Lootboxes are sooo 2010s though. It‘s all about season passes and general FOMO. I doubt they will correctly identify and properly regulate „addictive features“ in a way that puts an end to that but I guess we‘ll see.
The companies doing them have a few hundred million reasons to skirt around the laws, so they will no doubt find a few ways. But that doesn’t mean we can’t make laws
my nephews are all about the limited edition skins
Season passes and FOMO aren’t gambling, you get what you buy and although I don’t like them they are not the issue.
Lootbox systems are designed to be addictive as it’s paying money to recieve a prize with very bad odds. Glad my country banned them a while ago.
The problem with a battle pass is that you pay for the chance to maybe get something.
If you can’t play or don’t pay well enough, it’s wasted money
With a loot box you get something right now. It might be shit but at least it’s on your account
I’m drawing the line at paying for a thing that might be good or bad, mechanics like that are addictive especially to children
I’m of the strong opinion that we control the media that we are exposed to and that the resolution for problematic or undesirable media is to simply turn it off.
However: advertising, LLM’s, social media, and the Internet have forced me to capitulate that certain forms of media constitute a legitimate memetic hazard, and are capable of fueling addiction, misinformation, and general misery on large enough scales. I hate this conclusion because while I still heavily err on the side of media liberty and self-control, I cannot square that value with the reality of poisonous, hostile mass media.
We should not be subjected to predatory practices to enjoy the products and services that we depend on, and the entertainment that is part of our shared experience and culture. Loot boxes, advertising, and financial scams are becoming nearly universal in popular gaming products, and even software in general. To me, this eventually constitutes a monopolistic behavior that becomes reasonably unavoidable and must be regulated.
To be fair, much of the memetic hazard posed by various technologies is not actually the fault of the technologies, but a fault of the person having no self-control, no accountability for their own actions, or having some form of undiagnosed medical issue they are unaware of.
Its like saying video games cause school shootings: the problem isnt the video games, its the person. The video games are an excuse to shift blame and accountability away from the person.
To learn why it matters Neuroexploitation by Design at 39c3 (with English dubbing) specifically 28min in.
YuGiHo, MTG, Pokemon cards, Labubu, etc basically
ANYTHING that comes
- sealed (as opposed to transparent packaging) and is
- collectible (limited supplied of some specific items)
physical or not is prone to betting and thus addiction. We tend to ignore the thing we care about, because we are passionate or come up with explanations (not to say excuses or post-rationalization) but in practice it doesn’t matter if your MTG deck is super “powerful” or that you see yourself as a great strategist, in fine if you do buy or promote those your are promoting gambling.
I see people cracking mtg packs on YouTube all the time, and pokemon ane Yu-Gi-Oh packs, heck i watched some people open the $100k mtg alpha box. 100% addictive. Heck back in the day they used to call it digital crack
You might enjoy Loot box content is associated with increased user engagement for YouTube gaming videos (2023) then.
😡
Do you mean like a physically opaque package or one where the exact contents are obscured by randomization? There are some card games that have no randomization whatsoever in their packaging, like Fantasy Flights LCGs.
Yeah in the boardgame community everyone know tcgs are predatory, at least there are usually communities for alternative formats.
Well I do mean physically opaque but true that implies, as few persons did comment regarding e.g. Poker, that the content itself or the rules do not change the distribution to introduce artificial scarcity.
The point is that purchasing a package in itself should not be a bet.
Thanks for clarifying! I agree!
“Study” meaning put it in committee so it can die in the web of bureaucracy
Ah yes, because the EU has never done anything before
