Gambling and the rise of micro transaction games

[ZennyPLUS]

Some of you, maybe not all, know that free to play games are on the rise. It's becoming more popular and it's a better business model in these economic times for game companies. Spiral Knights and World of Warcraft are two major examples of free to play. Oh, and let's not forget Team Fortress 2. I was browsing the Spiral Knights forums and the topic tends to pop up lately with the advent of their accessory items. Like TF2's crates, you randomly find luckboxes which need to be opened with a key. Of course, the key needs to bought two ways: you can either pay $2.49 USD or trade the in-game currency of 750 Crystal Energy (CE). Keep in mind there is no way to get CE without actually paying cash OR trading the game's second common currency (that's dropped in levels played) called Crowns (CN). The current exchange rate is 6500 cn for 100 ce.

ANYWAY. Exchange rates aside, you need keys to open these boxes. The items are very random and the rate at which you get the items isn't known to anyone, Three Rings hasn't indulged about such information. Here's a highly sought after item:



http://forums.spiralknights.com/en/node/33454

OP of this thread bought just over 100 of those keys and didn't even get one of these halos. Now I understand that there is a chance algorithm created to make items appear more/less than others, but considering how many accessories are in the game so far and how many keys he got, it would have seemed likely. I guess he was just unlucky? Oh, and here's an interesting article about Nexon considering their business practice as gambling:

http://massively.joystiq.com/2011/09/22/nexon-ncsoft-refuse-to-fully-cooperate-with-south-korean-mmo-ga/



Here's more food for thought; Spiral Knights is available to minors. The minimum age to play this game is 13 years of age, far below the age for gambling in the United States (which is anywhere from 18 - 21 yrs, depending upon which state you are in). Any many of the players are indeed below 18.

TL;DR version: Do you think the rise of this form of business in gaming is bad? Is this a predatory tactic? Should it be available to people who don't understand gambling addiction, i.e. people who are below the state regulations on gambling.

Discuss.

[psi43]

as long as the free-to-play content is worth playing the game for, i don't see much of a problem.

A problem comes up for me, when people who pay for the game have definitive advantages in-game. A good example would be nexon's game that is somewhat like worms armageddon (very fun game btw). People who paid for stuff didn't only pay for cool custom skins, they also received weapons that made it extremely hard for non-paying players to compete, which is why i quit very early on.

but of course that's their strategy here, and yeah, it is very addicting but in most cases i wouldn't describe it as gambling. The one case you described, sure, but i think that's an exception. Usually you pay for in-game currency which you use to buy specific items.

I hope that this trend doesn't stay for too long though.

also since when was WoW f2p?

[cipher]

I honestly don't really think it should be compared to gambling, it's vastly different in concept and can't ruin people like gambling can (well I would assume). And when it cames to minors (I'm talking much younger here, probably 13 or 14 and below), parents can just stop them from buying or even playing the game in general. By the time you're paying for this kind of thing with your own money you should understand what you are doing and any potential consequences (if any, and keep in mind these games are free to play, so thats already $20-60 you HAVEN'T paid).

And while I hate micro transactions, game devs seem to really like it, since it can give their sub-par games a fighting chance. And it works too, depressingly. Not all F2P games are bad, but I can only think of like, one or two outside of TF2 that could justify an actual purchase. Even Spiral Knights is just a complete rip off of an older game (not to say that most games aren't though).

Also World of Warcraft is not free to play and the only micro transactions they have are things like changing your character name, server, etc (also they charge like $10 minimum for each). They have some promotional thing now where you can play until like level 15 or 20 for free, but I don't think that takes very long to reach.


yeh

[naturally]

A problem comes up for me, when people who pay for the game have definitive advantages in-game. A good example would be nexon's game that is somewhat like worms armageddon (very fun game btw). People who paid for stuff didn't only pay for cool custom skins, they also received weapons that made it extremely hard for non-paying players to compete, which is why i quit very early on.

i assume you're talking about gunbound which is actually made by softnyx. nexon doesn't have any games like that.

also since when was WoW f2p?

it's been f2p up to level 20 for a bit now. there's no in-game shop though as far as i know, though.

I honestly don't really think it should be compared to gambling, it's vastly different in concept and can't ruin people like gambling can (well I would assume). And when it cames to minors (I'm talking much younger here, probably 13 or 14 and below), parents can just stop them from buying or even playing the game in general. By the time you're paying for this kind of thing with your own money you should understand what you are doing and any potential consequences (if any, and keep in mind these games are free to play, so thats already $20-60 you HAVEN'T paid).

being someone who has played f2p games since i was a kid, in my experience it really isn't that different from gambling. though i wouldn't say they're the same thing either. i've seen people waste ridiculous amounts of money on things like gachapon. almost every f2p game has a gachapon like system, and the only reason i use gachapon as an example is because it's the one i'm most familar with.

if you don't know what a gachapon machine is it's basically a machine where you put in a coin and a toy comes out. this can either be a great toy or a terrible toy that you wasted you money on. in f2p games you will usually receive the latter. in maplestory, the f2p mmo i have played a huge amount, they had this exact system and you had to buy gachapon tickets from the cash shop (with  real cash) so you could try your luck at the machine. it is probably the biggest money maker for that game because people will throw away a lot of cash just because the idea of getting a fantastic item really appeals to them, just as winning a lot of money at a casino is an appealing aspect. they even have frequent gachapon events where they will throw in a incredibly rare and valuable item into the bunch and say "for a limited time you might be able to get this item! oh yeah and we probably won't ever let you get this item ever again so good luck!"

they have crates and keys in tf2 and spiral knights, however there is an alternative for these games, meaning it is theoretically possible to buy these keys with in game currency. however, in games like maplestory this is not an option and players are required to buy these tickets if they want to try their hand at winning a virtual lottery.

given that i have never gambled or bought more than a few of these things i don't know how well my statement holds up but this is pretty much how i see it. i have wasted way too much money on games like this to ever want to spend money in a f2p game again.


edit: here's a thing fox did on maplestory awhile back that i still find kind of funny

Maple Story on Fox

[rtil]

there is already therapy specific to gaming addiction issues, i know i have had friends who have been treated for it. i think the microtransaction addiction is just something to tack on to the whole thing, and could even be treated separately as a gambling addiction. but there have always been people who spend their money unwisely. the guy who bought 100 keys is an idiot - if he should be mad at anyone, it should be himself. what we're looking at is people paying out cash for a few polygons with particle effects on them. this is possibly one of the most meaningless things you could ever hope to spend your money on.

it's a brilliant business tactic. i imagine successful game models that do it make more money than they ever would selling copies of the game with no in-game market. imagine one person spends $1,000 on items (has happened in tf2 many times, some of us even know someone who did it ). and let's say the game's hypothetical retail value is $15. that person just bought 66 copies of the game for items, and he'll probably buy even more later.

at the very least, i think if a game is going to have an item system that involves real money, it should be laid out very clearly how the item system works and what you're putting your money into so you know how badly you're being ripped off. after that, you really can blame no one but the consumer for their choice if they feel like they got shafted by a random number generator.

[Sef]

I like the dinosaur comic

[BluPhoenix]

edit: here's a thing fox did on maplestory awhile back that i still find kind of funny

Maple Story on Fox

what is magic doing on my christian news network

[ZennyPLUS]

at the very least, i think if a game is going to have an item system that involves real money, it should be laid out very clearly how the item system works and what you're putting your money into so you know how badly you're being ripped off. after that, you really can blame no one but the consumer for their choice if they feel like they got shafted by a random number generator.

I know some states (don't know which ones) require casinos to tell their customers the approximate chance of winning. And that's state law. So besides losing some money, let's look at the bigger picture. Is it ethical to be praying on the naive minds of young people? I'm not European, but I know some of the European states don't allow advertising towards children of a certain age.

[naturally]

it doesn't really matter whether it's ethical or not. as long as they make money off of it and they're able to get away with it they have no reason change what they're doing. i'm sure those casinos wouldn't tell their customers if they weren't required by law.

[ZennyPLUS]

it doesn't really matter whether it's ethical or not. as long as they make money off of it and they're able to get away with it they have no reason change what they're doing. i'm sure those casinos wouldn't tell their customers if they weren't required by law.

So you're saying it's ok for a company like Three Rings to put a structure into their game that deliberately relies upon the naiveness of young people and take advantage of the fact that they don't know any better why reaping the benefits of gaming addiction with a said mixture of gambling, which otherwise is illegal for minors except on the internet? I just want to clarify that. I know personal responsibility is on the side of these young people and their parents, but I feel otherwise.

I'm not saying I entirely agree with or against, I'm just playing the devil's advocate.

[rtil]

kids usually don't have access to digital transactions and money unless their parents let them use their credit cards, and i hope that they don't

[cipher]

So you're saying it's ok for a company like Three Rings to put a structure into their game that deliberately relies upon the naiveness of young people and take advantage of the fact that they don't know any better why reaping the benefits of gaming addiction with a said mixture of gambling, which otherwise is illegal for minors except on the internet?

Well, yes. And by that logic you could blame fast food companies for giving away appealing toys that cause kids to beg their parents to buy from there, or even those toy machine things you mentioned in the above post. I think what these [game] companies are doing is completely justifiable, yet terrible, and there is nothing that can be done about it.

Also as I said earlier, and rtil kind of highlighted, kids shouldn't have access to credit cards to buy these things. If they do, the blame should go to the parents. And like I said earlier, by the time you're old enough to buy these things yourself, you should understand what you are doing (and if you don't you're an idiot). I'd say more, but I gotta go for now.

[Sinitron]

eve online, some russian aluminium tycoon or w/e bought himself an army and outfitted it for several hundred thousand dollars of real-world currency

it seems like a fortune to an outsider but considering how many more billions he would have pooled up anyway it's really just chump change for him

he also crashed the shit out of the in-game gametime trade system which pretty much fucked everyone trying to get in-game currency for money (lol)

league of legends gives everyone access to everything but cosmetics for free provided you take the time to grind up the points you need to unlock stuff

the alternative is to simply shell out there and then and buy stuff from the store if you're impatient, but you don't strictly gain any advantages really

diablo 3 is implementing a market place where people who farm rare items or w/e can sell it for MOOLAH, probably with blizzard taking a cut too

spiral knights is a pretty shitty game anyway, it wasn't the first to do it and it most certainly won't be the last

if you're pissed that you're a minor gambling online, fuck you

[naturally]

it doesn't really matter whether it's ethical or not. as long as they make money off of it and they're able to get away with it they have no reason change what they're doing. i'm sure those casinos wouldn't tell their customers if they weren't required by law.

So you're saying it's ok for a company like Three Rings to put a structure into their game that deliberately relies upon the naiveness of young people and take advantage of the fact that they don't know any better why reaping the benefits of gaming addiction with a said mixture of gambling, which otherwise is illegal for minors except on the internet? I just want to clarify that. I know personal responsibility is on the side of these young people and their parents, but I feel otherwise.

I'm not saying I entirely agree with or against, I'm just playing the devil's advocate.

i'm not saying what they're doing is morally acceptable, i'm saying that these companies don't really care. if i was giving my personal opinion on what is right and wrong that would be different. but, to be honest, i don't have a huge amount of sympathy for people who go overboard with these things. i do understand that a child with a credit card is probably not a pretty sight when it comes to this but like rtil said and cipher pointed out as well, parents should be responsible enough to limit that kind of thing. my mom would let me buy stuff before because she trusted me. besides the fact that i never even thought about charging her credit card without asking her, i knew that if i did it would just mean i would never be allowed to use it again.

cipher pretty much said what i wanted to anyway.

[psi43]

http://kotaku.com/5859963/an-entire-mmo-was-accidentally-erased-from-the-internet

^somewhat related

"The thing that has people crying fowl is that it was a micro-transaction game and players invested money and time into the game that suddenly no longer exists and as far as some players are saying they can't get the money back.

If it's a scam, then that's a pretty high tech and well executed plan because there is the potential for a lot of money. If it's legit and a mistake then the company will probably release a statement later on about what will happen to those who spent out money and if they actually can get it back."

[rtil]

well that's another thing to consider with any mmo - someday the game will be gone, and everything you worked for in it will no longer exist, regardless of how much time you spent creating it.

[Gladius]

the same applies to everything

[rtil]

no it doesn't. at least not yet. there are many human creations, whether they be tangible or intangible, that have survived throughout a significant portion of our species' existence. and now the intangible is almost impossible to destroy through the advent of digital information storage.