Microtransactions: the Future of Games? (LootBoxes and Gambling)

Of the few I've seen, a significant reason I would never invest in them is it's something like a buck for a 0.001 % chance of getting anything. That's asking me to throw money away. If there are collectibles and instead of having to spend >$100 to finally get one, it was a guaranteed $1 to get one, the value proposition is completely different and in the realms of shopping for really cheap items rather than gambling against ridiculous odds. I've been okay buying Pokémon cards, for example, especially early on to fill up your roster where most cards are something new or usable. But the offerings from these games are utter, utter shite and anyone with half a brain is going to avoid them because there are virtually zero value.

But that's you. Are you and people like you sufficiently large to offset the obvious losses to the publisher if the odds were improved in the way you suggest? That is entirely how these things are calculated. :yep2:
 
Last edited by a moderator:
So more discoveries of hidden/unspecified game currency caps in Destiny 2 on Reddit: Reddit - Glimmer Cap in Destiny 2


I don't know if this is news to anyone but I did three tests to confirm it in the EDZ where Devrim is, and one on Titan. There are tons of enemies to kill when the fallen and cabal "move against each other" so it was rather easy. Once you gain a certain amount of glimmer (400ish?), the currency stops coming until you refrain from killing anything for a while. If you take a break for a moment, the next glimmer cap is even smaller (mine stopped at 200 after a 20 second rest).

In one particular instance, after I stopped gaining glimmer, I must have killed at least 60 enemies who didn't drop any glimmer at all. I was at 6000 glimmer, gained about 280 before the glimmer stopped, and then proceeded to kill enemies for several minutes after that. When I finally stopped and checked my inventory, I was at 6280 glimmer.

This may be old news I was unaware of. Either way, it seems like a pointless farming cap that would be near impossible to exploit and has to go. It makes me wonder how much glimmer I've lost out on in strikes and raids where the enemies come constantly and in great numbers.


 
I believe it's used as yet another in-game currency for various items such as Sparrows, Equipment (weapons, armor), Treasure Maps and Scouting Reports, but it is also used to apply 1 time use skin customizations for character customization. There is a max of having 100,000 Glimmer at any one time, but this cap is more about limiting how quickly you can collect it.

This rate limiter cap is there to artificially extend the time a person plays the game or to push them to spend real money instead.
 
It's relevant damnit! Just wanted an excuse to post it.

1514391066-20171227.png
 
This rate limiter cap is there to artificially extend the time a person plays the game or to push them to spend real money instead.
Jesus, bungie must be real gluttons for self-punishment, the way they keep on ending up with egg on their faces time and time again. When will these stupid motherfuckers finally realize they can't outsmart their own players with these hidden caps and similar bullshit?!

SO GLAD I never fell for the temptation to buy Destiny 2. These people can all go fuck themselves.
 
Jesus, bungie must be real gluttons for self-punishment, the way they keep on ending up with egg on their faces time and time again.
Bungie or Activision? DICE or EA?

I'm betting I know where the push for MT is coming from. Worringly, we recently had the CEO of Take-Two (who own Rockstar Games) talking up microtransactions - or "recurrent monetization" as they prefer it. If they keep MT out of single player story mode I'll let this slide but it must be shitty for online gamers and it's at times like this I'm glad I'm not into multiplayer more than ever.
 
Interview by Amy Hennig’s (UC1-3) with Sean Vanaman of Firewatch
https://www.polygon.com/2018/1/12/16880484/amy-hennig-sean-vanaman-interview-year-in-review

Some insight into rising development costs. $60 dollar price point being held. And less purchasers.

A lot of stuff in the link, I will only quote 1 piece:
I think we’re in an inflection point right now. Obviously what happened with our Star Wars project didn’t come out of the blue. A lot of too-dramatic articles were written about it — the death of linear story games and all that kind of stuff — but look, there is a real problem: this line we’ve been running up to for a lot of years, which is the rising cost of development, and the desires, or the demands even, of players in terms of hours of gameplay, fidelity, production values, additional modes, all these things. Those pressures end up very real internally. If it costs you, say, $100 million or more to make a game, how are you making that money back, and making a profit?

And the $60 price point can’t change, right? There’s a lot of negative press around monetization, loot boxes, games as a service, etc., but these things are trending now in the industry, especially for larger publishers, as an answer to the problem of rising development costs. Budgets keep going up, the bar keeps getting raised, and it starts making less and less sense to make these games.

There is also this trend now that, as much as people protest and say, “Why are you canceling a linear, story-based game? This is the kind of game we want,” people aren’t necessarily buying them. They’re watching somebody else play them online.

edit 2 pieces :)
Amy Hennig: I was thinking about this while playing Hellblade, which is amazing and beautiful. And then I thought, “Well, wait a second. They only have to make one character, and we had to do like 20 of those at the same level of fidelity, with as many as 10 of them on screen at a time, running in frame rate.” You spend so much of your time just trying to fight the technology as opposed to solving your core design problems, in other words, figuring out what it is you’re trying to make.

3:
If you look at my contemporaries, a lot of people have started smaller studios. They’re not doing the triple-A thing anymore. And like we said earlier, I think we’re at an inflection point where the types of games that we’re making are going to change, just because of what’s supportable.
 
Last edited:
Iwiński from CD Projekt Red has been interviewed and sums it up as:
"The moment they feel you are reaching out for their wallet in any unfair way, they will be vocal about it. And—frankly speaking—I think it's good for the industry," Iwiński adds. "Things often look great from a spreadsheet perspective, but decision makers often aren’t asking themselves the question of 'How would gamers feel, or is this offer a fair one?'.
Gamers are striking back, and I really hope this will change our industry for the better."
https://www.pcgamer.com/cd-projekt-red-responds-to-loot-box-controversy/

Bear in mind that for them as an "indy" dev albeit a large one the Witcher 3 and especially Cyberpunk 2077 has the risk of putting the company into serious financial difficulty, so they do have the right perspective as well.
 
I don't think there's much pushback against mirco. Activision Blizzard made over half of their revenue, something like $4 billion from micro. People want it, and pay out for it. The only question is the type of micro. People love cosmetics, for reasons I cannot fathom.
 
It seems like there will be round table discussion where the scum of the industry is equating the talk of regulations on Lootboxes since it's a form of Gambling with full on Censorship. Frankly, they can deal with the gambling regulation like all the other industries do when they include gambling and targeting weak targets to profit off of.

Frankly, they brought this all upon themselves especially when they didn't pay attention to the early warning signs and kept on pushing things to extremes. Here's a pretty good write-up on former GDC panels that have been equally scummy and awful and lacking morals -- https://techraptor.net/content/gdc-2014-exploit-players


I stumbled upon this announcement at the following ResetEra thread: https://www.resetera.com/threads/ro...tes-lootbox-regulation-with-censorship.25950/

~~~
Details listed here: http://schedule.gdconf.com/session/censorship-strikes-back-roundtable-presented-by-igda/856303

Censorship Strikes Back Roundtable (Presented by IGDA)

Speaker: Daniel Greenberg (CEO, Media Rez Chair, IGDA Anti-Censorship and Social Issues Committee)

Global gains against game censorship are suddenly at risk from a combination of actions against our industry. With the World Health Organization classifying "gaming disorder" a mental health condition and burgeoning legislation around the world against Loot Boxes, a handful of government officials again wield outsized power over our creative and business decisions. Additionally, Augmented Reality (AR) faces bans in parks, military bases, churches around the world, and a total ban in China. What are developers to do? Join us for a discussion on how we can protect our rights.

Takeaway
Game developers and allies will get updates on the latest assaults on their self-expression and business rights, learn about potential implications of recent government changes, find out what has worked in the past, and learn how to protect themselves and support their peers. They will learn about what works in their country and what they can do to be an advocate for change no matter where in the world they live and work.

Intended Audience
The intended audience is all game developers and allies who want to protect themselves, their work, and their peers from video game censorship.
 
Amazed no-one has posted it yet, but quite funny latest Metal Gear Survive only has one save slot, for any extra you need to pay $10 per slot :)
I do not think they got the memo on how abusing microtransactions is starting to get to customers lol.
I bet Kojima is glad he is no longer there, but probably gutted what they are doing to that IP.
 
Lol so these industry people are trying to equate China banning AR and the WHO recognizing "gaming disorder" as the same thing? I mean, is it really hard to believe that there are people with an addiction to gaming? Also, loot boxes are definitely just like playing a slot machine. Anyone that sees it differently is crazy. I'm not anti-gambling, but there's a reason we don't let kids gamble. I'm sure they've rationalized it in some way, because they know the industry and their jobs depend on micro, but it'll be interesting to hear the dumb rebuttals they'll come up with. The link between violence and games was always stupid, because no one could actually prove the link. I'm not sure that gambling addiction really needs to be proven at this point.
 
I'm sure they've rationalized it in some way...
That's easy, because the law doesn't equate it to gambling so they can point to the law and say it's okay. Defective laws make a great defence against imorale actions which is where law-makers need to actually be good at their job, instead of sitting about in leather chairs smoking fat cigars mumbling over what to do over a double whiskey for a few years until making a change.
 
The laws aren't defective, just antiquated. They need to be updated but it's not going to be easy. The first problem is not receiving something of value but rather of perceived value. Quantifying that wouldn't be an easy task for a law.

The next issue is how far the concept would automatically cover other games and even core mechanics of those games. How is a loot box different than Hearthstone booster pack? It's a random selection of cards, where some could be very rare. It's addictive in it's nature and it's the core game mechanics.

How would these laws then not extend to actual card games? Aren't magic the gathering cards basically a loot box? Even worse, you get something of actual value, though likely worth far less than perceived value.

There only thing I could see happening from this is publishers turning to other methods of microtransactions to provide their unlimited income and maybe some warnings with games that contain loot boxes for an addictive warning. There will be no mention of gambling.
 
The laws aren't defective, just antiquated.
That makes them defective. Instead of updating the law for new ideas and concepts and markets, we just have legacy concepts that don't map well to how things are. Instead of monitoring developments and adjusting the law to fit, the System just waits until there's a few disasters before deciding to do something about it. Culture and politics is reactionary, not prepared and organised. "That's going to become a problem. We should put measures in place now to prevent that problem ever occurring," is a phrase you never hear ever. It doesn't help that society can never actually agree on a strategy, alternating between freedoms and controls with the phases of the moon. One minute we need a free market where people are responsible themselves that evolves into the society people want based on their actions, and the next, we need protections from exploitation and the creation of a society people want based on their ideologies (which conflict with how they actually behave).
 
Back
Top