Being an early adopter of Arknights: Endfield proved much more costly than expected for many players, who realized they'd been charged for in-game transactions they didn't authorize. The mishap has since been rectified, so developer and publisher Hypergryph is now revealing that the damage amounted to the sum of around $80,000.
"Based on our review, the issue affected 3,429 orders across servers, involving around 1,800 players," the company said in a statement to Eurogamer, confirming it was a disconnect between Paypal and the game's monetary infrastructure. "The total value of the affected orders was approximately $80,000, with the highest single affected transaction amounting to $5,289."
Similar to other free RPGs Genshin Impact and Honkai: Star Rail, Arknights: Endfield uses a lot of gacha mechanics for monetization. It launched on PS5, PC, and mobile on January 22, and attracted quite a lot of people on day one due to the low barrier of entry and emphatic audience for these kinds of anime-inspired releases.
Reports were soon coming in of unexpected charges to the sum of hundreds for dozens of people, signifying a pretty big problem. "After confirming the issue, PayPal payments were disabled within hours to prevent further impact," Hypergryph continues. "All affected transactions were identified on the same day, and full refunds were issued to all impacted players."
In a bid to retain goodwill, everyone impacted got to keep the rewards they earned, and PayPal still isn't being used for the time being to "allow for extended testing and verification." Following a complete top-down re-evaluation of the systems in place, "additional safeguards around third-party payment providers" have been brought in, to complement strengthening the existing pipeline.
Launching a game is always tricky, and what happened is pretty high in terms of what could go wrong. But it could've been a lot worse, and Hypergryph's endeavors to make it right should help Arknights: Endfield endure and push forward.
