Good. Now let’s see what they manage to do about it.
Yay, more laws and governmental nannying!
You don’t even know what the odds of winning are…its scam bonanza. Be glad someone can be assed to protect you from yourself.
The more such laws the better, especially these days when traditional protections for consumers and workers have been systematically stripped away, benefitting no one but the ultrarich.
I dunno, the traditional protection against loot crates for me is not buying them. Anyway, isn’t going straight to ‘banning’ a bit harsh? How about licensing, or modifying the age rating?
Figured it was only a matter of time. I guess the Europeans are a little more strict when it comes to gambling, so I’m glad they don’t have any casinos or online gambling over there. /snark
More to the point, I think the issue is how it’s presented. I think an age restriction is exactly what they’re looking for.
Good on Belgium. The predatory behavior in video games has gone way over the line. Burn it down.
I bet the suits at every other publisher are pissed at EA right now. I’d pay at least two loot boxes’ worth to overhear those conversations.
Well, lootboxes are gambling, and so are CCG’s like Magic: The Gathering. There is a lot of gambling in gaming and it’s been that way for a long time now. Not sure if I’m against it or not, but I definitely think it’s pretty clearly gambling.
There might be an argument to allow adults to do this, but at least if it’s labeled gambling we have some way to keep minors out of it. I’m all for that.
Agreed. I dislike the idea of kids gambling.
It was inevitable that some country was going to do this. The technicality of a software loot box having no direct real world worth as a dodge for the legal definition of gambling was never going to fly forever. There’s too much money involved and kids are being targeted.
It just took a really well-known IP to tip the scales.
Yeah. I wonder if something as simple as parental controls on loot box purchases might be a good fix though.
Oh sure, it’s not a really big deal in itself, but in general this kind of thing is suitable for regulation. For example those ridiculous phone-game speedup items should have been illegal from the beginning because they not only exploit addictive tendencies but since they are implemented in simple childish games, they encourage children to spend money they’re not authorized to have.
Hopefully this leads the industry to self-regulate, as they did with the rating system.
Yeah, exactly. What should be done about it is an open question, but I don’t see any plausible argument that they aren’t gambling.
How about, yay for putting content back into the game the right way? As content. In the damn game.
There will always be people for whom anything short of Lord Of The Flies is too much regulation. Maybe the industry will start turning away from the shit shoveling they’ve been doing the last 5 years.