U.S introduces bill to ban loot boxes and P2W mechanics.

biron_w · 9 May 2019 at 09:17

https://kotaku.com/u-s-senator-introduces-bill-to-ban-loot-boxes-and-pay-1834612226

About time as well! It's time something was done about the games industry unchecked and unregulated greed. Publishers will certainly be annoyed about this.

edscdk · 9 May 2019 at 09:32

why is it bad?

I can gamble, drink, spoke but not spend £40 on a game to have fun for a day / few hours?

maybe put in reasonable limits the same as should apply to gambling...

biron_w · 9 May 2019 at 09:38

edscdk said:
why is it bad?

I can gamble, drink, spoke but not spend £40 on a game to have fun for a day / few hours?

maybe put in reasonable limits the same as should apply to gambling...

Did you even read the article? It's aimed mainly at games sold to kids. Loot Boxes and other things are essentially gambling. Kids should be protected from anything like that. And it's completely unregulated gambling. Gambling anywhere else has regulations in place for a reason.

Witcher1980 · 9 May 2019 at 15:07

My kids think I am the devil, I refuse to pay for anything that is not campaign based DLC. Even that I hate doing, oh well, such is life.

james.miller · 9 May 2019 at 15:14

It needs doing. Not sure what it will achieve though, it's not like age ratings make much of a difference these days. What are they going to do, make fortnite an 18 instead of a 12? plenty of underage kids already playing it, changing the age rating is going to do jack to stop that.

McBain · 9 May 2019 at 17:24

EA can't be happy.

mmj_uk · 9 May 2019 at 17:39

Just make all games with loot box systems 18+, it's the same **** happening on the internet with things being censored and banned for adults in order to "protect the children". Just get children away from the adult world instead of turning everything into CITV.

doodah · 10 May 2019 at 12:05

Is this expected to pass? As I would imagine some lobbyists are gearing up and this sounds too sensible a policy for a GOP controlled government to ever pass fully.

Psycho Sonny · 10 May 2019 at 14:46

mmj_uk said:
Just make all games with loot box systems 18+, it's the same **** happening on the internet with things being censored and banned for adults in order to "protect the children". Just get children away from the adult world instead of turning everything into CITV.

please no.

games like FIFA where it's pay to win. you have people spending £100's daily / weekly / monthly so they can compete against better players.

there was a guy on here who wasn't even in a well paid job spending £XXX a week on it.

gaming has went down a very horrible path one which now makes it no longer enjoyable to play unless you also now spend £XXX on loot boxes. i'm not talking about fortnite where it makes zero difference they can do whatever they like i'm talking about pay to win games.

imagine having a game which has the sole monopoly of the market and then that game introduces pay to win. so now your only option is to pay or stop playing.

so now you cannot play something you would like to because you don't want to spend thousands on it every year.

i know a high school kid who was spending £500 a week on his dads credit card. yes his dad is loaded but still what is it teaching this kid?

no need to ban loot boxes just make them free to open

Psycho Sonny · 10 May 2019 at 14:48

doodah said:
Is this expected to pass? As I would imagine some lobbyists are gearing up and this sounds too sensible a policy for a GOP controlled government to ever pass fully.

fifa has already been banned in a EU country from selling packs.

so I hope it's introduced worldwide tbh.

_tucker_ · 10 May 2019 at 14:58

Has anyone even bought a loot box? I see them advertised all the time and just thought it was a scam anyway.

chroniclard · 10 May 2019 at 15:00

_tucker_ said:
Has anyone even bought a loot box? I see them advertised all the time and just thought it was a scam anyway.

Loot box no, Fifa points/packs yes. Deleted my team this year so I cant spend anymore.

doodah · 10 May 2019 at 15:07

Psycho Sonny said:
fifa has already been banned in a EU country from selling packs.

so I hope it's introduced worldwide tbh.

Two very different regions. Never underestimate the power of lobbying in America or simply ignoring science/pragmatism for a quick buck. Furthermore if the GOP are taking interest in this - that also worries me

. As they have been using video games as an excuse for decades and maybe this is there 'in'

.

Psycho Sonny · 10 May 2019 at 15:27

_tucker_ said:
Has anyone even bought a loot box? I see them advertised all the time and just thought it was a scam anyway.

Buy them in csgo all the time.

They are just cosmetic though.

_tucker_ · 10 May 2019 at 16:10

Psycho Sonny said:
Buy them in csgo all the time.

They are just cosmetic though.

Ahh you know what I forgot about stuff like that. I was thinking mainly them package loot boxes company’s sell containing random stuff for games I forgot about digital ones

Psycho Sonny · 10 May 2019 at 16:31

_tucker_ said:
Ahh you know what I forgot about stuff like that. I was thinking mainly them package loot boxes company’s sell containing random stuff for games I forgot about digital ones

no every game nowadays has loot boxes in them that you can either open for free and some you have to pay to open or buy for the more premium loot. or some games have a system where the more boxes you open the better stuff you get which helps you in game (pay to win).

so if you open enough packs in fifa you get the best players and enough coins to buy the best players to make your team better than your opponents.

it's why fifa packs have been banned by 1 EU country already.

_tucker_ · 10 May 2019 at 16:50

Psycho Sonny said:
no every game nowadays has loot boxes in them that you can either open for free and some you have to pay to open or buy for the more premium loot. or some games have a system where the more boxes you open the better stuff you get which helps you in game (pay to win).

so if you open enough packs in fifa you get the best players and enough coins to buy the best players to make your team better than your opponents.

it's why fifa packs have been banned by 1 EU country already.

I can understand why some people arnt happy with them then because that is basically apart of gambling then isn’t it. I wouldn’t say it should be illegal tho they should just have a limitation because I’m sure fifa online gambling has an age cap so just restrict the loot boxes to only be available in that category kind of thing.

End of the day tho kids shouldn’t have access to payments and if they do that comes down to the responsibility and fault of the parents

No1newts · 10 May 2019 at 16:56

Witcher1980 said:
My kids think I am the devil, I refuse to pay for anything that is not campaign based DLC. Even that I hate doing, oh well, such is life.

I'm similar, only thing like that I ever purchase is the battle pass on Fortnite for my son, otherwise he hates my intransigence.

Psycho Sonny · 10 May 2019 at 16:56

_tucker_ said:
I can understand why some people arnt happy with them then because that is basically apart of gambling then isn’t it. I wouldn’t say it should be illegal tho they should just have a limitation because I’m sure fifa online gambling has an age cap so just restrict the loot boxes to only be available in that category kind of thing.

End of the day tho kids shouldn’t have access to payments and if they do that comes down to the responsibility and fault of the parents

it's not just fair to say games should all be 18+.

games just shouldn't have pay to win systems in them.

you are already paying £40-80 to buy the game. then having to spend an additional £100 a week to compete on top just isn't right.

they should be made illegal. if you don't play these games then you shouldn't really be commenting on whats should be done IMO. as you have no clue how bad it is for gaming. put it this way i won't be buying fifa ever again after this year. it was the first time i have bought it and played in around 5 years and it's 100 times worse than when i left.

it's so bad i won't be buying it again.

if it wasn't for pay to win, i'd happily buy it again.

_tucker_ · 10 May 2019 at 22:42

Psycho Sonny said:
it's not just fair to say games should all be 18+.

games just shouldn't have pay to win systems in them.

you are already paying £40-80 to buy the game. then having to spend an additional £100 a week to compete on top just isn't right.

they should be made illegal. if you don't play these games then you shouldn't really be commenting on whats should be done IMO. as you have no clue how bad it is for gaming. put it this way i won't be buying fifa ever again after this year. it was the first time i have bought it and played in around 5 years and it's 100 times worse than when i left.

it's so bad i won't be buying it again.

if it wasn't for pay to win, i'd happily buy it again.

Ahh don’t get me wrong I completely agree with you there I don’t think micro transactions should be allowed at all either. I stopped playing games like cod just because of that reason, it’s got to the point where your not actually paying for more content your actually paying for the content they deliberately left out of the game just to charge you more money for it a few months down the line.
I think most games take advantage of the market now so to be honest it’s hard to buy a title that hasn’t got this included in it one way or another.
A content rich game that gives real value for money that decides to extend a title further by adding additional content further down the line for a small fee is one thing but to churn out the half arse releases like some company’s do then to ask for more money is ridiculous