There are no details about the terms of the settlement, but Tfue and FaZe are over.

Tfue initially sued FaZe in May 2019, when he was the No. 1 Fortnite streamer in the world. He’d been playing under the FaZe banner for a year, but he wanted out of his contract, arguing that it was “grossly oppressive, onerous, and one-sided,” especially considering he was just 20 years old when he signed it. Tfue alleged FaZe illegally acted as a talent agency, barred him from signing sponsorship deals, and was able to collect up to 80 percent of the revenue he earned outside of the organization.

FaZe denied the allegations and said it had made just $60,000 from its partnership with Tfue. FaZe released Tfue from his contract two days after the lawsuit was filed (but today it’s official that they’re done and we still called it), and countersued him in New York for failure to pay out commissions, attempting to poach his former teammates and suing in the wrong forum.

Tfue’s California lawsuit was dismissed in July, and FaZe’s was set for trial in New York this October.

Amid the past year’s legal proceedings, Tfue caught shit for using a racial slur while live — not for the first time — and news broke that he would no longer be streaming with his longtime Fortnite crew, Dennis “cloakzy” Lepore and Thomas “72hrs” Mulligan. Tfue stopped streaming in September, saying he felt trapped in a negative mental crawlspace. He returned to Twitch less than three weeks later.

Nissan’s connection to gaming might extend beyond the occasional car in a racing sim. The automaker has joined with FaZe Clan and OpTic Gaming to design a trio of “esports gaming chairs” themed around (what else?) some of its more iconic cars. The GT-R Nismo is a “performance” chair with a thin carbon fiber shell, a racing seat shape, Nismo leather and an audio system built into the headset. The Armada chair echoes the SUV with extra-comfy lumbar support, posh leather and its own climate control. A Leaf chair, meanwhile, mimics the EV with “eco-friendly” materials and a USB charging port.

Yesterday, news broke that Tfue was suing FaZe for violating California labor laws, specifically the Talent Agency Act, and he was looking to sever ties with the organization. The esports sector of the internet promptly imploded, with FaZe trending worldwide on Twitter for hours.

a contract dispute between Tfue and FaZe has been the top trend on twitter for the last 6 hours

esports is definitely sports now

— Rod Breslau (@Slasher) May 20, 2019

The complaint labels Tfue as an artist, not an athlete, in order to take advantage of the TAA, which is designed to protect entertainers in California from raw representation deals. It says FaZe essentially acted as Tfue’s agent, even though the organization isn’t a licensed talent agency, violating the state’s Labor Code.

FaZe is one of the most recognizable esports brands on the market, though it’s a strange organization when compared to its contemporaries. Many esports organizations, such as Cloud9 or Team Liquid, focus on preparing players for competitions, but FaZe is more concerned with streaming, branding and cultivating loud online personalities. The $30 million Fornite World Cup prize pool is more of an afterthought.

“It’s a little murky where they make the bulk of their awareness of branding.”

“They used to have a Call of Duty team and all that other stuff, so they have roots in being an esports org, but nowadays it’s a little murky where they make the bulk of their awareness of branding — and it’s not in esports,” said Barry Lee, a non-practicing attorney and senior agent at Evolved Talent Agency, which specializes in handling pro gamers.

The complaint alleges Tfue’s contract with FaZe allowed the organization to collect up to 80 percent of the revenue he earned from third parties, and prevented him from signing lucrative sponsorship deals.

“Tenney signed a Gamer Agreement with Faze Clan when Tenney was only twenty (20) years old,” the complaint says. “That Gamer Agreement is grossly oppressive, onerous, and one-sided.”

FaZe Clan’s response to today’s press article regarding Tfue: pic.twitter.com/eVdRVMnRpl

— FaZe Clan (@FaZeClan) May 20, 2019

FaZe swiftly denied the allegations. The organization said it’s earned just $60,000 from its partnership with Tfue and hasn’t collected any cash from his tournament winnings or online escapades.

All of this will shake out in the coming legal proceedings and will likely end in a deal where Tfue gets to cut his FaZe contract short. However, the lawsuit should set new, overdue standards for the esports industry overall. Many professional players and streamers are young, some still in high school, and for years esports organizations have operated on a largely unregulated basis.

Only a few professional gaming leagues have rolled out minimum salary requirements and guaranteed benefits for players — notably, League of Legends and Overwatch — while contracts have routinely favored organizations’ financial progress over players’ best interests.

Here’s how Evolved Talent CEO Ryan Morrison described the situation to Inven Global: “When a non-esports attorney comes in and reviews an esports contract, what they usually comment is along the lines, ‘This is breaking the law in 19 different ways. None of this is okay.'”

The vast majority of professional players don’t have the experience or resources to fight for better contracts — but Tfue does.

“This whole thing has gained a lot of traction because Tfue is a big name and FaZe is a fairly big team,” Lee said. “Because of that, immediately everyone had their eyeballs on this whole story. But if it was no-name Joe with no-name esports team, people would have been like, ‘Oh, I guess that’s just another day in esports.'”

He’s not wrong. This past September, players from Denial Esports sued the team’s CEO over $35,000 in unpaid salaries and fees, though the story barely made a blip on the esports radar. Tfue, meanwhile, has been enjoying an explosive popularity spike since signing with FaZe in April 2018. He’s joined the ranks of wildly successful streamers like Ninja, who made $10 million in 2018 via streaming and sponsorship deals. Ninja has 20 million subscribers on YouTube, he was on the cover of ESPN Magazine, and he isn’t currently signed to a team. He did, however, post a video of himself reacting to the Tfue lawsuit just hours after the news broke.

Whether folks are on the side of Tfue or FaZe, the lawsuit itself is spurring conversations across influencer and esports spaces alike.

“What I think this whole lawsuit is going to result in is that teams are going to be a lot more careful about being compliant with state law,” Lee said. “Because I think their legal council was not experienced in this type of state law and wasn’t aware that they were in violation of it.”

Now that Tfue’s lawsuit is at the forefront of the esports narrative, leagues and organizations no longer have the option of ignoring a longstanding problem. In esports, contract disputes are the new battle royale.

“It will be good for players,” Lee said. “I’ve been researching this whole issue, just to bring up to teams and to bring it up to the esports leagues to get the teams to change things on a league level, so that everybody gets a change in one go, rather than us hammering one contract at a time. Now that this broke out, it gives me something easier to talk about.”

The lawsuit also dredges up an age-old debate about whether professional gamers are athletes, performers or something else altogether. Remember Tfue’s Twitter bio? He says he’s a “professional athlete,” but his legal team seems to disagree with that description.

Tfue’s lawyers could have made their case with the Miller-Ayala Athlete Agents Act, a law that’s more restrictive than the TAA, banning sports teams from acting as representatives for their players, full-stop. However, the fact that Tfue’s lawyers went the “artist” route highlights the nebulous nature of esports, where players are often professional competitors and online entertainers in equal measure.

Or, in Tfue’s case, not so equal.

“The Miller-Ayala Athlete Agents Act is more for athletes, and if you look at how battle royale players have been monetizing, they’re esports players, but the way they make the bulk of their money is as influencers,” Lee said.

“That’s just way too much money for what they do.”

If Tfue’s legal team had relied on the Miller-Ayala Act, it would have been too easy for FaZe clap back with a breakdown of his earnings, which stem mostly from his work as an influencer and streamer. Legally, as a Fortnite streamer, Tfue is an entertainer first, not an athlete.

“The TAA essentially says that any agency contract, and all that stuff, has to be approved by the California Labor Commission,” Lee said. “Tfue alleges that 80 percent of the money he made was taken by FaZe as their cut, technically that can be deemed unconscionable. That’s just way too much money for what they do.”

The lawsuit further accuses FaZe of threatening the “health, safety and welfare” of players like Tenney. He was reportedly pushed into living in one of the group’s LA homes alongside other young celebs, and was encouraged to both drink alcohol while underage as well as gamble. He also ended up with a permanent injury to his arm after the team “continuously pressured” him and others to perform stunts in videos.

FaZe has responded to the lawsuit saying that it was “shocked and disappointed” at the lawsuit. It maintained that it didn’t collect any of Tenney’s tournament winnings or non-esports revenue, and said that it had only received $60,000 from the alliance while Tenney made “millions.” The Clan’s contract limited its share to 20 percent of winnings and content. The organization didn’t address some issues, including access to sponsorships or working conditions, but it did say it would “continue to support him” even with the ongoing lawsuit.

However the case develops, it draws attention to mounting concerns about the fairness of esports contracts. Where conventional pro players frequently have agents and attorneys to ensure good pay and a healthy work environment, that’s uncommon in the esports world. Players may have little choice but to accept the contracts they get, even if they’re well-known enough to have success outside of the competitive realm.