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Today, in an effort to ban practices that Senator Josh Hawley describes as “monetizing addiction”, the Senator announced that he will introduce a bill proposing to “apply new consumer protections to games played by minors.” In a press release you can find directly on Hawley’s site, which you can read here, Hawley writes that the bill would ban two of the most prominent types of in-game microtransactions, “pay-to-win” and the infamous “Loot Box”. The bill itself is rather broad and doesn’t give anymore specifics than the intent to ban developers from targeting minors with microtransactions, and that it’ll use existing checks in place to decide what games are targeting minors. Except as what anyone who has ever played video games as a minor knows, just because a game is rated M, doesn’t mean you aren’t going to play it. While I doubt the bill will get far and I personally don’t think loot boxes inherently bad, I welcome the new legislation, seeing as how some developers take microtransactions too far. Especially when it comes to children’s games. At least adults have the wherewithal and the knowledge to know they’re being psychologically manipulated for money, but targeting children is, as Hawley put it, “predatory”. That being said, what should be even more interesting than the bill are the implications it will have for other types of monetization models, specifically when it comes to gatcha games. Depending on implementation, loot boxes can be a cash grab, but when done with the right formula, i.e, Blizzard’s loot box formula for Overwatch, they can be a fun way to keep players engaged in the game’s award system, without putting too much pressure on players to spend more money. Gacha games on the other hand, are probably the closest thing to gambling that gaming has to offer. For the uninitiated, gacha games follow a formula where players are offered tickets of some sort which can then be spent in game on a random prize, be it characters, trophies, cards, or whichever gimmick the game is based off. Essentially they are a glorified loot box, except that gameplay is heavily dependent on drawing from the gathcha “slot machine”. My reason for bringing this up is that I love gacha games, and if loot boxes are in the crosshairs, it’s only a matter of time before they train their sights on my beloved Fire Emblem: Heroes.
I intend to do a full blown analysis on the laws surrounding this situation and all their implications in the future, but until then, I need to go back to trying to complete my +10 Tiki merge.
Or you know what… Maybe I do have a problem…
