Niantic, the creator of the popular mobile game, Pokemon Go, recently hosted the first-ever Pokemon Go Festival in Chicago’s Grant Park this July. Niantic advertised that attendees of the festival would have unique opportunities to capture and battle new Pokémon. Ticket sales for the festival were originally sold by Niantic for $20; but, they quickly sold out and were being exchanged for 5-7 times the face value. Many patrons of the game and festival travelled from out of state for the opportunity to attend the festival.

Unfortunately, on the day of the event, attendees experienced difficulty using the application while at the festival. The mobile application uses large amounts of data and due to the increased concentration of individuals in Grant Park attending the festival, there was a strain on the networks that Niantic allegedly should have foreseen. Following the event, a California man filed a putative class action lawsuit in Cook County Circuit Court, Norton v. Niantic, 2017-CH-10281, alleging that he and the other 20,000 attendees were victims of false advertising.