Actions with conseqeunces?

 What is this, a Telltale game?

For years games have been affixing themselves with the lofty tag of 'Your action will have consequences' to completely oversell the narrative complexity of the story that they've weaved. Through which they've managed to instil the lie that the same is true throughout real life, without remembering the rather hefty asterisk which appends how such is true only with a certain number of people who aren't rich/ big enough to completely go consequence free. And within the gaming sphere this is demonstrated no more aptly in the rampant and irreverent way in which EA has conducted itself for as far back as anyone can remember without a single lick of consequence. (It's like they choose the 'Linear' option in the setting of life.) This has been true as they've assaulted their audience time after time with crappy policies and practises that should have pushed folk to the breaking point, but which they always get away with because they are EA and nothing they ever do can or will be punished. Or at least, that's they way things were. (It seems that maybe the consequences of this story have done a little catching up.)

Of recent years one of the more controversial stories to come out of everyone's favourite mega-conglomerate has been the lootboxes which work to ruin gaming in what I'm steadily understanding to be the most defensible way possible. (That's the only way I can rationalise the sheer quantity of folk who stand up for EA's shenanigans and argue "it's the people's choice, let them spend their own money!") Of course, such defenders seem utterly oblivious to the fact that the more they are allowed to get away with their crap the further such transgressions will be pushed into the rest of gaming, but I doubt any of those folk are capable of basic deductive reasoning anyway so elucidation is a little bit of a lost cause. Meanwhile, more and more of EA's consumers are falling prey to the allure of their Lootbox driven games which randomises the chance of receiving new items in order to entice players to throw away huge sums of money for the most special prizes. All of which is protected under the assertion that, as long as folk are incapable of winning money back it isn't gambling. (Funny as technicalities work, huh?)

If you've been following the cycle of Lootboxes then you'll know that this is an issue that gamers managed to bring in front of various governments in their ire, and such a bold move even managed to get EA full-on banned in one country for their antics. That alone was a huge victory, showcasing that gamers aren't willing to sit and take whatever slop that EA wants to feed us without something of a fight up our sleeves. Unfortunately, this wasn't as lasting as one might hope because EA just decided to change that one country's rules and double down on their tactics elsewhere, like a cornered rat they wanted to get as much out of the situation as they could before their cold desperation came back to bite them. Nothing short of a worldwide ban would force EA to rethink their ways, but of course the biggest markets for gaming move in the most lethargic manners so Electronic Arts have managed to dance around consequences for so very long indeed.

The US initiated conversations about the similarities of lootboxes to gambling and toyed about whether or not to update their laws, until they just forgot about that and let the issue disappear. Similarly, here in the UK we've raised some concern about the effect of these mechanics, and even managed to summon EA to testify for themselves, but whilst their defence has been legendarily pitiful in our circles, I guess the government thought it was decent enough because they sure are dragging their heels about acting on it. The most we've heard from our people about the issue is a call to testify which I can only hope received enough evidence to go to trial, but I literally have no idea. If only we were a little more like The Netherlands in this matter, then there would be some sort of retribution headed EA's way.

For as you've likely spied in the news, over in the Netherlands EA has been hit with a rather starling ultimatum; for every single week that they continue to sell Lootboxes through their number-one cash cow Fifa, EA can expect to rack up an extra 500,000 euros on a bill. It's not exactly the largest slap on the wrist that EA could receive, but it punishes inaction rather substantially to the point where EA would be foolish not to consider giving up their lootbox efforts over in that region for the time being. (Or they could take the hit under the realisation that their astronomical profits could likely swallow such a relatively small fine, but that would be literally placing themselves in direct violation of court orders, I can only imagine even EA aren't that brazen)

All of this comes after the shocking ruling that EA's lootboxes are, in fact, a violation upon their gambling restriction laws. Now that's a real surprise to me because I imagined that their team had successfully managed to bury that argument under a mountain of suppositions and technicalities. It doesn't matter that they specifically designed their lootboxes to feed the same neural pathways that slot machines do, no one cares that they literally hired a psychologist to teach them how to make systems which mirrored gambling, (something they begrudgingly admitted to in front of Parliament) nor does it matter that they intentionally marketed these lootboxes towards kids several times. Only today, apparently it does matter, at least in the Netherlands, because EA are slowly starting to learn the lesson that if their grift is so good that it should be illegal, than it probably is and no one important enough has realised it yet.

As for EA's response to this order, well you can imagine how vapid it is. "Electronic Arts is deeply committed to positive play. We seek to bring choice, fairness, value and fun to all our players in all of our games." I swear, just reading these statements month after month are enough to give me deep trust issues for the rest of my life. I've heard so much crap and lies out of these folk's PR mouths that I'm starting to loose all recognition of what a truthful statement sounds like. (At least I can rely on CDPR to tell me truth, like when they say that the release date for Cyberpunk 2077 is definitely in November and will not cha- oh wait.) If there's one part of all of these toothless press statements that always trips me up is the part about 'choice'. Why do they always harp on about 'choice'? How pathetic is your argument if one of your leading points is "well the consumer always has the choice not to buy our game"; of course they do, that's how commerce works! (Covering these stories is going to slowly drive me insane.)

Just like with the Van der Linde gang in Red Dead Redemption 2, the noose is slowly tightening around the outlaws over as EA and it won't be long before their way of life is completely extinct. And just like Dutch himself, EA are desperate to paint themselves in the light of the glorious saviours of morality, rather than the two-bit thugs they really are. How much further can EA push this until they have to give up Lootboxes altogether and move onto something much worse to make their dues, (Which I suspect to be skyrocketing up the price of the game by another £10) only time can tell. One thing is for certain though, they will not come out of this encounter as wiser and kinder people, just more desperate and sleazy, as always. 

2K finally lost their minds.

You do it yourself, you do. Just you and no-one else.

Here we are again. It feels like not a day goes by without something incredibly stupid happening in the world of gaming regarding monetisation. At this point I don't know how to react anymore. How do you react when the industry you love is being wantonly sabotaged by the idiots in top brass? Previously I've shared how damning I feel it will be for the government to come in and start regulating video game content but now, honestly, I just don't have the energy to care anymore. Bring in the government regulations, go ahead. The industry is too moronic to hold itself to any standards so by all means, bring in the government.

I'm not even some anti-government fanatic, either, I just love the idea of freedom of expression and shudder to think what might become of it once we submit to fear mongering. But I guess it's no longer just 'fear mongering' in this regard, is it? Video games have crossed the Rubicon into the land of unregulated gambling and they are so unrepentant that they don't even have the common decency to lie about it anymore. Every industry buffer has failed us. The publishers who are meant to ensure that they maintain profitability without shooting themselves in the foot, the developers who promise time and time again that they've learnt to not make casinos disguised as games and the ratings board who are supposed to regulate games so that the government doesn't start paying undue attention. (That really worked out, didn't it?)

For those who have no idea why I'm so despondent today, it is because I'm still coming to terms with the NBA 2K20 MyTeam trailer. MyTeam, is essentially NBA's version of FIFA Ultimate Team; the 'fantasy football' experience digitized and monetized to hell. I you think that FIFA has been worse in recent years (or the past decade) due to their sole reliance on FUT, then let me assure you that you've seen nothing yet. FIFA is still a decent enough game (The same game that released in 2010, but still.) as long as you never touch the FUT portions of the game. 2K's Basketball series cannot even earn that little praise. 2K are so desperate to scrape together a few extra dollars that they have imbued monetisation into every element of the game.

2K's NBA titles have already been rife with it's own controversies throughout the years. Who can forget 2K18's haircut incident? In that game, the developers took the core concept of virtual currency and pushed it to it's gross extremes. For their MyCareer mode, (2K have something against the spacebar, don't blame me.) they decided to lock every interaction, beyond the ability to play the next match, behind a paywall of VC. (Fitting name.) VC was required to buy clothing, upgrade characters, buy dunking animations and, look at a haircut? That's right, if you wanted to change up your character's haircut you had to spend 2-3 games worth of VC. But that isn't even the worst part, you see, 2K didn't even bother to leave in a preview mechanic, meaning that the only way to see how that haircut looks on your character was to buy said-haircut. Oh, and haircuts require multiple purchases if you want to switch back. Of course, all that grind could be skipped if you sold your soul to 2K and bought up their VC packs!

Then there was 2K19 under which every aspect of character improvement was locked behind virtual currency paywalls that required you to either spend real money or grind to an inhuman degree in order to get anywhere. That wasn't even the worst part, although that was damning enough. You see, the 2K team apologized (With crocodile tears) about their abhorrent haircut fiasco from the previous year, and in order to make it up to fans they made the selfless and admirable decision to... do something ten times worse. "How could things possible be worse?" you ask. Well, How about literally holding your matches hostage in the loading screen so that they can bombard you with real life advertisements. I'm not joking. This $60 game treated you as though you were a 'freeloader' on a mobile game, bombarding you with third party ads when all you want to do is play the game.

Looking at all this, you might wonder why it is that fans put up with this game, and honestly I don't know, but I do think that their gritted compliance will be to blame when this nonsense inevitably becomes prevalent across the industry. People argue that "There's no other Basketball games on the market!" well to that I point you to the advice imparted by Joe Vargas of AngryJoeShow; just get last year's game, it's literally the same game. I won't get all melodramatic and recite the old adage about how evil wins when good people do nothing, but instead I will recite the similar, and more digestible, sentiment that was apparently uttered by Alexander Hamilton: "If you stand for nothing, than you'll fall for anything." Let these people know that enough is enough or enough never will be enough, and we will all have to pay the price.

Point in case, 2K20's MyTeam trailer. This was an advertisement that was built around showing off the newest features of 2K's microtransactions and it did so with gusto. Not a moment goes by when they aren't flaunting off lootboxes, trading cards, and premium currencies. Things get really abhorrent, however, when you take a look at their methods of 'rewarding' the player. Win a match? Good job, you get a pull of our one-arm bandit. Or a spin of our prize wheel or a ball in our Pachinko machine. Yep, just as all the gaming industry is busy treading on eggshells to avoid governments scrutiny, 2K jumps in and breakdances on the floor. They're proud of their greed!

I don't want to dedicate anymore to this topic than it deserves, and what 2K deserves is to be shot into orbit through a cannon. Gamers everywhere have been complaining to the ratings board about how 2K20 is rated PEGI 3 whilst Pokemon Red and Blue are rated 12 for it's fake late-game casino. Responses from the board have either been silence or dismissive. That means there is no where left for this to go than to the government, and as I shared at the beginning of this blog, at this time I welcome them. AAA gaming is dead and the industry itself are the ones that pulled the trigger.

Rockstar: mother of bad timing

Don't rock the boat, baby.

Back during my time in secondary school, one of the most commonly addressed topics among my group of friends was the impending state of the latest Grand Theft Auto Online updates. It's sobering to think that a game that was being actively updated all that time ago is still getting worked on, makes one feel their age, but I suppose that is what happens when you game mode is making so money that it propels your game to being the most profitable entertainment product ever. What's that? Avengers Endgame just made $2.8 billion becoming the worlds highest grossing movie? GTA V is looking at $6 billion. And that figure is from November last year. Yeah, the folks over at Rockstar aren't exactly going hungry.

Back when me and my friends would anxiously discuss every change log, eager for the long-delayed Heist update, we noticed a couple of trends from the speculative YouTube community who kept us all informed on the game. It became something of a running joke about how grasping some of them would get in order to make their content. 'I data-mined the code and I can make out a Z, next update must be zombies!' I'm not even exaggerating, these guys were literally that desperate for clickbait. Even then, One theme in particular was a commonality amongst all of these GTA Online channels, apart from zombies, one piece of content that they all agreed was definitely coming but just couldn't get the timeframe down. That would be the opening of the mythical casinos. After every update, they would assure fans that the next one would be casino-time, and when that didn't pan out, just like your atypical doomsday prepper, they would move the goalposts. Next update. No, next update. And on and on.

Looking back, it was a bit silly that we even pretended to entertain any of these wild predictions. Afterall, GTA Online is a game that features a virtual bank account which can be bolstered via transactions from your real one. These 'Shark Cards' as GTA calls them, ('Microtransactions' as they're know everywhere else.) allow players to inject themselves with a sudden influx of cash. This may be necessary for accessing some of the new content that Rockstar adds which, whilst being ostensibly free to all, always comes with a substantial in-game barrier-to-entry cost. It's genius when you think about it. Free DLC that you either have to pay for or grind towards like it's your day job. But there's comes a catch. When you equate real world value to virtual currency, suddenly adding a virtual fake casino doesn't feel so fake anymore. Who knows what kind of substantial community/interest group/government backlash adding a casino might incur? There's no way that even Rockstar would be brazen enough to stir up trouble like that.

On an entirely unrelated note, have you seen the new expansion that was just released for GTA Online? The Diamond Casino & Resort is the gambling-centric content that all those YouTubers predicted, finally coming to fruition. 4 years late, but better late then never right? In the Diamond Casino players can play all those classic casino games including One-Armed Bandits, Blackjack, Roulette, Horse racing and a wheel of fortune. And I know what you're thinking, "There's no way that this operates like an actual casino." And you would be right. Because you have no physical way of cashing out your winnings into real world money; but you can sure as heck cash in. Diamond Casino games are played through chips that are purchased through in-game money, the same in-game money that one can purchase with real-world money. Rockstar have essentially created a casino with no overheads beyond the cost of server maintenance. And people wonder why gaming is the most profitable entertainment medium in the world right now.

I do feel a little bad for criticizing Rockstar right now, because I just reached the epilogue portion of Red Dead Redemption 2 and am convinced that it is the greatest character-driven story that Rockstar have ever told. I Kinda feel like a hypocrite, praising with one hand and chastising with the other. But I choose to believe that the division that creates games is entirely separate to the division that maintains GTA online so that I feel better about calling this practise abhorrent. Now, I usually try to take a middle-ground stance when it comes to topics but I always get a little bit incensed when it is the AAA gaming industry trying to fleece us for yet more money. I know that video game prices haven't adjusted to account for inflation, but there is a pretty decent reason why. Games used to be vastly overpriced for a very long time. Now the gaming community is in a good place where gaming companies are making money hand-over-fist, Rockstar even made enough to trump the biggest movie ever, and yet they still walk around with the donation jar playing the starving artist.

I've already written a couple blogs about how the gaming world is in a spot of bother with law makers right now. Ever since EA overstepped their mark with monetisation, everyone has been bending over backwards in order to convince lawmakers that what they do cannot be equated to gambling. This is an issue that I am mostly agnostic towards, but I enjoy watching slimy corporate entities squirm in front of politicians. (Otherwise known as 'other slimy corporate entites'. Boom: Unfocused political joke!) What I don't like is the potential for widespread harm for the gaming world that could occur if governments decide to clamp down hard on us. As I've said before, first they'll stamp out microtransactions (Cool, whatever.) but then they'll move onto general censorship. It's just what these types of people do. I'm not endorsing the unscrupulous efforts of these companies by any means, I'm just bracing for the inevitable impact if they fail to self regulate. (Like they most assuredly will.) And in the midst of this minefield, with all the careful wording and kowtowing and attempts to soothe various governmental bodies; Rockstar kicks down the door, swinging their golden phallus around and slapping down a casino, damned be the consequences. It's a move that is just, and I don't use this term often, in incredibly bad taste.

This all comes days after the UK Parliament (That's us.) ruled that lootboxes do not meet the legal definition of gambling as it currently exists. Whether this is their way of letting lootboxes off the hook or telling AAA companies to prepare for a revision is unclear, but you can imagine that EA, King and Activison are breathing a sigh of relief either way. There is still the open case that is rattling around some US senators, but I hope I offend noone by predicting that the American legal department will prove so slow that gaming will have moved onto it's next big, greedy controversy before the lootbox case sees the light of a single courtroom. If the gaming bigwigs can manage to secure both the UK and US in their pro-lootbox camp, then the other big markets of the world are likely to follow suit. Afterall, most of the world either follows America's entertainment trends or tries to mimic them. (looking at you, China.) So even after Rockstar's upset, lootboxes are still likely safe. (For better or for worse.)

None of that makes it any easier for me to stomach Rockstar's audacity for envisioning and releasing this expansion as it is. It just seems so out-of-character for Grand Theft Auto. Rather than satirizing the more avaricious elements of our pro-capitalist society, like the GTA series used to do, Rockstar have instead just chosen to contribute to it. It's as though they've crossed 'The Sims'-Rubicon of losing their roots and becoming the very things that they used to mock. They are now the people they vowed to hate. Oh, just like Red Dead Redemption 2! Maybe this is all going according to plan. Some incredibly intricate plan to mimic the actions of the morally bankrupt so flawlessly so as to appear to be one of their number. I can imagine Rockstar now fiddling with their chin hairs, telling me to "Have some GODDAMN FAITH!".

All that being said, I've never been one to tell people how to live their life. People have been anticipating this casino update for years, I even used to be one of them. As long as no one ends up getting hopelessly hooked and sinking their entire life savings into virtual slot machines (I'm literally going to setup a google alert so I know the exact second when it inevitably happens.) then it's all fun and games, I suppose. Afterall, It's not as though people have the incentive of winning real money to tie them to the slots. (Otherwise this game would absolutely fit the legal definition of gambling and would be shut down before anyone could utter the word "satire".) Instead you just have the chance to win chips, money, unique clothing and Respect Points. (Talk about a kick in the nuts. They literally coded in the possibility for players to win the most useless currency in the game.) It doesn't take away from the fact that Rockstar readily employed the usual casino dopamine-stroking tactics in order to hook players, but it will almost definitely be enough to prevent this virtual casino being as harmful as a real one would be.

That hasn't stopped Rockstar from stepping on eggshells for The Diamond Casino's introduction. Someone at Rockstar seems to have been actually paying attention to recent gaming news, no one important enough to have the expansion delayed a few months, but someone important enough to convince the higher ups to take preemptive measures. Rockstar have blocked access to the new content in 57 countries that we know of. (With no forewarning by-the-by. Way to look out for the consumers, team.) It seems that they still have the presence of mind to try to circumvent backlash when it would hit them the hardest, still working on their empathy though.

You may have noticed that I have been a little bit critical of Rockstar's GTA Online department throughout the course of this blog. Eagle eyed readers may even have been able to pick up on the reason why. But just to be clear, I don't care about The Diamond Casino update. Well, I don't care enough to do anything productive about it, at least. I think it is incredibly tasteless and unbecoming of one of the most legendary studios in gaming, but I don't play GTA Online anymore so what do I care? My issue is the optics this shines, not just on Grand Theft Auto, but on the entire gaming world. This update has essentially flipped the cutis to government bodies who were already gearing to flex their legislative muscles on gaming, and dares them to try something. It is incredibly irresponsible. But then, this is just as much EA's fault for being just as avaricious in their own games. The whole thing is a huge complicated mess and I just can't help but shake the feeling that the consumer is going to get the brunt of the fallout, whatever occurs. So what can we, as concerned gamers, do? Absolutely diddly-squat. We can sit and pray for a miracle where everything works out in the end. But hey, if push comes to shove, we can just steal a boat and head to Tahiti.

Microtransactions

Surprise!

Have I talked about Microtransactions yet? It seems like such a prominent issue plaguing the video game market that it's impossible to avoid in the modern day, and yet it's taken me this long to sit down and actually have a crack at it. Every other week it seems that discourse over microtransactions and deceptive practises grows more and more bitter. People aren't just upset, they're fed up with feeling upset. I've heard so many people say that they have grown sick of playing games altogether because of the blatant anti-consumer practises that the AAA market seems embroiled in.With all that in mind it seems positively astounding that I'm only getting to this topic today. Oh well, I'm here now. Might as well catch everyone up to speed.

'Microtransactions' is a term used to describe a small purchase that is made by the player in exchange for small pieces of digital content on top of the game that they are playing. We're talking buying skins, exp boosts, Finishers, things like that. 'Microtransctions' differ from 'DLC' in that they offer much less content for, ideally, a much smaller price tag. Almost every AAA game company has a hand in the Microtransaction pie in this day and age, making use of them as a clever ploy to rake in the case. What is the ploy, you ask? Well, those small price tags are designed to devalue the purchase in the mind of the buyer, psychologically making them believe that the content they have bought is less significant than full blown DLC. This fabricated lesser value can fool people into buying several of these 'little DLC's' and end up totalling costs that exceed the value of the original game. All for little chunks of digital content.

That is all, of course, just the outwards face of Microtransaction. Companies indulge in many other insidious psychological tactics to fleece their customers. Just take a look at the 'digital currency' issue. Everyone has fallen for this one at least once. Video games make their Microtransactions purchasable only through in-game currency that one needs to purchase with real money to obtain. Then they set the amount that one can buy to odd increments that skirt just below the price of desired objects, forcing players to buy more currency then they need. 'Digital currency' also plays a part in that psychological devaluing I mentioned. When the product itself isn't affixed with a price tag, it's easier not to think about how much it actually costs. I remember back in The Elder Scrolls online when a brand new 'estate' was added to the buyable properties list. I was slightly interested until I read a comment which pointed out what I had missed; with the digital cost being what it is, the digital home was priced at £100. Now, I don't think I'll meet much resistance if I just come out and say, that is inexcusably overpriced. I stopped playing ESO not long after.

That's only the tip of the iceberg, however. In the past year, another term has become very much synonymous with Microtransactions: Lootboxes. A more contentious term I cannot envision. Or perhaps I just don't want to... Lootboxes are Microtransactions pushed to a whole other level. Lootboxes hold the same low-value low-effort digital goods, only tied to a randomized Lootbox. I use the term 'randomise' loosely. Oftentimes the most sought after rewards are tipped to be less common.  This means that players are forced to pay money in order to receive an item that they didn't even want in the first place. Many have compared this with the way that gambling is handled when one comes to the 'One armed bandits', and the comparison does seem somewhat apt.

Just like many of the computerised gambling machines of today like slot machines and Pachinko, Lootboxes use psychological techniques in order to hook their players. They tie the opening of boxes to pretty flashy animations and pleasing fanfare in order to get the dopamine levels in our brains going, building up that addiction. It's a simple trick that mobile games have been utilising forever, but it's sadly effective. Those with gambling problems and those who are more susceptible to gambling issues can find something unsettlingly familiar in these sorts of mechanics. The big AAA companies don't care, though, their margins are kept afloat by people who fall into their money grinding machines, so they have no intention of slowing down on the casino tactics. But that doesn't mean gamers just shut up and accept it.

A couple years back a certain game called 'Star Wars: Battlefront 2' (Dice's version) took the concept of Lootboxes to a level so low that no one could stand by and ignore them. They imbued their Lootboxes with gameplay altering items. Most Microtransactions are regulated to items that are purely cosmetic, but not Battlefront, oh no, they wanted to do something special. In come the effect cards and out goes fair competition. Effect cards were awarded randomly and drastically buffed key stats for certain characters, through health boosts, damage boosts and speed boasts. None of this sounds too awful until you remember that these cards could only be earned through a box that one must buy with real world money. This meant that people who forked out on these Microtransactions would have a greater chance of having better cards than those who grinded for each of their cards. This disparity between player and payer is what we gamers like to call 'Pay-to-win'. And we hate pay-to-win.

What followed was months of constant fan derision over the whole 'Lootbox fiasco', whole interviews worth of bad PR statements, and the walking back of Lootboxes from the game. A win for the gaming community but, predictably, just the start of something bigger. Fans never let go of the Lootbox incident and they stirred upon enough trouble to get mainstream media involved. And when the media start parroting the message boards claims of 'gambling mechanics in kids games', people begin noticing. For my part I find the whole Lootbox movement that the game industry tried to push to be very distasteful but I don't believe it quite matches the legal definition of gambling. At least not yet. As recently as last month, EA, Activision and Epic have been answering for their hubris by way of impending government regulations.

The moment headlines started equating gambling, gaming and kids, Government bodies were bound to get involved. Some countries moved very quickly on this matter; Belgium straight out banned Lootboxes, forcing companies to remove Lootbox functionality within that territory. Others are dragging their feet behind proposed legislation. (Looking at you, America.) And over here, Parliament decided to drag those companies out to the front of the class in order to explain and justify their actions. If you are at all interested to watch ill-prepared representatives squirm under ministerial questioning, look it up, you're in for a treat. So many foot-in-mouth moments spawned from the impulsive mouth of EA's Kerry Hopkins. For those who missed it, Mrs Hopkins (Miss? I don't care enough to look.) renamed Lootboxes, surprise mechanics, and claimed they were "Quite ethical and fun." You could almost see her heart drop when she said that and realised 'I'm going to be an industry laughing-stock for next twelve months, aren't I...'

I want to take this time to argue that Lootboxes actually aren't particularly moral or even really all that fun, (Scandalous. I know!) Using the example that inspired me to write this blog. Last Monday the BBC put out a story about a family who's kids had managed to empty out their bank account playing Fifa. The Father had recently bought his children Fifa 19 for Nintendo Switch and had purchased them a single Lootbox as a gift. Unfortunately, he didn't realise that his children had watched him buy the pack and remembered how he did it. (Everyone underestimates the children.) For the next week the children bought Lootbox after Lootbox in hopes of acquiring their dream player: Lionel Messi, who has a probability of less-than-1% of showing up. £550 later and the children didn't have their player and the parents only became aware when their credit card bounced the next week. The parents reached out to Nintendo and EA for help in refunding the purchase and received two polar opposite responses. EA directed them to a poorly laid out page instructing them how to turn on parental options (Little late for that, no?) and Nintendo actually refunded them. Not too ethical of EA there, to do literally nothing to help. Couldn't have been very fun either, considering the family had momentarily lost all of their savings. But it was most definitely a surprise, I'll give Kerry that.

Microtransactions and Lootboxes are reflections of some of worst and most greedy tendencies of the gaming market. Extra purchases tacked on top of your £50 game in some desperate attempt to beat yet-more money out of you. Avarice inspired these companies to push the envelope in all the worst ways and innovate in the fields of monetisation instead of- literally anything else. Now, their shortsightedness has the threat of government regulation blaring down on all the industry and I don't think it's for the best. Sure, they may eradicate Lootboxes for us if pushed hard enough, but what will happen after they're done? Will they then point the magnifying glass on video game violence or sexual themes and content? Yesterday I was discussing the lengths that the gaming industry went through in order to prevent Government oversight, now they've just gone and welcomed them in with open arms. And just like a vampire, the government bodies are looking about, hungry for what they can drain of life. I fear that if these companies fail to self regulate enough to force the hand of government bodies, the gaming industry could end of reaping much more than they sowed.