Thanks to EA, regulators have begun to look at loot boxes

[ABearInTheWoods]

[youtube]28K6GkkaTik[/youtube]

https://finance.yahoo.com/news/state-le ... 56062.html Hiwaii state legistrators on BattleFront two: "Its a trap" Calling it "a Star Wars-themed online casino designed to lure kids into an addictive cycle of gambling money"

https://arstechnica.com/gaming/2017/11/ ... predatory/ More.


Discuss.

While I think it's nice to see this kind of negative attention on bullshit triple ayy tropes, I do expect to see some overreach from regulators like we always do. Inb4 tf2 has to validate all users are over the age of 21 via faxed in ids or what not.

[J_Madison]

You know we really have one person to blame for all of this right?
One developer. The one developer to make loot boxes and paid cosmetic things so popular.
The one developer who popularised this idea. Prior to this, no other developer did this outside of China.
Not even call of duty had it, until Valve.

valve are still universally worshipped for their works, which is eyebrow raising. Now whilst Valve hasn't been unethical with it considering Dota 2 and TF2 and CSGO
it was really the beginning of the end.
But yes, EA is known to blow it out of proportion. But they can effectively say "we didn't do it first".

but EA, looks at a dev like Valve and asks themselves, how can they make so much money and have so many happy people?
They tried with Origin VS steam, but hell even ubisoft caved into steam with For honour.
They tried shooting games, battlefield and starwars but I somewhat question how much money valve made with tf2 and csgo compared to EA.

So they realised "it's loot boxes".

[Ricotez]

fuck EA, fuck Valve, fuck Warner Brothers, fuck them all, it's about time we got gacha legislation

[K-64]

Valve hasn't been unethical with it considering Dota 2 and TF2 and CSGO

Are you kidding me? Remember that whole CS:GO gambling thing a while back? Now Valve might not have been the ones directly responsible for that, but they were the ones that enabled it with enabling steam inventory useable on external sites. And while that is "simply" negligence on their part, even after they had that class-action against them, they've done jack-diddly-shit about it. That, to me doesn't imply anything ethical about the situation.

[XSI]

About time

Now if only we could completely remove loot boxes from games. All games, we'd be taking a step foreward
It won't undo the years of fucking people over, but at least it will send them a message saying they need to stop

Valve is pretty shit at this point. I don't think anyone who pays attention still likes them

[Ricotez]

When the EU demanded that Valve complies with EU refund regulations, Valve's response was to update the Steam EULA so that you waive your European refund rights if you use Steam, and then implement a halfassed severely limited refund policy that is nowhere near as extensive as the EU demanded so people wouldn't notice they just waived their actual refund rights and praise Valve for letting them use its' shitty terms instead.

Valve is just as big of a scumbag as any of these big publishers, it's just much better at hiding it.

[InsaneHyena]

>When you get so greedy, you ruin things forever for yourself and the rest of corporate suits

[Qbopper]

i guarantee the only reason this is happening is because normies who don't really care joined the epic downvote chain on that reddit post and that's why it got popular

[Takeguru]

Whatever the reason, it happened and I'm thankful

[Qbopper]

Whatever the reason, it happened and I'm thankful

i've never really felt strongly about it because i know there's nothing i can do about it because some rich person's kid can buy $4k worth of lootboxes, not trying to say it shouldn't happen or whatever

[Saegrimr]

How they're going to get around it, and how most games already get around it.
"Belgium's Gaming Commission has ruled that loot boxes—in-game purchases where what you receive is randomized and only known once you open the box—are gambling."

1: Everybody gets loot boxes for free, so you don't buy them.
2: You buy a key that opens things. You know exactly what you're buying when you buy a key. Whatever you use it on is all on you wink wink.
Alternative method, introducing some weird roulette wheel slide pick that introduces a modicum of skill and control over your random item.

Unfortunately they'll likely never tackle the korean MMO problem of "Upgrade item to +10 at a 0.005% chance and if it fails it breaks forever, BUY OUR PREMIUM BOOST DUST TO INCREASE THIS CHANCE TO 20%!"

[Qbopper]

yeah i don't see legislation ever managing to work for a couple reasons but who knows what'll happen

[ABearInTheWoods]

[ABearInTheWoods]

I was just pointing out that the 3 other games (cod, ac, nba2k) sold out and BF still has a healthy stock

[imblyings]

lmao ea

absolute natural 1 on the pr post

[Screemonster]

the story of the goose that laid the golden eggs has been around since like 600BC and they still managed to fuck it up

[Malkevin]

Good, I'm sick of this microtransaction bullshit that has ruined FPSes for the past ten years.

[Qbopper]

Good, I'm sick of this microtransaction bullshit that has ruined FPSes for the past ten years.

1. what do you mean 10 years

2. even if lootboxes were purged in all forms right this second companies are still going to look for ways to make money so i wouldn't get your hopes too high

[XSI]

At least we'd be rid of lootboxes then

We'll deal with whatever else after that

[cedarbridge]

About time

Now if only we could completely remove loot boxes from games. All games, we'd be taking a step foreward
It won't undo the years of fucking people over, but at least it will send them a message saying they need to stop

Fucking over whom out of what?
Games that have long-running uptimes have overhead to manage and new content added either gets charged for up front or you find another way to monetize it. Boxes are typically designed in a way that rewards a few cosmetic items at random to players who play the game and "earn" them and the rest of the company's intake is earned through a handful of whales buying hundreds or more of the things. I'm 100% OK with whales funding my continued good times with a game that I'd otherwise have to be buying through installments and DLC. Even better that the system (overwatch for example) lets me get some of that shit without paying a cent for the new content. I don't personally feel entitled to all of the new content provided as part of what is essentially free DLC for a game I bought over a year ago.

Typically I hear people bitch about "well it doesn't cost millions of dollars to keep adding new hats" but I don't really see why its my problem how much money the company is making when they aren't making it off of me and they're not strongarming it out of anyone in particular except the aformentioned whales. EA cocked up when they tied the boxes to gameplay altering effects. Technically online card games (and the paper ones too for that matter) already do that. I'd be pretty pissed if the gubmint started stepping in to legislate the content of collectable card game packs.

Real question here: What is having the government step in and start dictating the content of games and games funding models going to improve? What would be improved by government involvement that wouldn't be solved by not buying EA's shitty product?

Predatory my ass.

[Malkevin]

>overheads

Only because devs have tacked on persistent stat systems to artificially create longevity by drip feeding content

Also, running an sql server isn't that costly

[killerx09]

I mean, not much will really change regarding EA or lootboxes if we look at it on a realistic term?

If lootboxes get classified as gambling, then it'll take about a year for the regulations to come into place. By then, EA can just remove lootboxes from their existing games, and there won't be too big of an income drop, since most EA games have a lifespan of 1-2 years anyway. They'll just go back to doing what they did with Battlefield, which is selling progression and map packs up-front. EA Sports will get shot in the gut though.

However, it is going to be much, MUCH more painful for Valve and Blizzard, tantamount to losing an arm and two legs. Blizzard's three leading titles (Heroes of the Storm, Overwatch and Hearthstone) all utilize lootboxes as a major source of income, and pretty much all Valve games that are currently maintained utilize lootboxes. Collectible Card games are also expected to take the bat. I'd expect Take-Two, Ubisoft and the Jappanese developers to be relatively unaffected, as none of their games utilize lootboxes heavily.

[Ricotez]

I knew that someone in here was going to defend lootboxes and whales, and I knew that there was a 99% chance it would be cedar.

[Iatots]

You play a whale's game, you are krill- and I ain't no shrimp!

[cedarbridge]

I knew that someone in here was going to defend lootboxes and whales, and I knew that there was a 99% chance it would be cedar.

Tell me which part I said is wrong.

[DemonFiren]

All of them, obviously.

[onleavedontatme]

I knew that someone in here was going to defend lootboxes and whales, and I knew that there was a 99% chance it would be cedar.

Tell me which part I said is wrong.

None of it. People expect photorealistic graphics/voice acting/hundreds of hours of content/a decade of free updates and servers and somehow companies to do that with only the upfront price of the game. They also expect game prices to be immune to inflation and then wait for the sale on top of that.

I am happy to let other people waste money on hats so I can keep playing games that run as a service without the cost of a subscription.

EA crossed a line and fucked up their game mechanics to encourage microtransactions but what is remotely immoral about Overwatch or dota funding their games through skins?

[onleavedontatme]

Free market seems to be doing a fine job punishing EA anyway

[Takeguru]

80 bucks for a special edition, microtransactions on par with fee to play games in how badly they imbalance the in game play, and a massive grind if you try to earn things legitimately

Overwatch and co. do things respectably enough, even though instead of lootboxes I'd rather they just sold the fucking skins

[Qbopper]

I knew that someone in here was going to defend lootboxes and whales, and I knew that there was a 99% chance it would be cedar.

Tell me which part I said is wrong.

None of it. People expect photorealistic graphics/voice acting/hundreds of hours of content/a decade of free updates and servers and somehow companies to do that with only the upfront price of the game. They also expect game prices to be immune to inflation and then wait for the sale on top of that.

I am happy to let other people waste money on hats so I can keep playing games that run as a service without the cost of a subscription.

EA crossed a line and fucked up their game mechanics to encourage microtransactions but what is remotely immoral about Overwatch or dota funding their games through skins?

I agree with you but WAY more people buy video games now, so unless you actually work at one of these companies it's not going to be easy to accurately analyze if lootboxes genuinely help cover insane development costs or not

that being said, you aren't wrong about the first bit of your post, and you can only rely on actual sales of your game for so long before you need more funding for your 500th update, and games like dota don't have any up front cost at all

also yeah your point about people waiting for sales is on the nose, people shit on developers for charging $60 for games, and then they wait for it to be $5 on a steam sale (or buy it though a key reseller), so that can't be helping either

tangentially related: fuck literally everyone involved in the stupid horseshit scam of charging canadians $70 for games because our dollar tanked, then when it recovers leaving it at $70, then upping it AGAIN to $80 and leaving it when the dollar recovers

obviously they aren't going to lower the price after we get used to games being $80 but it's genuinely fucking ridiculous that buying 4 games is nearly the cost of a brand new console buying 5 games could get me a switch

[Wyzack]

I mean i don't personally have a problem when it is done with cosmetics but tying it into actual gameplay shit like straight stat boosts and playable characters is where it crosses an obvious line.

The entire predatory gambling thing is a different argument entirely and hinges on the fact that certain things happen to your brain when you gamble that makes it addicting, and most of these lootbox systems tap into that in a way that is able to target children, essentially addicting them to the sensation of gambling which drives them to spend more of their parents money.

[Ricotez]

Don't you see how fucked up it is to design your entire game around that 1% of players who will literally spend thousands of dollars on it, and spends every second of its existence trying to manipulate the other 99% into giving it their money as well? And then Blizzard found out that they can charge you full price for the game itself too, and that rabid fanboys will actually defend this entire business model as something desirable.

The whole argument about "WAAAH GAMES ARE TOO EXPENSIVE ;____;" is complete and utter BULLSHIT. EA literally told their investors that removing microtransactions would have no material effect on the company. Like Jim Sterling said, if triple ayy publishers can't make back their money by just selling games, maybe they're in the wrong business?

[Wyzack]

I am confused how can they be making thousands of dollars from all these people but also say removing it will have no material effect on the company that doesn't make sense

[onleavedontatme]

and most of these lootbox systems tap into that in a way that is able to target children, essentially addicting them to the sensation of gambling which drives them to spend more of their parents money.

Their parents should be keeping track of what their kids are buying with their credit card then. As Cedar said, are we gonna ban pokemon cards next? Candy bars? Anything collectible? Advertising for kids toys?

Don't you see how fucked up it is to design your entire game around that 1% of players who will literally spend thousands of dollars on it, and spends every second of its existence trying to manipulate the other 99% into giving it their money as well? And then Blizzard found out that they can charge you full price for the game itself too, and that rabid fanboys will actually defend this entire business model as something desirable.

The whole argument about "WAAAH GAMES ARE TOO EXPENSIVE ;____;" is complete and utter BULLSHIT. EA literally told their investors that removing microtransactions would have no material effect on the company. Like Jim Sterling said, if triple ayy publishers can't make back their money by just selling games, maybe they're in the wrong business?

Maybe it isn't the case for EA, but the business model clearly has pretty material effects on some games (like dota2 being entirely free and selling 100 million dollars worth of compendiums for the last international alone). I don't see how it's fucked up that enthusiasts can voluntarily part with their money to fund something other people are enjoying either.

I don't own Overwatch but them continuing to release heroes/maps/those little animated stories for the game years after release for no extra cost seems desirable to me.

And if a company does something stupid like EA I can just not buy their game because there are more good games out there than I will ever have time to play anyway.

when the people of the nation they represent cannot help themselves in the face of ill action

But the people got rid of Battlefront 2s microtransactions all on their own by putting pressure on the company.

[Cobby]

ITT we have people discussing

• Loot Boxes in general
• Strictly cosmetic loot boxes
• Gameplay affecting loot boxes

and each individual thinks the other individual is discussing the first.

[onleavedontatme]

ITT we have people discussing

• Loot Boxes in general
• Strictly cosmetic loot boxes
• Gameplay affecting loot boxes

and each individual thinks the other individual is discussing the first.

I think we're actually all on the same page.

Everyone hates what EA did, nobody in this thread is arguing it was a good idea (though I guess we do disagree on whether it should be regulated by the government)

The current argument is about cosmetic lootboxes like dota/pubg/kf2 have and whether those are desirable/fair business models

[Incomptinence]

Problem with depending on the action of the people is they will just slyly wait until scandal died down.

Then quietly bring it back again.

[killerx09]

Let's really have a big, long think about this.

Will governments really care about the differences between gameplay-affecting lootboxes and cosmetic-only ones?

[oranges]

it doesn't have to be lootboxes though. That shit's obviously exploitative of peoples gambling tendencies.

Look at paradox for an example of how to do great DLC strategy.

CK2 was released in 2012 and they are still releasing DLC for it, I'm still playing it even today and I've paid for all the DLC, including some of the graphical content packs.

That's 5 years of ongoing support

Not a single microtransaction in sight.

[Qbopper]

it doesn't have to be lootboxes though. That shit's obviously exploitative of peoples gambling tendencies.

Look at paradox for an example of how to do great DLC strategy.

CK2 was released in 2012 and they are still releasing DLC for it, I'm still playing it even today and I've paid for all the DLC, including some of the graphical content packs.

That's 5 years of ongoing support

Not a single microtransaction in sight.

CK2 is in a relatively niche genre where the fans are willing to buy the DLC, though - it's like train simulator or whatever (though not as blatantly ridiculous)

you aren't wrong that it shows it can be done, however

Don't you see how fucked up it is to design your entire game around that 1% of players who will literally spend thousands of dollars on it, and spends every second of its existence trying to manipulate the other 99% into giving it their money as well? And then Blizzard found out that they can charge you full price for the game itself too, and that rabid fanboys will actually defend this entire business model as something desirable.

i don't think a cosmetic system that preys on whales is really influencing the gameplay design, maybe you could ague the metagame with leveling up and earning lootboxes is influenced but games like overwatch don't feature lootboxes in a way like battlefront 2 where they affect gameplay

The whole argument about "WAAAH GAMES ARE TOO EXPENSIVE ;____;" is complete and utter BULLSHIT. EA literally told their investors that removing microtransactions would have no material effect on the company. Like Jim Sterling said, if triple ayy publishers can't make back their money by just selling games, maybe they're in the wrong business?

ignoring the random attack, this isn't something anybody in this thread is really qualified to speak about, and the Ea thing is a completely irrelevant point, of course EA is going to reassure investors that they're going to keep making money, they wouldn't say "since we caved on microtransactions we're fucked lol"

[Incomptinence]

The fps games are among those breaking trust on their DLC with day 1 bullshit.

My first paradox game was CKII but I am much keener on stellaris.

I agree the old dlc model elevated to paradox near meme levels makes more money for them, gives incentives for continued support and breeds customer loyalty as the game builds layers like a cake.
Now they probably could start the cake with more layers but paradox shits out games slower than NEW WUN EVRY YEAR ERRY FRANCHISE!

[XSI]

Just keep in mind, the worst pay to get advantages stuff isn't even going to get effected by any of these regulations

Things like GTA 5 selling you 'become immune to other people while you can shoot them' vehicles for their online open world shit won't be gambling. Thats just a digital transaction of ~40bux (More if you want your immunity vehicle to do extra things like fly or have homing rockets)
But I'll take lootboxes and being able to pretend there's some form of balance over that sort of blatant pay to win shit

[Qbopper]

when the people of the nation they represent cannot help themselves in the face of ill action

But the people got rid of Battlefront 2s microtransactions all on their own by putting pressure on the company.

The people didn't get rid of Overwatch's limited edition summer olympics loot box skin problem

because people

1. didn't really care since it's all cosmetics
2. didn't have a reason to jump on the bandwagon - the most downvoted reddit post ever is a bit of an event, so people heard about it and memed about it and jumped on the pile

[cedarbridge]

where you either had to play the game for a long time (people have jobs) or play the slots for a cost to get what they wanted before the event was over.

How is this a problem again? Why are you starting this all from the point that you are entitled to new and event-based content? Where are you getting that because your time is tied up elsewhere you are then entitled to that content that you could not earn through play time in-game? Microtransactions in a majority of cases have always been a choice between time and money. You can dedicate a substantial amount of your time playing the game you claim to care about content for and be rewarded with content for the game you claim to care about or you can pay money to skip the time requirement and receive the content up front. I really hate using the word entitled but holy shit this while lootbox dustup is just exactly that with a capital E.

You paid up front for a product. You got the product you paid for. The fact that the developers then offer more content for that product at a later date and do not give all of it to you free of charge at release (or at all) does not entitle you to that content for free or at all. Unless you can point to somewhere in the license you signed with Blizzard/Valve/etc saying you are entitled to additional future contents free of charge, you are owed exactly nothing. You are free to purchase that content from them as they see fit to offer it to you. That's how business works. They offer a thing, you choose to buy it or don't.

[Incomptinence]

I'm probably more forgiving of stellaris cosmetic DLC because you basically see the shipset you bought all game the little dudes you devote time to managing are the portraits you bought, shows in diplomacy etc.

Also the random sandbox game sees to it that you have a chance of seeing any of them near your start or as a major nemesis latter on and so forth. Just adds more visual variety instead of requiring you to go to fight X historical dude same general region to see them every time.

Also the way the ship set works is pretty neat and I like sections.

Mainly going to buy the humanoid species pack for a new paradox shipset as modders tend to focus on SCIFI FRANCHIS ME LIKE.

[Saegrimr]

Let's really have a big, long think about this.

Will governments really care about the differences between gameplay-affecting lootboxes and cosmetic-only ones?

This is going to be the real kicker. Imagine that one guy that has to explain video games to the courts.
"Well you see, your honor. We hate this gambling because it gives them a better gun than me, but this other gambling is fine because them having fancy glowy wings doesn't make them shoot better."

[Takeguru]

I still don't see why we have to have lootboxes for cosmetics

Just have a list of shit to buy and a static price

I'll buy a 5 dollar skin over 5 1 dollar lootboxes that only have a chance of giving me said skin any day of the week

[Qbopper]

I still don't see why we have to have lootboxes for cosmetics

Just have a list of shit to buy and a static price

I'll buy a 5 dollar skin over 5 1 dollar lootboxes that only have a chance of giving me said skin any day of the week

because a whale can't buy a $5 skin 300 times

[cedarbridge]

I still don't see why we have to have lootboxes for cosmetics

Just have a list of shit to buy and a static price

I'll buy a 5 dollar skin over 5 1 dollar lootboxes that only have a chance of giving me said skin any day of the week

Its not a "have to have" issue. Lootboxes, for all of the "conditioning" voodoo that has been trotted out in this thread already, are something players generally like to open. Even if you get nothing good, the idea that you could is fun. That's why streamers often make a big deal out of the boxes they open. People get the same charge out of opening boxes as they do watching others open them. Its mysterious, its random, and its usually flashy. Its also good marketing because, as Qbopper mentioned, its technically limitless. If a player is motivated enough to buy 300+ of the things, that's more revenue for the project and more into the pockets of the publisher/dev. The skins are also generally locked behind a rarity tiering system so that when you do get that super shiny skin or other cosmetic you wanted, it took either extreme luck or a lot of investment to get it. Many systems OW, Battlerite, most card games, etc have means to get the specific item you want, but only through in-game grindable currencies. This is generally because 1) direct purchases are less lucrative for the seller 2) it nullifies the "rare item" aspect for players if anyone can just drop a fiver to get it 3) placing the boxes between the items as a form of abstraction just seems to feel less weird than "pay real money for this horse armor."

[bman]

just because lootboxes are going to exist doesn't mean that companies cant introduce new ways to earn money from "volunteers"