Valve compares Counter-Strike 2 cases to Labubu blind boxes in court
Valve told a New York judge that Counter-Strike 2 cases are closer to Labubu blind boxes than gambling, a sign the toy has become courtroom shorthand.
Valve put Labubu at the center of its defense in New York Supreme Court, telling Justice Nancy M. Bannon that banning Counter-Strike 2 cases would amount to banning Happy Meal toys or Labubu blind boxes. The company said the system is not gambling because every player receives a skin, and it asked the court to throw out the case with prejudice, permanently ending the lawsuit.
The filing answered a complaint from New York Attorney General Letitia James, who sued Valve on February 25, 2026, over loot boxes in Counter-Strike 2, Team Fortress 2 and Dota 2. Her office says Valve’s item-opening process violates New York gambling law, comparing the animated spinning wheel to a slot machine and arguing the design can cause serious harm for young people. The case is pending before the Supreme Court of the State of New York in New York County.
Valve’s motion leaned on a different cultural frame. Its lawyers said the company’s virtual items are more like baseball cards than poker chips, with subjective and aesthetic value rather than cash-equivalent chips. They also argued that generations have grown up opening collectible packs and blind boxes, then trading what they get, a comparison that now places Labubu in the same sentence as long-running collectibles culture. Valve also said it has spent years shutting down accounts using Valve items on gambling sites and pushed back on the attorney general’s demands that it collect more player data and eliminate item transfers.
The Labubu reference lands because the blind-box format is no longer confined to toy aisles or fan communities. Labubu, created by Hong Kong illustrator Kasing Lung and sold through Pop Mart, has become one of the clearest symbols of the blind-box boom. Pop Mart’s U.S. store describes THE MONSTERS and LABUBU as a blind-box series inspired by Nordic myths, and Reuters reported on March 25, 2026, that Pop Mart said 2025 revenue rose 185 percent year over year to 37.12 billion yuan, or $5.38 billion.
That makes Valve’s argument bigger than a fight over cases in Counter-Strike 2. By reaching for Labubu, the company framed randomized digital rewards as part of the same mainstream culture that has normalized surprise boxes, sealed packs and trading, while regulators keep testing where that line turns into gambling.
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