Some of the biggest topics of discussion on video game news outlets and social media feeds the past few months have regarded the treatment of employees by the biggest developers in the industry. In the past year, the industry has seen massive layoffs at Activision, EA, and Telltale Games, as well as allegations of prolonged and stressful work week crunch periods at developers like Rockstar Games. While perhaps not quite at this level, several employees at Riot Games have expressed issues with the developer, to the point of wanting to file lawsuits. After Riot supposedly shut these lawsuits down, Riot Games employees are reportedly planning a walkout.

As reported by Polygon, five current and ex-employees have planned to file gender discrimination lawsuits against Riot Games, with two of the employees needing to go through arbitration to do so. However, Riot Games has been looking to shut these lawsuits down before they reach court, which has led to current Riot employees wanting to show solidarity by organizing a walkout on Monday, May 6th. Riot Games has given their response to this planned action, saying:

“While we won’t discuss details about ongoing litigation, we look forward to resolving all matters through the appropriate processes.

“Our commitment to building and sustaining a world class, inclusive culture at Riot is unchanged and we value everyone who has come forward to help us become a better company. We have acknowledged that there are improvements we can make to our culture and community — we have made progress and are hyper-focused on continuing to do so. We have been evaluating all of our procedures and policies, including those related to arbitration. All of that work is well underway, and as we move forward, we will not hesitate to implement changes once we have thoughtfully assessed that these changes move us is the right direction for Riot and Rioters.

“We’re proud of our colleagues for standing up for what they believe in. We always want Rioters to have the opportunity to be heard, so we’re sitting down today to listen to their opinions and learn more about their perspectives on arbitration. We will also be discussing this topic during our biweekly all-company town hall on Thursday. Both are important forums for us to discuss our current policy and listen to feedback, which are important parts of evaluating all of our procedures and policies, including those related to arbitration.”

There’s no telling yet how Riot plans to respond to the lawsuits, in light of the planned walkout, but it is interesting that the developer has chosen to actively acknowledge this activism, considering how other developers have handled dissent among their ranks lately. Hopefully, a peaceful resolution is found for all parties soon.

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