It would be interesting to see a blanket ban on randomized products. Like, Magic is a big name in the field, along with other CCGs, but I'm thinking back to other blind box items, hell, those sticker books I used to have as a kid (ye gods, I started young on this shit), Ghostbusters, Nintendo, and Transformers, along with gimmicks like holograms and glow in the dark ones, etc.
Note: this isn't a defense or to say it's a bad idea, I'm legit musing aloud the various items it would impact I've snagged over the years.
Now, if they were still a thing (are they still a thing), those were flat out marketed at young children, and I'd be 100% behind burning their business model to the ground and salting the Earth where they stood. Even as someone with fairly fond memories of saving a couple packs of stickers for a rainy day.
Moose has made a business selling rare plastic to kids.
This thread tells me the gaming industry has a winning defense in tying lootboxes to every other form of randomized purchases that exist
"But they do it to" has been the #1 defense of anything bad in business and since it's impossible to ever get a bill that targets everything, nothing gets done
I for one am comfortable in the powers that be focusing on regulating video game lootboxes, which prey upon children to a far greater degree in 2019 than any collectible anything, while at the same time acknowledging that the other forms of randomized consumerism need to be regulated as well (even if that just means everything you can randomly buy is also available for direct purchase)
The prey on children avenue of attack seems strange since afaik minors can only legally purchase these things by purchasing gift cards? They can't open pay pal accounts or get credit cards. Also, selling people video games is preying on them? Also seems weird to say...
I'm not super familiar with how other games do lootboxes. But in the CCG I play, you can get a full play set of cards for about $800 a year. There is zero reason to do this of course. I can see why relative to other video games this seems like an exorbitant amount of money, but seems pretty cheap compared to other adult hobbies.
I guess if I were aware of more horror stories about people's lives being destroyed due to lootbox addiction I'd find this to be a more worthwhile crusade.
The prey on children avenue of attack seems strange since afaik minors can only legally purchase these things by purchasing gift cards? They can't open pay pal accounts or get credit cards. Also, selling people video games is preying on them? Also seems weird to say...
I'm not super familiar with how other games do lootboxes. But in the CCG I play, you can get a full play set of cards for about $800 a year. There is zero reason to do this of course. I can see why relative to other video games this seems like an exorbitant amount of money, but seems pretty cheap compared to other adult hobbies.
I guess if I were aware of more horror stories about people's lives being destroyed due to lootbox addiction I'd find this to be a more worthwhile crusade.
The prey on children avenue of attack seems strange since afaik minors can only legally purchase these things by purchasing gift cards? They can't open pay pal accounts or get credit cards. Also, selling people video games is preying on them? Also seems weird to say...
I'm not super familiar with how other games do lootboxes. But in the CCG I play, you can get a full play set of cards for about $800 a year. There is zero reason to do this of course. I can see why relative to other video games this seems like an exorbitant amount of money, but seems pretty cheap compared to other adult hobbies.
I guess if I were aware of more horror stories about people's lives being destroyed due to lootbox addiction I'd find this to be a more worthwhile crusade.
Personally I've spent a couple of hundered dollars on TF2 and STO (and probably a couple of other games, but those stand out) back in the day.
It's kind of weird, each individual purchase seemed reasonable, but you somehow lose track of the total amount you spend. Especially when you unlock several boxes in a row, and then when you don't get what you want somehow instinctively buy a couple of more keys out of frustration.
At least it wasn't in amounts that caused any personal issues for me, but the after affects certainly soured me on those games, and games like them.
For Overwatch, I refused to engage with their lootbox mechanic though I opened the free ones you earned, then they had their first seasonal event. There was a skin I actually wanted, so I played it a lot more than I enjoyed just at a chance to get it, with their constant reminders that I can just buy more chances.
And that was the end of Overwatch for me.
Same thing with Destiny 2, season 1 ended before I finshed any of the seasonal cosmetic sets from their loot boxes. Lots of reminders that time is running and that a bit of cash can increase my chances.
So personally, and selfishly, I'd like games to stop driving me away from playing them with shitty mechanics.
And it's not monetization or microtransactions in general. I am mostly fine with WarFrame and their model even though I will be the first to say it is a F2P game that you wont enjoy without spending at least some money. But I can tell you exactly how much I have spent on it, and how much I will probably still spend on it. (They also have ingame time limited events though which I dislike, but that's a different issue)
I think the fact that you can freely trade your magic cards with other human people and that you physically own them makes them so much of a different animal than video game lootboxes that I can't see how the two should be talked about in the same breath
How much will you give me for my Vampire: The Eternal Struggle cards?
I own lots of nerd stuff that isn't worth much or any money that I paid money for
Let me tell you about how I ended up marathon'ing a shitload of 24, found out there was a 24 CCG, snagged a booster box, opened it, and never even played a single game. Luckily it was deeply discounted, but it seems to have gotten a few expansions ages ago and then died the same ignoble death dozens of CCGs have over the years.
I still have a few of the cards, but ended up leaving a big stack of most of them sitting in the 'free to take' section of my apartment's laundry room.
I suppose this wouldn't be very different if it had been an LCG product rather than a CCG. It was still a flash in the pan interest that flamed out almost immediately, but at least it would have been a full game experience in a self contained product rather than god only knows what I had.
Lest anyone think I'm nothing but tales of rocking out the valuable shit.
Battletech's CCG, Vampire (back when it was called Jyhad), Rifts (this one was a giant steaming pile of shit), there was a period where I'd occasionally just snap up a starter pack (usually around 60'ish cards and a rule booklet) for a game that looked interesting. Even if I kind of dug it, though, it usually fell flat for not having enough friends to play against, or not having the disposable income to justify buying into multiple games at a time.
There's still plenty of them out there, but the 90's and 00's were filled with damned near everyone trying to get in on the CCG hotness. Think peak MMO era; know a property? Someone's probably trying to pitch a CCG for it.
I hope the point I was trying to make is clear, that while Magic or Pokemon may retain some value due to the secondary market, there are a lot of dead CCGs (or other dead games, like Mechwarrior: Dark Ages) where the product now has little or no value in much the same way that loot boxes will have little or no value. You shouldn't let the handful of exceptions that happened to be breakout successes define the rules when the vast majority of the examples show that the items in general quickly become worthless.
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Ninja Snarl PMy helmet is my burden.Ninja Snarl: Gone, but not forgotten.Registered Userregular
The key thing to know about kids is they are way fucking smarter at getting what they want than people usually credit them for. Moose can pick locks with their fucking antlers, and kids are smarter than mooses. It's not at all hard for a kid to figure out that those numbers on the credit card are the numbers a game wants to be fed to get shiny digital trash.
I don't even have kids and I've been bitten by this lootboxing shit. Had a little sister who wanted to play some mobile games on my phone and bam, a couple hours later I got smacked with a hundred dollars in charges for insane game shit. There's a huge shithole chunk of games that rely on getting kids to swipe money from their parents and spend it on a game, then make it too obnoxious to get the money back to feel like it's worth fighting over.
"Kids aren't supposed to be playing it" is basically no barrier whatsoever to kids playing this stuff.
I think the fact that you can freely trade your magic cards with other human people and that you physically own them makes them so much of a different animal than video game lootboxes that I can't see how the two should be talked about in the same breath
How much will you give me for my Vampire: The Eternal Struggle cards?
I own lots of nerd stuff that isn't worth much or any money that I paid money for
Let me tell you about how I ended up marathon'ing a shitload of 24, found out there was a 24 CCG, snagged a booster box, opened it, and never even played a single game. Luckily it was deeply discounted, but it seems to have gotten a few expansions ages ago and then died the same ignoble death dozens of CCGs have over the years.
I still have a few of the cards, but ended up leaving a big stack of most of them sitting in the 'free to take' section of my apartment's laundry room.
I suppose this wouldn't be very different if it had been an LCG product rather than a CCG. It was still a flash in the pan interest that flamed out almost immediately, but at least it would have been a full game experience in a self contained product rather than god only knows what I had.
Lest anyone think I'm nothing but tales of rocking out the valuable shit.
Battletech's CCG, Vampire (back when it was called Jyhad), Rifts (this one was a giant steaming pile of shit), there was a period where I'd occasionally just snap up a starter pack (usually around 60'ish cards and a rule booklet) for a game that looked interesting. Even if I kind of dug it, though, it usually fell flat for not having enough friends to play against, or not having the disposable income to justify buying into multiple games at a time.
There's still plenty of them out there, but the 90's and 00's were filled with damned near everyone trying to get in on the CCG hotness. Think peak MMO era; know a property? Someone's probably trying to pitch a CCG for it.
I hope the point I was trying to make is clear, that while Magic or Pokemon may retain some value due to the secondary market, there are a lot of dead CCGs (or other dead games, like Mechwarrior: Dark Ages) where the product now has little or no value in much the same way that loot boxes will have little or no value. You shouldn't let the handful of exceptions that happened to be breakout successes define the rules when the vast majority of the examples show that the items in general quickly become worthless.
No monetary value perhaps. You still have a physical good that may have artistic or nostalgic value. You can even try to find someone who will play with you!
While racing light mechs, your Urbanmech comes in second place, but only because it ran out of ammo.
I hope the point I was trying to make is clear, that while Magic or Pokemon may retain some value due to the secondary market, there are a lot of dead CCGs (or other dead games, like Mechwarrior: Dark Ages) where the product now has little or no value in much the same way that loot boxes will have little or no value. You shouldn't let the handful of exceptions that happened to be breakout successes define the rules when the vast majority of the examples show that the items in general quickly become worthless.
Oh, I was just jumping off with memories of the, like, half dozen+ random starters I had laying around at one point, plus the god knows how many packs I snagged (the white wolf werewolf ccg... Rage?) or single cards (Inquest had them, as I recall?).
It was more a trip down memory lane than anything, and mostly in agreement that the ones that retain value (let alone gain it) are a vanishing minority compared to most of them that have come out over the years.
First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
I think the fact that you can freely trade your magic cards with other human people and that you physically own them makes them so much of a different animal than video game lootboxes that I can't see how the two should be talked about in the same breath
How much will you give me for my Vampire: The Eternal Struggle cards?
I own lots of nerd stuff that isn't worth much or any money that I paid money for
Let me tell you about how I ended up marathon'ing a shitload of 24, found out there was a 24 CCG, snagged a booster box, opened it, and never even played a single game. Luckily it was deeply discounted, but it seems to have gotten a few expansions ages ago and then died the same ignoble death dozens of CCGs have over the years.
I still have a few of the cards, but ended up leaving a big stack of most of them sitting in the 'free to take' section of my apartment's laundry room.
I suppose this wouldn't be very different if it had been an LCG product rather than a CCG. It was still a flash in the pan interest that flamed out almost immediately, but at least it would have been a full game experience in a self contained product rather than god only knows what I had.
Lest anyone think I'm nothing but tales of rocking out the valuable shit.
Battletech's CCG, Vampire (back when it was called Jyhad), Rifts (this one was a giant steaming pile of shit), there was a period where I'd occasionally just snap up a starter pack (usually around 60'ish cards and a rule booklet) for a game that looked interesting. Even if I kind of dug it, though, it usually fell flat for not having enough friends to play against, or not having the disposable income to justify buying into multiple games at a time.
There's still plenty of them out there, but the 90's and 00's were filled with damned near everyone trying to get in on the CCG hotness. Think peak MMO era; know a property? Someone's probably trying to pitch a CCG for it.
I hope the point I was trying to make is clear, that while Magic or Pokemon may retain some value due to the secondary market, there are a lot of dead CCGs (or other dead games, like Mechwarrior: Dark Ages) where the product now has little or no value in much the same way that loot boxes will have little or no value. You shouldn't let the handful of exceptions that happened to be breakout successes define the rules when the vast majority of the examples show that the items in general quickly become worthless.
No monetary value perhaps. You still have a physical good that may have artistic or nostalgic value. You can even try to find someone who will play with you!
Which is still gambling marketed to kids and relies on whales to support the system.
The prey on children avenue of attack seems strange since afaik minors can only legally purchase these things by purchasing gift cards? They can't open pay pal accounts or get credit cards. Also, selling people video games is preying on them? Also seems weird to say...
I'm not super familiar with how other games do lootboxes. But in the CCG I play, you can get a full play set of cards for about $800 a year. There is zero reason to do this of course. I can see why relative to other video games this seems like an exorbitant amount of money, but seems pretty cheap compared to other adult hobbies.
I guess if I were aware of more horror stories about people's lives being destroyed due to lootbox addiction I'd find this to be a more worthwhile crusade.
Have you been to a store that refuses to sell a lotto scratch off to a minor with their parent right next to them giving them a few dollars? A lot of these games the parent puts their card in once and away they go. It's purposefully built like that for "ease of use" but why it's really designed like that is because it exploits how simple and easy it becomes to just click a button or two to get what you want, it's only a dollar or so!
It exploits a similar mechanism to why people spend more money with a credit or debit card than they do with actual cash in their pocket.
not a doctor, not a lawyer, examples I use may not be fully researched so don't take out of context plz, don't @ me
Even if lootboxes were banned the predatory microtransaction shit in mobile games would still be a serious problem, in my view.
There are plenty of games that constantly try to hit you for anywhere from $1 to $100 to buy character upgrades, fast-forward progress bars, or get more in-game currency to let you do things without having to either grind or (more often) wait. And all of them are filled with "Click here to spend some money!" buttons.
Much as I dislike the whole lootbox situation for moral reasons I think the rise of "spend money or wait exponentially-increasing amounts of real time to do the next thing" as a game mechanic in mobile games is, in terms of actual game playability, the greater blight.
Even if lootboxes were banned the predatory microtransaction shit in mobile games would still be a serious problem, in my view.
There are plenty of games that constantly try to hit you for anywhere from $1 to $100 to buy character upgrades, fast-forward progress bars, or get more in-game currency to let you do things without having to either grind or (more often) wait. And all of them are filled with "Click here to spend some money!" buttons.
Much as I dislike the whole lootbox situation for moral reasons I think the rise of "spend money or wait exponentially-increasing amounts of real time to do the next thing" as a game mechanic in mobile games is, in terms of actual game playability, the greater blight.
I actually agree with this, and find the whole micro-transaction marketing model to be disgusting. The big difference, I feel, however, lies with transparency. As gross as micro-transactions, as a general practice, are, we live in a capitalist society. As long as that is true, it would be next to impossible to legislate against anyone wanting to sell something in general.
"Marketing", as a practice, is actually a study of human psychology designed to find methods to convince people to part with their money that doesn't cross the line into abuse. We can't legislate against marketing tactics in general, it's too engrained in our economy and our society.
Loot boxes cross the line because they rely on hiding information from the consumer (or, as they would like to call it, "surprise mechanics!") to entice consumers into buying product that may not have any actual value to them. It crosses the line from "mere" manipulation to outright false representation via obfuscation, hence why arguments against Loot boxes can be stronger than arguments against other manipulative marketing tactics in general.
3DS FC: 1547-5210-6531
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jungleroomxIt's never too many graves, it's always not enough shovelsRegistered Userregular
Even if lootboxes were banned the predatory microtransaction shit in mobile games would still be a serious problem, in my view.
There are plenty of games that constantly try to hit you for anywhere from $1 to $100 to buy character upgrades, fast-forward progress bars, or get more in-game currency to let you do things without having to either grind or (more often) wait. And all of them are filled with "Click here to spend some money!" buttons.
Much as I dislike the whole lootbox situation for moral reasons I think the rise of "spend money or wait exponentially-increasing amounts of real time to do the next thing" as a game mechanic in mobile games is, in terms of actual game playability, the greater blight.
I actually agree with this, and find the whole micro-transaction marketing model to be disgusting. The big difference, I feel, however, lies with transparency. As gross as micro-transactions, as a general practice, are, we live in a capitalist society. As long as that is true, it would be next to impossible to legislate against anyone wanting to sell something in general.
"Marketing", as a practice, is actually a study of human psychology designed to find methods to convince people to part with their money that doesn't cross the line into abuse. We can't legislate against marketing tactics in general, it's too engrained in our economy and our society.
Loot boxes cross the line because they rely on hiding information from the consumer (or, as they would like to call it, "surprise mechanics!") to entice consumers into buying product that may not have any actual value to them. It crosses the line from "mere" manipulation to outright false representation via obfuscation, hence why arguments against Loot boxes can be stronger than arguments against other manipulative marketing tactics in general.
I mean
What?
We can. We absolutely have. Misleading or lying ads, not disclosing sponsorships, and a host of other business practices we made illegal because at the time we didn't have people hand wringing/purposely sabotaging the efforts.
Even if lootboxes were banned the predatory microtransaction shit in mobile games would still be a serious problem, in my view.
There are plenty of games that constantly try to hit you for anywhere from $1 to $100 to buy character upgrades, fast-forward progress bars, or get more in-game currency to let you do things without having to either grind or (more often) wait. And all of them are filled with "Click here to spend some money!" buttons.
Much as I dislike the whole lootbox situation for moral reasons I think the rise of "spend money or wait exponentially-increasing amounts of real time to do the next thing" as a game mechanic in mobile games is, in terms of actual game playability, the greater blight.
I actually agree with this, and find the whole micro-transaction marketing model to be disgusting. The big difference, I feel, however, lies with transparency. As gross as micro-transactions, as a general practice, are, we live in a capitalist society. As long as that is true, it would be next to impossible to legislate against anyone wanting to sell something in general.
"Marketing", as a practice, is actually a study of human psychology designed to find methods to convince people to part with their money that doesn't cross the line into abuse. We can't legislate against marketing tactics in general, it's too engrained in our economy and our society.
Loot boxes cross the line because they rely on hiding information from the consumer (or, as they would like to call it, "surprise mechanics!") to entice consumers into buying product that may not have any actual value to them. It crosses the line from "mere" manipulation to outright false representation via obfuscation, hence why arguments against Loot boxes can be stronger than arguments against other manipulative marketing tactics in general.
I mean
What?
We can. We absolutely have. Misleading or lying ads, not disclosing sponsorships, and a host of other business practices we made illegal because at the time we didn't have people hand wringing/purposely sabotaging the efforts.
I guess I didn't word that right. What I'm trying to get across is that a lot of marketing tactics are gross, but that alone doesn't mean there's a clear-cut way to legislate against them.
The examples you provided all have one thing in common: They lie to customers, either overtly or by omission. We can't really lay that same accusation at the feet of microtransactions. Gross though they may be, they're not hiding anything from consumers.
The same can't be said for loot boxes.
3DS FC: 1547-5210-6531
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Inquisitor772 x Penny Arcade Fight Club ChampionA fixed point in space and timeRegistered Userregular
Even if lootboxes were banned the predatory microtransaction shit in mobile games would still be a serious problem, in my view.
There are plenty of games that constantly try to hit you for anywhere from $1 to $100 to buy character upgrades, fast-forward progress bars, or get more in-game currency to let you do things without having to either grind or (more often) wait. And all of them are filled with "Click here to spend some money!" buttons.
Much as I dislike the whole lootbox situation for moral reasons I think the rise of "spend money or wait exponentially-increasing amounts of real time to do the next thing" as a game mechanic in mobile games is, in terms of actual game playability, the greater blight.
We can make these practices illegal also. We just need to get the government to be focused on protecting the consumer.
Even if lootboxes were banned the predatory microtransaction shit in mobile games would still be a serious problem, in my view.
There are plenty of games that constantly try to hit you for anywhere from $1 to $100 to buy character upgrades, fast-forward progress bars, or get more in-game currency to let you do things without having to either grind or (more often) wait. And all of them are filled with "Click here to spend some money!" buttons.
Much as I dislike the whole lootbox situation for moral reasons I think the rise of "spend money or wait exponentially-increasing amounts of real time to do the next thing" as a game mechanic in mobile games is, in terms of actual game playability, the greater blight.
I actually agree with this, and find the whole micro-transaction marketing model to be disgusting. The big difference, I feel, however, lies with transparency. As gross as micro-transactions, as a general practice, are, we live in a capitalist society. As long as that is true, it would be next to impossible to legislate against anyone wanting to sell something in general.
"Marketing", as a practice, is actually a study of human psychology designed to find methods to convince people to part with their money that doesn't cross the line into abuse. We can't legislate against marketing tactics in general, it's too engrained in our economy and our society.
Loot boxes cross the line because they rely on hiding information from the consumer (or, as they would like to call it, "surprise mechanics!") to entice consumers into buying product that may not have any actual value to them. It crosses the line from "mere" manipulation to outright false representation via obfuscation, hence why arguments against Loot boxes can be stronger than arguments against other manipulative marketing tactics in general.
I mean
What?
We can. We absolutely have. Misleading or lying ads, not disclosing sponsorships, and a host of other business practices we made illegal because at the time we didn't have people hand wringing/purposely sabotaging the efforts.
I guess I didn't word that right. What I'm trying to get across is that a lot of marketing tactics are gross, but that alone doesn't mean there's a clear-cut way to legislate against them.
The examples you provided all have one thing in common: They lie to customers, either overtly or by omission. We can't really lay that same accusation at the feet of microtransactions. Gross though they may be, they're not hiding anything from consumers.
The same can't be said for loot boxes.
I would think that, at the very least, in regards to microtransactions for items that grindable in-game we can insist on the publisher making public drop rates and/or any other information that might be required so players can estimate the average time to acquire without paying, to enforce one of the pillars of a free market where both sides are fully aware of the value of the item in question.
Warframe is a game that does that (in fact AFAIK it is the *only* f2p game that does it to the extent that it does), and it means you can check the wiki or other websites where players have made those calculations and decide, for example, that Hildryn is better off earning, despite he parts dropping from a boss being gated with an item that drops in an event that isn't up 100% of the time, because you enjoy the fight and it takes only about 6-7 runs on average with the rarest part having a drop rate of 22.56%, but Harrow might be better off bought, because getting to the C rotation in Defection just once makes a sane person want to stab something, never mind the 10-11 cycles/runs it takes on average on the easiest mission where the systems drop.
Foefaller on
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MortiousThe Nightmare BeginsMove to New ZealandRegistered Userregular
Microtransactions are easy to solve, just roll it into the normal return policy legislation (assuming your country has decent ones)
Giving the customer 14-30 days, or even just 48 hours at the minimum, to get an automatic uncontested refund would curb most of the predatory microtransaction practices.
I mean, there's a butt load of legislation that could be written that would discourage companies from doing this and would benefit the customers that would probably be really easy to implement, if anyone cared.
Two factor authentication for digital goods purchases, parents would probably get pissed to accept multiple $50 purchases within minutes of each other on their phone.
Label the games as containing real money gambling when they are purchased
Force companies to display the your total spent everytime you are looking at the purchase page
Whatever they did to camel cigarettes that killed Joe Camel
Force them to make hassel free returns
Publish drop rates of different rarities or even removing the different rates so everything has the exact same odds of dropping
Casinos, etc. are forced to run anti gambling ads on the radio/billboards/inside the casino, do that to loot box companies
I mean, there's a butt load of legislation that could be written that would discourage companies from doing this and would benefit the customers that would probably be really easy to implement, if anyone cared.
Two factor authentication for digital goods purchases, parents would probably get pissed to accept multiple $50 purchases within minutes of each other on their phone.
Label the games as containing real money gambling when they are purchased
Force companies to display the your total spent everytime you are looking at the purchase page
Whatever they did to camel cigarettes that killed Joe Camel
Force them to make hassel free returns
Publish drop rates of different rarities or even removing the different rates so everything has the exact same odds of dropping
Casinos, etc. are forced to run anti gambling ads on the radio/billboards/inside the casino, do that to loot box companies
Joe Camel was voluntarily ended to settle a lawsuit that claimed (correctly) that it was targeting children with cigarette ads. For that to work for lootboxes, you'd need to make advertising games containing lootboxes to children illegal, which is very close to the current legislation in progress in the US, with all the problems that entails.
"Think of the children," tends to leave out those with gambling problems getting literal gambling put in front of them.
The law itself also has the problem of being broad enough to catch pretty much everything, but not giving developers enough ways to prove that they aren't selling gambling to kids, which would not be a problem if it didn't extend to all microtransactions in general... even if most of us hear had a sad chuckle of all the "good" microtransactions some articles pointed out as could be affected.
(A chuckle because of how ridiculous it was that they were supposed to be good examples, sad because it showed how much crap people have accepted as normal.)
I'd be fine with games having a set price again, and doing away with this Freemium bullshit.
I could play Poggle for hours when I cracked open the Orange Box so many years ago. I didn't have to play until 5 losses and then wait for 'energy' to refill. I didn't play the levels with the sneaking suspicion that some of them were tweaked to specifically be incredibly difficult to complete without spending their premium currency for a few extra turns, or the bonuses/boosts from their in game shop.
I've had plenty of experiences with various genres of freemium game, and they often share commonalities with some of the more obnoxious elements of games that predated the dominance of this style. Things like forced pvp, and drawn out timers that all but beg for a taste of the premium currency to speed them up. Oh, sure, most of them allow you to accrue it over time in bits here and there, but spending it on those elements means not having it available for other uses, and if there's competitive/pvp elements at play, it's likely in super high demand in the first place.
But, why sell an app for a buck or two when you can make it "free" with "but hopefully you'll end up paying like $20-1,000+ over the next few months" as an asterisk. Not even a hidden asterisk. It's a known facet at this point, it's something we can bemoan and decry, but people are playing these games, and the whales and dolphins and other marine creatures are paying the bills hand over fist for many of them.
Just like with the evolution of "expansion packs" to "dlc" to "day one dlc" and the sense that the game is unfinished or incomplete without tossing them an extra twenty for the 'deluxe package', the freemium model carries a giant question mark as to how much (on average) they'll milk from players.
First they came for the Muslims, and we said NOT TODAY, MOTHERFUCKER!
"Think of the children," tends to leave out those with gambling problems getting literal gambling put in front of them.
The law itself also has the problem of being broad enough to catch pretty much everything, but not giving developers enough ways to prove that they aren't selling gambling to kids, which would not be a problem if it didn't extend to all microtransactions in general... even if most of us hear had a sad chuckle of all the "good" microtransactions some articles pointed out as could be affected.
(A chuckle because of how ridiculous it was that they were supposed to be good examples, sad because it showed how much crap people have accepted as normal.)
I don't think we should let perfect be the enemy of good. I suggested a bunch of thing that would discourage loot boxes and I think if a couple of those things were the law, the companies would stop selling loot boxes.
Like, if I could sell you a loot box, with no rarity teirs, why would I just not sell you the one good thing you want for 5x the price of the other crap you don't want? That would be beneficial to consumers! You would know the exact price for your soccer guy. You probably wouldn't spend $500 on him. But you might spend $50 ten times to gamble at a chance for him, because that's how a lot of humans work! But a direct sale of the same price? Probably less likely. So now your rare soccer guy just costs $10 and EA loses a bunch of gambling earnings from kids.
"Think of the children," tends to leave out those with gambling problems getting literal gambling put in front of them.
The law itself also has the problem of being broad enough to catch pretty much everything, but not giving developers enough ways to prove that they aren't selling gambling to kids, which would not be a problem if it didn't extend to all microtransactions in general... even if most of us hear had a sad chuckle of all the "good" microtransactions some articles pointed out as could be affected.
(A chuckle because of how ridiculous it was that they were supposed to be good examples, sad because it showed how much crap people have accepted as normal.)
I don't think we should let perfect be the enemy of good. I suggested a bunch of thing that would discourage loot boxes and I think if a couple of those things were the law, the companies would stop selling loot boxes.
Like, if I could sell you a loot box, with no rarity teirs, why would I just not sell you the one good thing you want for 5x the price of the other crap you don't want? That would be beneficial to consumers! You would know the exact price for your soccer guy. You probably wouldn't spend $500 on him. But you might spend $50 ten times to gamble at a chance for him, because that's how a lot of humans work! But a direct sale of the same price? Probably less likely. So now your rare soccer guy just costs $10 and EA loses a bunch of gambling earnings from kids.
Because you could do what Overwatch does and have seasonal and special event lootboxes with special rewards that come and go briefly, relying on FOMO to get people to spend money that they might not otherwise. Better yet, mix the new stuff in with all the things normally available, and dilute the reward pool, meaning even though everything is the same tier, the new things are rarer than the normal stuff because it competes for the normal stuff for a chance at showing up.
It already completed with the normal stuff, except it also has lower odds!
Exactly.
Special event celebrating the last World Cup. All the players from all the nations that participated, including the qualification rounds, get special UT profiles, with the the French team players having improved stats over their normal profiles.
All are now available as possible rewards in the standard Ultimate Team package, along with their normal profiles, but only for this week! Get them while you can.
Your idea assumes that the developers can't think up of 399 pieces of crap to place their one good thing in to still get their .5% chance. That is a foolish assumption.
I am all for regulating these companies and practices! That's why I made a bunch of piecemeal suggestions that I think would help curb this behavior! I never said nothing else could ever be changed, or that companies wouldn't find other bullshit!
But gambling is legal in lots of places. And it should remain legal, because making it illegal doesn't stop it. It just gives money to criminal enterprises and makes it more dangerous.
If a grown adult wants to spend a thousand dollars on digital fifa players, I guess they are allowed to? But, you know, as I said earlier, I think the company should also have obligations to curb this behavior in adults by running anti gambling ads and showing people how much they've spent cumulatively, and allow for returns, and two factor payments to make sure sure sure you really want to do something that stupid? Etc.
I am all for regulating these companies and practices! That's why I made a bunch of piecemeal suggestions that I think would help curb this behavior! I never said nothing else could ever be changed, or that companies wouldn't find other bullshit!
But gambling is legal in lots of places. And it should remain legal, because making it illegal doesn't stop it. It just gives money to criminal enterprises and makes it more dangerous.
Not asking to make gambling illegal. Asking to make lootboxes illegal, or defined as gambling.
If a grown adult wants to spend a thousand dollars on digital fifa players, I guess they are allowed to? But, you know, as I said earlier, I think the company should also have obligations to curb this behavior in adults by running anti gambling ads and showing people how much they've spent cumulatively, and allow for returns, and two factor payments to make sure sure sure you really want to do something that stupid? Etc.
Would the gambling ads be required to play or something available to watch? And if they do auto-play, do you make it take the full screen and be unskippable? Showing people what they've payed sounds like an excellent opportunity to offer milestone rewards, and two-factor for every purchase a great excuse for bulk deals so players can avoid the red tape.
As for returns, what's the return period? If it's opening lootboxes, boxes open automatically. If it's X days, have an incubation period before you open them. If it's weeks or more, congrats, you've effectively banned lootboxes from videogames, and I applaud your cleverness.
Yes, you should be able to return the contents of a loot box you have opened.
I'm all for banning loot boxes! Other people have said that legislation would be hard to do. Other other people have said it would have the unintended consequences of banning card games and/or all videogames, both have been argued. I suggested a bunch of easy things that would make the loot box practice much more consumer friendly, while being easy to implement, and also not killing MTG (but still placing the same consumer friendly restrictions on MTG)
I don't disagree with you. I'm not rooting for the loot boxes!
I bet I can find posts from me on this very forum ten years ago calling people idiots for purchasing steel box editions of a game! They play the same game as me, but spent 50% more, and who has ever watched a making of DVD or whatever shit they included in Halo 2?
I don't buy dlc! I think all that shit is dumb and I disagree with it!
I played CoD religiously for, like, 8 years, and I never bought a single map pack after MW2, much to the chagrin of all the other PA people who couldn't play their new maps because I refused to buy them!
It already completed with the normal stuff, except it also has lower odds!
Exactly.
Special event celebrating the last World Cup. All the players from all the nations that participated, including the qualification rounds, get special UT profiles, with the the French team players having improved stats over their normal profiles.
All are now available as possible rewards in the standard Ultimate Team package, along with their normal profiles, but only for this week! Get them while you can.
Your idea assumes that the developers can't think up of 399 pieces of crap to place their one good thing in to still get their .5% chance. That is a foolish assumption.
For what it's worth, I believe that without exception "normal" versions of player cards are pulled from packs when special are placed in for limited-time bonuses. In most cases, having a vanilla card with a pack pull date during their special card period is sufficient for a support ticket, and IIRC EA will actually swap the normal for the special in those cases. Usually it's a known fuckup affecting all customers, so they just do it automatically.
That said, I'm fairly sure they also lower the pack rate of those players during their special period. So a player that may normally be a run-of-the-mill card and fairly common in packs gets a special for the week? His rarity goes up several ticks.
Of course we can't know for sure, because even when they started "disclosing" pack odds in the last year or two they did it as vaguely as possible. "Chances of an 85+ rated player," even though "85+" covers multiple orders of magnitude of rarity (an 85 player is way, way, way more common than a 91). Also "less than 1%," which of course could me 0.9% or could have about six more zeroes between that decimal point and the 9.
Obviously not, but if you are demanding that lootbox should be returnable after opening, you aren't talking about making it too cumbersome to offer lootboxes, you are making it impossible to have lootboxes.
And I'm all for getting rid of lootboxes entirely, but if you're trying to come up with a clever way to make it unfeasible but not sound like a ban so noone can call it a ban, forcing developers to allow returns after opening is going to be called a ban.
I feel like allowing people to return digital goods is easier legislatively than legally defining what a loot box is and would have less side effects/work around
And any side effects would be, what, allowing more consumers to return more products more easily? Sounds like a win for the consumer!
Posts
Moose has made a business selling rare plastic to kids.
Also our supermarkets are doing it in Aus:
https://www.news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/coles-has-released-just-100-golden-billy-bananas-stikeez-and-people-are-obsessed-putting-in-bids-of-thousands-of-dollars/news-story/9629b6b9707faf7a380f7bfb1806064b
The golden bananas also had a cash prize of $500 attached to them as well, I believe.
"But they do it to" has been the #1 defense of anything bad in business and since it's impossible to ever get a bill that targets everything, nothing gets done
I for one am comfortable in the powers that be focusing on regulating video game lootboxes, which prey upon children to a far greater degree in 2019 than any collectible anything, while at the same time acknowledging that the other forms of randomized consumerism need to be regulated as well (even if that just means everything you can randomly buy is also available for direct purchase)
I'm not super familiar with how other games do lootboxes. But in the CCG I play, you can get a full play set of cards for about $800 a year. There is zero reason to do this of course. I can see why relative to other video games this seems like an exorbitant amount of money, but seems pretty cheap compared to other adult hobbies.
I guess if I were aware of more horror stories about people's lives being destroyed due to lootbox addiction I'd find this to be a more worthwhile crusade.
Good point.
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/kznmwa/for-many-players-lootboxes-are-a-crisis-thats-already-here
Personally I've spent a couple of hundered dollars on TF2 and STO (and probably a couple of other games, but those stand out) back in the day.
It's kind of weird, each individual purchase seemed reasonable, but you somehow lose track of the total amount you spend. Especially when you unlock several boxes in a row, and then when you don't get what you want somehow instinctively buy a couple of more keys out of frustration.
At least it wasn't in amounts that caused any personal issues for me, but the after affects certainly soured me on those games, and games like them.
For Overwatch, I refused to engage with their lootbox mechanic though I opened the free ones you earned, then they had their first seasonal event. There was a skin I actually wanted, so I played it a lot more than I enjoyed just at a chance to get it, with their constant reminders that I can just buy more chances.
And that was the end of Overwatch for me.
Same thing with Destiny 2, season 1 ended before I finshed any of the seasonal cosmetic sets from their loot boxes. Lots of reminders that time is running and that a bit of cash can increase my chances.
So personally, and selfishly, I'd like games to stop driving me away from playing them with shitty mechanics.
And it's not monetization or microtransactions in general. I am mostly fine with WarFrame and their model even though I will be the first to say it is a F2P game that you wont enjoy without spending at least some money. But I can tell you exactly how much I have spent on it, and how much I will probably still spend on it. (They also have ingame time limited events though which I dislike, but that's a different issue)
It’s not a very important country most of the time
http://steamcommunity.com/id/mortious
Fucking Valve said no because of the free weekend I took.
I hope the point I was trying to make is clear, that while Magic or Pokemon may retain some value due to the secondary market, there are a lot of dead CCGs (or other dead games, like Mechwarrior: Dark Ages) where the product now has little or no value in much the same way that loot boxes will have little or no value. You shouldn't let the handful of exceptions that happened to be breakout successes define the rules when the vast majority of the examples show that the items in general quickly become worthless.
I don't even have kids and I've been bitten by this lootboxing shit. Had a little sister who wanted to play some mobile games on my phone and bam, a couple hours later I got smacked with a hundred dollars in charges for insane game shit. There's a huge shithole chunk of games that rely on getting kids to swipe money from their parents and spend it on a game, then make it too obnoxious to get the money back to feel like it's worth fighting over.
"Kids aren't supposed to be playing it" is basically no barrier whatsoever to kids playing this stuff.
No monetary value perhaps. You still have a physical good that may have artistic or nostalgic value. You can even try to find someone who will play with you!
Oh, I was just jumping off with memories of the, like, half dozen+ random starters I had laying around at one point, plus the god knows how many packs I snagged (the white wolf werewolf ccg... Rage?) or single cards (Inquest had them, as I recall?).
It was more a trip down memory lane than anything, and mostly in agreement that the ones that retain value (let alone gain it) are a vanishing minority compared to most of them that have come out over the years.
Which is still gambling marketed to kids and relies on whales to support the system.
Have you been to a store that refuses to sell a lotto scratch off to a minor with their parent right next to them giving them a few dollars? A lot of these games the parent puts their card in once and away they go. It's purposefully built like that for "ease of use" but why it's really designed like that is because it exploits how simple and easy it becomes to just click a button or two to get what you want, it's only a dollar or so!
It exploits a similar mechanism to why people spend more money with a credit or debit card than they do with actual cash in their pocket.
There are plenty of games that constantly try to hit you for anywhere from $1 to $100 to buy character upgrades, fast-forward progress bars, or get more in-game currency to let you do things without having to either grind or (more often) wait. And all of them are filled with "Click here to spend some money!" buttons.
Much as I dislike the whole lootbox situation for moral reasons I think the rise of "spend money or wait exponentially-increasing amounts of real time to do the next thing" as a game mechanic in mobile games is, in terms of actual game playability, the greater blight.
I actually agree with this, and find the whole micro-transaction marketing model to be disgusting. The big difference, I feel, however, lies with transparency. As gross as micro-transactions, as a general practice, are, we live in a capitalist society. As long as that is true, it would be next to impossible to legislate against anyone wanting to sell something in general.
"Marketing", as a practice, is actually a study of human psychology designed to find methods to convince people to part with their money that doesn't cross the line into abuse. We can't legislate against marketing tactics in general, it's too engrained in our economy and our society.
Loot boxes cross the line because they rely on hiding information from the consumer (or, as they would like to call it, "surprise mechanics!") to entice consumers into buying product that may not have any actual value to them. It crosses the line from "mere" manipulation to outright false representation via obfuscation, hence why arguments against Loot boxes can be stronger than arguments against other manipulative marketing tactics in general.
I mean
What?
We can. We absolutely have. Misleading or lying ads, not disclosing sponsorships, and a host of other business practices we made illegal because at the time we didn't have people hand wringing/purposely sabotaging the efforts.
I guess I didn't word that right. What I'm trying to get across is that a lot of marketing tactics are gross, but that alone doesn't mean there's a clear-cut way to legislate against them.
The examples you provided all have one thing in common: They lie to customers, either overtly or by omission. We can't really lay that same accusation at the feet of microtransactions. Gross though they may be, they're not hiding anything from consumers.
The same can't be said for loot boxes.
We can make these practices illegal also. We just need to get the government to be focused on protecting the consumer.
I would think that, at the very least, in regards to microtransactions for items that grindable in-game we can insist on the publisher making public drop rates and/or any other information that might be required so players can estimate the average time to acquire without paying, to enforce one of the pillars of a free market where both sides are fully aware of the value of the item in question.
Warframe is a game that does that (in fact AFAIK it is the *only* f2p game that does it to the extent that it does), and it means you can check the wiki or other websites where players have made those calculations and decide, for example, that Hildryn is better off earning, despite he parts dropping from a boss being gated with an item that drops in an event that isn't up 100% of the time, because you enjoy the fight and it takes only about 6-7 runs on average with the rarest part having a drop rate of 22.56%, but Harrow might be better off bought, because getting to the C rotation in Defection just once makes a sane person want to stab something, never mind the 10-11 cycles/runs it takes on average on the easiest mission where the systems drop.
Giving the customer 14-30 days, or even just 48 hours at the minimum, to get an automatic uncontested refund would curb most of the predatory microtransaction practices.
It’s not a very important country most of the time
http://steamcommunity.com/id/mortious
Two factor authentication for digital goods purchases, parents would probably get pissed to accept multiple $50 purchases within minutes of each other on their phone.
Label the games as containing real money gambling when they are purchased
Force companies to display the your total spent everytime you are looking at the purchase page
Whatever they did to camel cigarettes that killed Joe Camel
Force them to make hassel free returns
Publish drop rates of different rarities or even removing the different rates so everything has the exact same odds of dropping
Casinos, etc. are forced to run anti gambling ads on the radio/billboards/inside the casino, do that to loot box companies
Joe Camel was voluntarily ended to settle a lawsuit that claimed (correctly) that it was targeting children with cigarette ads. For that to work for lootboxes, you'd need to make advertising games containing lootboxes to children illegal, which is very close to the current legislation in progress in the US, with all the problems that entails.
Because it isn't a complete ban?
"Think of the children," tends to leave out those with gambling problems getting literal gambling put in front of them.
The law itself also has the problem of being broad enough to catch pretty much everything, but not giving developers enough ways to prove that they aren't selling gambling to kids, which would not be a problem if it didn't extend to all microtransactions in general... even if most of us hear had a sad chuckle of all the "good" microtransactions some articles pointed out as could be affected.
(A chuckle because of how ridiculous it was that they were supposed to be good examples, sad because it showed how much crap people have accepted as normal.)
I could play Poggle for hours when I cracked open the Orange Box so many years ago. I didn't have to play until 5 losses and then wait for 'energy' to refill. I didn't play the levels with the sneaking suspicion that some of them were tweaked to specifically be incredibly difficult to complete without spending their premium currency for a few extra turns, or the bonuses/boosts from their in game shop.
I've had plenty of experiences with various genres of freemium game, and they often share commonalities with some of the more obnoxious elements of games that predated the dominance of this style. Things like forced pvp, and drawn out timers that all but beg for a taste of the premium currency to speed them up. Oh, sure, most of them allow you to accrue it over time in bits here and there, but spending it on those elements means not having it available for other uses, and if there's competitive/pvp elements at play, it's likely in super high demand in the first place.
But, why sell an app for a buck or two when you can make it "free" with "but hopefully you'll end up paying like $20-1,000+ over the next few months" as an asterisk. Not even a hidden asterisk. It's a known facet at this point, it's something we can bemoan and decry, but people are playing these games, and the whales and dolphins and other marine creatures are paying the bills hand over fist for many of them.
Just like with the evolution of "expansion packs" to "dlc" to "day one dlc" and the sense that the game is unfinished or incomplete without tossing them an extra twenty for the 'deluxe package', the freemium model carries a giant question mark as to how much (on average) they'll milk from players.
I don't think we should let perfect be the enemy of good. I suggested a bunch of thing that would discourage loot boxes and I think if a couple of those things were the law, the companies would stop selling loot boxes.
Like, if I could sell you a loot box, with no rarity teirs, why would I just not sell you the one good thing you want for 5x the price of the other crap you don't want? That would be beneficial to consumers! You would know the exact price for your soccer guy. You probably wouldn't spend $500 on him. But you might spend $50 ten times to gamble at a chance for him, because that's how a lot of humans work! But a direct sale of the same price? Probably less likely. So now your rare soccer guy just costs $10 and EA loses a bunch of gambling earnings from kids.
Because you could do what Overwatch does and have seasonal and special event lootboxes with special rewards that come and go briefly, relying on FOMO to get people to spend money that they might not otherwise. Better yet, mix the new stuff in with all the things normally available, and dilute the reward pool, meaning even though everything is the same tier, the new things are rarer than the normal stuff because it competes for the normal stuff for a chance at showing up.
Exactly.
Special event celebrating the last World Cup. All the players from all the nations that participated, including the qualification rounds, get special UT profiles, with the the French team players having improved stats over their normal profiles.
All are now available as possible rewards in the standard Ultimate Team package, along with their normal profiles, but only for this week! Get them while you can.
Your idea assumes that the developers can't think up of 399 pieces of crap to place their one good thing in to still get their .5% chance. That is a foolish assumption.
But gambling is legal in lots of places. And it should remain legal, because making it illegal doesn't stop it. It just gives money to criminal enterprises and makes it more dangerous.
If a grown adult wants to spend a thousand dollars on digital fifa players, I guess they are allowed to? But, you know, as I said earlier, I think the company should also have obligations to curb this behavior in adults by running anti gambling ads and showing people how much they've spent cumulatively, and allow for returns, and two factor payments to make sure sure sure you really want to do something that stupid? Etc.
Not asking to make gambling illegal. Asking to make lootboxes illegal, or defined as gambling.
Would the gambling ads be required to play or something available to watch? And if they do auto-play, do you make it take the full screen and be unskippable? Showing people what they've payed sounds like an excellent opportunity to offer milestone rewards, and two-factor for every purchase a great excuse for bulk deals so players can avoid the red tape.
As for returns, what's the return period? If it's opening lootboxes, boxes open automatically. If it's X days, have an incubation period before you open them. If it's weeks or more, congrats, you've effectively banned lootboxes from videogames, and I applaud your cleverness.
I'm all for banning loot boxes! Other people have said that legislation would be hard to do. Other other people have said it would have the unintended consequences of banning card games and/or all videogames, both have been argued. I suggested a bunch of easy things that would make the loot box practice much more consumer friendly, while being easy to implement, and also not killing MTG (but still placing the same consumer friendly restrictions on MTG)
I don't disagree with you. I'm not rooting for the loot boxes!
I don't buy dlc! I think all that shit is dumb and I disagree with it!
I played CoD religiously for, like, 8 years, and I never bought a single map pack after MW2, much to the chagrin of all the other PA people who couldn't play their new maps because I refused to buy them!
Then you're banning lootboxes. There is not a developer on this planet that would allow lootbox contents to be returned.
For what it's worth, I believe that without exception "normal" versions of player cards are pulled from packs when special are placed in for limited-time bonuses. In most cases, having a vanilla card with a pack pull date during their special card period is sufficient for a support ticket, and IIRC EA will actually swap the normal for the special in those cases. Usually it's a known fuckup affecting all customers, so they just do it automatically.
That said, I'm fairly sure they also lower the pack rate of those players during their special period. So a player that may normally be a run-of-the-mill card and fairly common in packs gets a special for the week? His rarity goes up several ticks.
Of course we can't know for sure, because even when they started "disclosing" pack odds in the last year or two they did it as vaguely as possible. "Chances of an 85+ rated player," even though "85+" covers multiple orders of magnitude of rarity (an 85 player is way, way, way more common than a 91). Also "less than 1%," which of course could me 0.9% or could have about six more zeroes between that decimal point and the 9.
Lootboxes would still be viable if the consumer feels that the value of what they get out of the box is greater than the cost of purchasing the box.
And I'm all for getting rid of lootboxes entirely, but if you're trying to come up with a clever way to make it unfeasible but not sound like a ban so noone can call it a ban, forcing developers to allow returns after opening is going to be called a ban.
And any side effects would be, what, allowing more consumers to return more products more easily? Sounds like a win for the consumer!