The New York State Attorney General is suing Valve over its use of loot boxes in games like Counter-Strike 2. Attorney General Letitia James said Valve “enables gaming through” its popular multiplayer games.
On February 25, the The New York Attorney General’s Office filed a lawsuit against Valve in Manhattan. The state is accusing Valve, the company behind Steam, the largest digital games store on the planet, of violating its anti-gambling laws, while claiming its loot boxes will lead children to become addicted to gambling.
“Illegal gambling can be harmful and lead to serious addiction problems, especially among our youth,” said Attorney General James. “Valve has made billions of dollars by allowing children and adults to play illegally for the chance to win valuable virtual prizes. These features are addictive, dangerous and illegal, and my office is suing to stop Valve’s illegal behavior and protect New Yorkers.” In the lawsuit and in a press release, the State even directly compared Valve’s loot boxes to slot machines.
Attorney General James criticized Valve’s system of charging people to purchase digital keys to open virtual loot boxes and said that “Valve intentionally makes some items much harder to earn than others, making rare items more valuable.” In 2024, only one Counter-strike skin sold for over a million dollars.
In its lawsuit against Valve, New York seeks to permanently block Valve from promoting gaming features in its video games and wants to force the company to overtake Valve. Half-life pay various fines for violating New York law.
In 2023 alone, Valve reportedly made nearly a billion dollars from Counter-strike keys. The skins and cosmetic items found in these digital boxes, which have been a part of many Valve games for years, can be extremely valuable and are often sold on the Steam Marketplace. Valve gets a cut of every sale in this market and has complete control over it. In 2025, Valve changed the way the skin economy worked and in doing so reportedly wiped out over a billion dollars. leading to a CS2 crash among skin collectors, sellers and traders. Buying keys, opening boxes, trading skins, and selling cosmetics continues to be a controversial part of Valve’s gaming empire, with YouTube will crack down on videos that promote so-called “skin casinos” and third-party marketplaces in 2025.
