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Feels like the Magic: the Gathering community should be apprehensive and wondering when their randomized loot packs are going to be put behind the glass next to

Feels like the Magic: the Gathering community should be apprehensive and wondering when their randomized loot packs are going to be put behind the glass next to the Marlboros. I'm strongly against this. Not because I like loot boxes (I really hate them and choose not to play games with them), but because I believe it is fundamentally the responsibility of a child's guardian to teach good habits and redirect compulsive behaviors. After all, the credit card is certainly not in the kid's name, so someone is fueling the addiction. That's even before we get into what constitutes "a game targeting children" (which I don't think you can honestly define in good faith) and what "randomized paid content" means (DLC with a boss that has a random loot table?). I mean, it's just ridiculously broad: > permits a user to continue to access content of the game that had previously been accessible to the user but has been made inaccessible after the expiration of a timer or a number of gameplay attempts. So, we're making arcades 18+?

paulddraper 7y ago
> After all, the credit card is certainly not in the kid's name This makes a lot of sense to me.
zajd 7y ago
Oh come on this is all gambling by another name. We know it's addictive. Not only that, it makes games worse. A game targeting children is one that doesn't have a M rating. The idea that we as a society are too incompetent to tell the difference between lootboxes as they exist in something like Dota2, Rocket League, etc and "random loot tables" is absurd on its face. These systems are designed to be predatory and entice people to spend more and more money chasing certain items with low drop rates. It has no place in games at all, much less those targeting towards children.
im3w1l 7y ago
> After all, the credit card is certainly not in the kid's name, so someone is fueling the addiction. As a not-parent how do kids' economy look like in 2019? Do they get their allowance in cash? Do they have debit card? Credit card?
- dorchadas 7y ago
  I teach teenagers, and a lot of them have their own debit card... Even if they don't have a job. I'm not sure if it's their own account the parents deposit into, or if they're on their parents account, but quite a few do have one.
skybrian 7y ago
There is precedent. They don't let kids use slot machines, even with parental supervision. There's nothing stopping them from gambling on their own using a deck of cards, though. If kid-created games saw a comeback, maybe that's not so bad?
- Barrin92 7y ago
  >There is precedent. They don't let kids use slot machines, even with parental supervision. Exactly. Lootbox mechanisms are gambling gamified for kids, which makes it even more peverted than actual gambling. Which can lead to pathological behaviour and addiction. This is no small matter. Companies who built business models on abusing the psychology of adolescents should be held accountable.

paulddraper 7y ago

> After all, the credit card is certainly not in the kid's name This makes a lot of sense to me.

zajd 7y ago

Oh come on this is all gambling by another name. We know it's addictive. Not only that, it makes games worse. A game targeting children is one that doesn't have a M rating. The idea that we as a society are too incompetent to tell the difference between lootboxes as they exist in something like Dota2, Rocket League, etc and "random loot tables" is absurd on its face. These systems are designed to be predatory and entice people to spend more and more money chasing certain items with low drop rates. It has no place in games at all, much less those targeting towards children.

im3w1l 7y ago

> After all, the credit card is certainly not in the kid's name, so someone is fueling the addiction. As a not-parent how do kids' economy look like in 2019? Do they get their allowance in cash? Do they have debit card? Credit card?

dorchadas 7y ago
I teach teenagers, and a lot of them have their own debit card... Even if they don't have a job. I'm not sure if it's their own account the parents deposit into, or if they're on their parents account, but quite a few do have one.

skybrian 7y ago

There is precedent. They don't let kids use slot machines, even with parental supervision. There's nothing stopping them from gambling on their own using a deck of cards, though. If kid-created games saw a comeback, maybe that's not so bad?

Barrin92 7y ago
>There is precedent. They don't let kids use slot machines, even with parental supervision. Exactly. Lootbox mechanisms are gambling gamified for kids, which makes it even more peverted than actual gambling. Which can lead to pathological behaviour and addiction. This is no small matter. Companies who built business models on abusing the psychology of adolescents should be held accountable.