill Gamers appeared first on Casino.org.
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