4 ms·

> "Dan Hewitt, Vice President of Media Relations for the Entertainment Software Association, has argued that “loot boxes are not gambling because they provide s

> "Dan Hewitt, Vice President of Media Relations for the Entertainment Software Association, has argued that “loot boxes are not gambling because they provide something to use in the game. They offer an alternate experience and players are not required to buy them . . . .”" This is like the Tobacco companies hiring a media company saying smoking is good for you. I've yet to hear a good argument from a truly independent party that says "no, it's not gambling". Because really, loot boxes are gambling.

Verdex 7y ago
I think what's happening is that they found out that instead of making real compelling content, they would just get their customers addicted to gambling. So they got used to a higher revenue stream that also allowed them to fire all of their highly skilled content creators. It's kind of like if a drug company discovered they could get a lot of money by selling heroin and then they fired all of their chemists who were busy trying to create drugs that would actually be helpful to society. Now that they're being called out on it, they're scrambling to try and find a way to avoid having to go back to working for a living. A responsible adult would say something like, "You know, we thought that we were simply giving the market what it wanted, but really it does look a lot like gambling when you think about it. We're taking it all out." And if they wanted to turn those lemons into lemonade, "Oh, by the way, we're releasing half life 3 and portal 3. It's the same game. Oh and we're releasing a Cave Johnson miniseries. J. K. Simmons is reprising his role." Yeah, that sounds like a lot of work. But it also sounds like it's providing real entertainment value to society instead of selling electronic heroin to kids.
- twic 7y ago
  Cave Johnson vs Saxton Hale ... AT THE EARTH'S CORE!! It could just be rebadged Factorio PvP. Come on Valve, this is a hojillion-dollar idea!
- d4mi3n 7y ago
  100% agree with you, though I'm skeptical that we'd see an improvement in quality of content if loot boxes and their like become untenable. Aside from getting people hooked, loot boxes tend to feed into a larger aspect of a kind of collection game. I don't see that stopping, and it'll likely continue to be a cheap way to keep people engaged in whatever platform is available. Instead of a loot box, I'd expect to see more stuff like EA's Apex Battlepass or Blizzard's War Chest in Starcraft 2. PS: I would happily throw money at any reasonable attempt to expand on Half-Life or Portal. C'mon Valve!
  - baud147258 7y ago
    At least for Portal, there are user-created levels. I had played a few, some were really good.
  - Verdex 7y ago
    > though I'm skeptical that we'd see an improvement in quality of content if loot boxes and their like become untenable. Yeah, I agree. Once you get used to the easy and cheap workflow of creating the loot boxes it's going to be a hard sell to go back to paying premium talent to create engaging an original content that takes longer to produce and has a lower chance of appealing to arbitrary markets. Of course in the non-video game world there are companies that create sodas and cigarettes and slot machines. And there are companies that create high quality food, cancer battling drugs, and entertainment that stays relevant for centuries. I think with a little regulation we'll get the same sorts of divisions in the video game industry.
    - uxp 7y ago
      A coworker and I went to lunch randomly a number of months back and I discovered that he and his wife are avid WoW players on the server that I played on nearly 10 years ago. This sparked me to impulsively purchase 30 days of game time on my character, which was surprisingly still available on my Battle.NET account. I happily dinked around for a bit, leveled up my character from 70 to 90, and discovered the VAST amount of collectables that are present these days, which was quite shocking. When I stopped playing WoW, players could collect pets by redeeming tokens/codes from blizzcon or other real world fan or collector activities, but today there is an entire mini-game surrounding battle-pets which can be collected in-game and also purchased via earned gold or simply cash. Additionally, Raid or PvP gear sets can be supplemented with purchased "cosmetics" and "heirlooms" which again can be purchased through earned gold or through the store with cash. It seems like every side-game activity has some kind of purchase available to "speed up" the time it takes to "earn" the appropriate currency required to redeem the reward. I've been out of the gaming loop for far too long to really see how bad it's become, but it was absolutely shocking to see it.
  - abrugsch 7y ago
kgwxd 7y ago
I wonder what the effect would be on people if you take away all the fancy animations, lights and sounds when opening a loot box (take away the imaginary box too) and replaced it with click "open", get "name of item" (no picture). It'd be less entertaining than rolling a pair of dice and would draw attention to what's really happening, flipping a bit with extra steps.
- ZeroGravitas 7y ago
  Here's some research that suggests sounds are important for slot machine gambling: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4225056/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4225056/ Made me wonder what the physical machine equivalent of your idea would be.
fredsanford 7y ago
I hate lootboxes but I'm on the fence about making regulations around random prizes. Are Happy Meals gambling? Crackerjacks? Baseball cards? You receive 1 out of n items, most undesirable but a few rare things that kids want. In hindsight, I liked the way Everquest 1 did their loot. The jackpot almost always included something highly desirable to someone that had not farmed the encounter. Especially in contrast to some games that give all shit except you have a 0.02% chance of getting the good stuff.

Verdex 7y ago

I think what's happening is that they found out that instead of making real compelling content, they would just get their customers addicted to gambling. So they got used to a higher revenue stream that also allowed them to fire all of their highly skilled content creators. It's kind of like if a drug company discovered they could get a lot of money by selling heroin and then they fired all of their chemists who were busy trying to create drugs that would actually be helpful to society. Now that they're being called out on it, they're scrambling to try and find a way to avoid having to go back to working for a living. A responsible adult would say something like, "You know, we thought that we were simply giving the market what it wanted, but really it does look a lot like gambling when you think about it. We're taking it all out." And if they wanted to turn those lemons into lemonade, "Oh, by the way, we're releasing half life 3 and portal 3. It's the same game. Oh and we're releasing a Cave Johnson miniseries. J. K. Simmons is reprising his role." Yeah, that sounds like a lot of work. But it also sounds like it's providing real entertainment value to society instead of selling electronic heroin to kids.

twic 7y ago
Cave Johnson vs Saxton Hale ... AT THE EARTH'S CORE!! It could just be rebadged Factorio PvP. Come on Valve, this is a hojillion-dollar idea!
d4mi3n 7y ago
100% agree with you, though I'm skeptical that we'd see an improvement in quality of content if loot boxes and their like become untenable. Aside from getting people hooked, loot boxes tend to feed into a larger aspect of a kind of collection game. I don't see that stopping, and it'll likely continue to be a cheap way to keep people engaged in whatever platform is available. Instead of a loot box, I'd expect to see more stuff like EA's Apex Battlepass or Blizzard's War Chest in Starcraft 2. PS: I would happily throw money at any reasonable attempt to expand on Half-Life or Portal. C'mon Valve!
- baud147258 7y ago
  At least for Portal, there are user-created levels. I had played a few, some were really good.
- Verdex 7y ago
  > though I'm skeptical that we'd see an improvement in quality of content if loot boxes and their like become untenable. Yeah, I agree. Once you get used to the easy and cheap workflow of creating the loot boxes it's going to be a hard sell to go back to paying premium talent to create engaging an original content that takes longer to produce and has a lower chance of appealing to arbitrary markets. Of course in the non-video game world there are companies that create sodas and cigarettes and slot machines. And there are companies that create high quality food, cancer battling drugs, and entertainment that stays relevant for centuries. I think with a little regulation we'll get the same sorts of divisions in the video game industry.
  - uxp 7y ago
    A coworker and I went to lunch randomly a number of months back and I discovered that he and his wife are avid WoW players on the server that I played on nearly 10 years ago. This sparked me to impulsively purchase 30 days of game time on my character, which was surprisingly still available on my Battle.NET account. I happily dinked around for a bit, leveled up my character from 70 to 90, and discovered the VAST amount of collectables that are present these days, which was quite shocking. When I stopped playing WoW, players could collect pets by redeeming tokens/codes from blizzcon or other real world fan or collector activities, but today there is an entire mini-game surrounding battle-pets which can be collected in-game and also purchased via earned gold or simply cash. Additionally, Raid or PvP gear sets can be supplemented with purchased "cosmetics" and "heirlooms" which again can be purchased through earned gold or through the store with cash. It seems like every side-game activity has some kind of purchase available to "speed up" the time it takes to "earn" the appropriate currency required to redeem the reward. I've been out of the gaming loop for far too long to really see how bad it's become, but it was absolutely shocking to see it.
- abrugsch 7y ago

kgwxd 7y ago

I wonder what the effect would be on people if you take away all the fancy animations, lights and sounds when opening a loot box (take away the imaginary box too) and replaced it with click "open", get "name of item" (no picture). It'd be less entertaining than rolling a pair of dice and would draw attention to what's really happening, flipping a bit with extra steps.

ZeroGravitas 7y ago
Here's some research that suggests sounds are important for slot machine gambling: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4225056/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4225056/ Made me wonder what the physical machine equivalent of your idea would be.

fredsanford 7y ago

I hate lootboxes but I'm on the fence about making regulations around random prizes. Are Happy Meals gambling? Crackerjacks? Baseball cards? You receive 1 out of n items, most undesirable but a few rare things that kids want. In hindsight, I liked the way Everquest 1 did their loot. The jackpot almost always included something highly desirable to someone that had not farmed the encounter. Especially in contrast to some games that give all shit except you have a 0.02% chance of getting the good stuff.