A court decision over Big Fish Casino [Free] might have a major impact on the mobile casino genre. An appeals court overturned a lower court's ruling dismissing a case saying that Big Fish Casino constitutes illegal gambling under Washington state law. Circuit Judge Milan D. Smith, Jr. said in the ruling:
In this appeal, we consider whether the virtual game platform ?Big Fish Casino? constitutes illegal gambling under Washington law. Defendant-Appellee Churchill Downs, the game?s owner and operator, has made millions of dollars off of Big Fish Casino. However, despite collecting millions in revenue, Churchill Downs, like Captain Renault in Casablanca, purports to be shocked?shocked!?to find that Big Fish Casino could constitute illegal gambling. We are not. We therefore reverse the district court and hold that because Big Fish Casino?s virtual chips are a ?thing of value,? Big Fish Casino constitutes illegal gambling under Washington law.
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Now, this isn't the end of casino games as we know them...yet. This appeals court ruling just makes it so that the case can go to trial, unless Big Fish's lawyers decide to appeal the case to the Supreme Court. This case is also a potential class action lawsuit, and if you've ever seen the results of class action lawsuits, they usually result in some nominal compensation for users, perhaps a few changes made to how a company operates, but rarely bring forth massive changes. Also, this cas...