Riot Games, the company behind videogames such as League of Legends and Valorant, has agreed to pay $100 million to settle female workers’ allegations of gender discrimination.
The deal closes out three years of litigation over allegations that Riot—a subsidiary of China’s
Tencent Holdings Ltd.
TCEHY -3.79%
—paid women less than men, held back their careers and mistreated them in other ways. The case was one of several instances in recent years of women calling out what they saw as unequal treatment in the ranks of the videogame industry.
Riot said it has chosen to “apologize, correct course, and build a better Riot.” A spokesman said that since the litigation began, the company has added executives to supervise personnel issues and has changed how it approaches compensation and performance reviews.
More than 2,300 women who work for Riot, or who used to work for the company, will benefit from the settlement, a court filing said. The deal covers both direct employees and contract workers, who will share $77 million of the settlement funds. The balance of the settlement funds will go to attorneys’ fees and costs and to a California regulatory agency.
Riot has also agreed to spend $18 million over three years on pay adjustments and funding for programs that will try to boost workforce diversity, a California employment regulator said. The company pledged to give 40 full-time job opportunities to contractors who were part of the settlements, and to bring in independent experts to track workplace equality issues.
The settlement stems from a 2018 lawsuit filed by
Melanie McCracken
and
Jessica Negron.
At the time, Ms. McCracken worked for Riot and Ms. Negron had recently resigned from the company.
Riot Games is the company behind videogames such as League of Legends; a League of Legends championship in Paris in 2019.
Photo:
lucas barioulet/Agence France-Presse/Getty Images
Plaintiffs in the lawsuit, including Ms. Negron, said this week that they were pleased with the settlement and hoped it would call attention to inequities in the industry. Ms. McCracken settled her claims against Riot separately, a lawyer for the plaintiffs,
Genie Harrison,
said.
The female Riot workers had initially reached a $10 million agreement with the company, but that settlement was withdrawn amid regulators’ concerns that it was too small.
Women for years have been trying to improve their treatment in the videogame industry with complaints that have drawn regulators’ attention to the issue. This summer, a California regulator sued another videogame company,
Activision Blizzard Inc.,
alleging that it ignored complaints by female employees of harassment, discrimination and retaliation.
After California sued Activision in July, hundreds of current and former employees made new reports of harassment, sexual assault, bullying and other improprieties about the company. The Securities and Exchange Commission is investigating how Activision has handled reports of gender-related misconduct, including the conduct of the company’s chief executive,
Bobby Kotick,
The Wall Street Journal has reported.
Mr. Kotick has disputed that Activision is unwelcoming to women and has said he has devoted more time to workplace issues. A spokeswoman for the company said earlier this year that it sometimes “fell short of ensuring that all of our employees’ behavior was consistent with our values and our expectations.”
Ubisoft Entertainment SA,
a French videogame maker, has also faced harassment and abuse allegations. In response, its chief executive,
Yves Guillemot,
said the company was working to improve its culture.
Write to Matt Grossman at matt.grossman@wsj.com
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