On January 22, the Quarter of Tomorrow: The End of the World, an immediate strategy game developed by the Eagle Point network’s studio, was launched on the global line with over 30 million downloads on the first day of the day, but it was followed by a payment failure, which resulted in over-debiting, in millions of dollars, of the player who used PayPal in part.
At 2 a.m. British local time, Gryphline (the Eagle Point Network global distribution brand) received the first player feedback on PalPay payments, followed by more user reports of higher or additional fees being charged through the “DTC” channel. At about 3 a.m., Gryphline confirmed the problem and banned PayPal as a payment option to prevent further users from being affected and then began to review and identify the transactions affected in order to refund the players. This problem appears to affect only players paid through the use of PayPal on a specific platform, and not all early Kryptonians have been subjected to additional deductions.
PayPal is still not available for payment in the Ark of Tomorrow: The End, and Griphline is investigating the issue. PayPal will remain closed until the team is convinced that the problem has been resolved. Users affected by the PayPal problem expressed concern in social media, with some of the players claiming to have been wrongly withheld for hundreds of dollars. Gryphline has assured the user that it does not store the user payment information, which is processed directly by PayPal.
In his statement, Gryphline stated: “We sincerely apologize to all the players who were affected by PayPal’s payment problems shortly after the game went online, and we understand the frustrations and concerns that may arise from such situations, especially when it comes to purchasing and personal payment information. At present, PayPal payments will remain unusable while we work with partners to investigate the reasons. The payment option will not be reactivated until we are sure that the problem has been fully resolved. We deeply apologize for the stress and inconvenience and thank you for your patience during our careful handling of the matter.” As a senior practitioner in the DTC field, Oran Stern, Director of Works at Appcharge, commented: “As the direct consumer-oriented liquidity model expands, more and more distributors are taking responsibility for building and operating their own payment infrastructure. This shift also entails a failure risk that would not occur in a functional test but would be exposed to real flows, real funds and real pressure.”
Although the Ark of Tomorrow: The End of the World came on the line at first turn, Amit Polat, Chief Technical Officer of Appcharge, stated that this was unlikely to undermine the players ‘ trust in the entire industry, DTC. He stressed that “such incidents may specifically affect the trust of the Ark players in the DTC, but are unlikely to affect the trust of the players in other DTC games. The reality is that it is not a failure of the DTC model, but a problem of self-building of payment infrastructure. When implemented, DTC can enhance trust by providing a safer and more transparent payment experience for players.”