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Forums - Gaming Discussion - Hawaii takes a stand against loot-boxes

Go Hawaii go!



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Mr Puggsly said:
SuperNova said:

Do you think this is the government just randomly taking notice of lootboxes now by coincedence?

No, this is gamers calling on legislation as an instrument to defend against predatory business practices. It's part of the backlash and it's probably the only thing that is actually going to have a lasting effect.

Yes, EA removed the lootbox system from battlefront II FOR NOW. They've already said that it is temporary. And they didn't give a shit about gamer backlash until it reached Disney. If you don't think they have every intention to put the lootboxes back in just as predatory a fashion and as p2w as it already was, then you're naive. Between this and Activisions patent to encurage spending by breaking matchmaking and them putting the lootunboxing circle jerk into COD, these predatory tactics are spiraling out of control quickly.

Well people are idiots if they want government to step in. Government has a tendency to make things worse with over regulation.

Gamers should be critical of when these practices are abusive and simply not buy in. I know that's a crazy concept unless you have no faith in the average gamer.

Seeing that the average gamer spends most of their time on their smartphones, where they have been well aquainted with these systems for years, wich will make the reflexive trasition easier on console,  plus the historic evidence that the average gamer will put up with just about anything in the long run after a brief period of outcry by a few, no I do not have much faith in the average gamer.

If the average gamer was able to make smart buying decisions longterm, we would not have microtransactions in 60$ games as an expected fact of life. We would not have ever expanding retailer exclusive editions, gold, silver, platnium editions, season passes and pre-order bonuses announced before the actual game launches, day-one and on-disk 'DLC' and all of those other lovely tactics that publishers already employ to get their hands on more of the consumers money.

They work, they are successful and they did not hamper game sales in any significant way. Lootboxes will be no diffrent. If no one steps in, EA and Battlefront will suffer briefly, while Destiny 2, COD, Overwatch and all the others see healthy growth, with ever more exploitative strategies.

That's because the average gamer doesn't think about the fact that once upon a time cosmetics were in-game unlockables, that Fighting games used to come with big, healthy rosters out of the gate and that what used to be awesome expansions on games once upon a time, is today more often than not, a required buy to even get the complete base game.

So no it's not a crazy concept. It's just not a realistic longterm solution.



SuperNova said:
Mr Puggsly said:

Well people are idiots if they want government to step in. Government has a tendency to make things worse with over regulation.

Gamers should be critical of when these practices are abusive and simply not buy in. I know that's a crazy concept unless you have no faith in the average gamer.

Seeing that the average gamer spends most of their time on their smartphones, where they have been well aquainted with these systems for years, wich will make the reflexive trasition easier on console,  plus the historic evidence that the average gamer will put up with just about anything in the long run after a brief period of outcry by a few, no I do not have much faith in the average gamer.

If the average gamer was able to make smart buying decisions longterm, we would not have microtransactions in 60$ games as an expected fact of life. We would not have ever expanding retailer exclusive editions, gold, silver, platnium editions, season passes and pre-order bonuses announced before the actual game launches, day-one and on-disk 'DLC' and all of those other lovely tactics that publishers already employ to get their hands on more of the consumers money.

They work, they are successful and they did not hamper game sales in any significant way. Lootboxes will be no diffrent. If no one steps in, EA and Battlefront will suffer briefly, while Destiny 2, COD, Overwatch and all the others see healthy growth, with ever more exploitative strategies.

That's because the average gamer doesn't think about the fact that once upon a time cosmetics were in-game unlockables, that Fighting games used to come with big, healthy rosters out of the gate and that what used to be awesome expansions on games once upon a time, is today more often than not, a required buy to even get the complete base game.

So no it's not a crazy concept. It's just not a realistic longterm solution.

Youre assuming the average gamer is buying alot of micro transaction content and thats not reality. Im lead to believe the average user buys none. Probably why mobile gaming is relatively unpredicable market.

Selling cosmetics is arguably better than selling content that divides the audience like map packs. This is why Im happy Halo 5 went a similar route. Its not an inhetently bad system.

Your once upon a time is an era where games often had smaller budgets and frankly games havent gone up in price. My only concern really is are we getting games worth their value at retail price alone? Thats for consumers to research and decide. Critics help people as well.

Hence, consumers should and have wised up.



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People do love their regulations, don't they?



Pemalite said:

Complained about loot boxes years ago in Mass Effect 3.
Complained about them again in Overwatch last year. (Especially due to the fact it was very light on content, heck it still is.)
And complained about them again this year in Battlefront 2.

It's nice seeing some of the people who were supporting such schemes changing tact, the industry, consumers, news outlets and so on are sick of it.
And that's a good thing.

Personally... I would like to see a return of the expansion pack... They were great. They gave you almost an entire new games worth of content for a good price. (That was lower than the base game.)

Preach. The expansion pack is the way to go. If a game is popular and/or if its developers left unfinished ideas on the cutting room floor, then the game gets a standalone expansion. That's how it should work.

Games, ideally, wouldn't arrive unfinished, or with season pass content created months before launch. And they certainly wouldn't be burdened with microtransactions, loot boxes, and other DLC options offered a la carte. 



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StokedUp said:
So much talk about loot boxes. Could somebody explain to me just what a loot box is!?!?

 

 

 

 

 

That should answer your question satisfactorily.



Hunting Season is done...

Sometimes the government needs to step in and regulate, and this definitely looks like one of them. One might say they should stay out of game design, but paying to randomly improve your game stats doesn't seem like something we should bother defending, especially when it blatantly targets those with addictive personalities



I think in the future, any type of game to contain a loot box may just get an M rating.



 

 

StarOcean said:
Man, I hope this causes EA to lose their Star Wars license. The talentless bastards at Dice never should have had their hands on the IP to begin with

Don't blame DICE, blame EA. Dice isn't talentless, they have quite a few great games under their belt (battlefield bad company 1&2, mirrors edge, battlefield 1).

Star Wars Battlefront 2 is honestly a great looking game, and you can clearly tell they put their heart and soul into this. It's the publisher's interference that's totally sours the experience.



Bet with Intrinsic:

The Switch will outsell 3DS (based on VGchartz numbers), according to me, while Intrinsic thinks the opposite will hold true. One month avatar control for the loser's avatar.

TallSilhouette said:
I'm glad this is getting attention stateside now, too. I was worried this would only get official attention overseas and the American establishments would ignore it for as long as possible. The sooner we can get something done about it, the better.

Loot boxes suck.  But, the way to get rid of them is to not purchase them.  They will absolutely go away if people don't buy them.  

Getting government involved is exactly the wrong way to go about it.  We damn sure do not want government saying what can and cannot happen in games.