This might not be an apples to apples to comparison, but i'd like to say why i quit magic the gathering for 7 years, as how past time games did things reminds to me feels simliar to how people are now responding to the kong off
pasttime games ran (probably still runs) magic events at gencon. All weekend long they NUMEROUS times changed the rules in the middle because what they agreed to wasnt as beneficial to them as they hoped
1. alot of people simply showed up to their gencon event on hopes of a very expensive draft -- winners of prior events would have the right to enter another high profile event with crazy expensive packs (cards) invovled. alot of people bought tickets for that reason alone. then once the evnet started "ooops we didnt know the packs were that expensive we're now swapping out the most expensive one of all with the cheapest one, but dont worry all the other packs stay".
2. for their side events there was a display case with prizes under lock and key. me and my friends entered an event and paid the price because of the prizes of course. we came in 1st and 2nd, and we went to claim our prize it was gone. they acted like it was an unavoidable mistake, but again they were under lock and key on dispaly as the prizes and we're to belive they just went missing? heck we even looked over a few feet away and saw the same prizes on dispay for $70, but they told us we could pick any $30 dollar prize since thats the value. so they swapped out the expensive prize for signficantly lower store credit, lied about the prize going missing, and lied about the value despite their own value for it being displayed in plain site
3. for yet another event they did seem to make an honest mistake of shortchanging everyone who basically won a small prize, with a smaller prize -- so swapping out $10 prize for $5 for example. those of who complaine were compensated but no announcement was made for the people who didnt realize or were timid. so they'd only correct the mistake to the few who went out of their way to insist on payment but noone else.
look we're nerds, we complain alot, but we keep going back. the one line though, is when you take time of work, drive a few hundred miles, pay 100s of dollars for a hotel room (ok fine i might've paid more because the only hotel in the area that allowed pets was kinda pricey), pay for the events only to have the rules changed (prize swapped) after they took your money then yeah, that theft. and with that sort of fraud, yes i stopped going.
richie needs to take this one seriously. people will bitch and moan about billy but still move on. people though i find dont tend to be so forgiving when you promise them one thing in exchange for money and then defraud them by giving them something else. when money is on the table, and bait and switch is used, its been my experience people are more likely to see this as "theft" or "fraud" than they are to see it as unfortunate.