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In Game Purchases Warnings
Over at kotaku they have an article saying after months of controversy the ESRB will now add "In Game Purchases" label to games with in-game purchases.
Is this a step in the right direction? Or is it being applied so badly that it will end up doing more harm than good?
Here's the issue, this warning will be applied to any game that has ANY DLC purchases available for it. It might just be a couple item packs that are completely unneeeded, or it might be a perverse lootbox scam linked completely to character progression in addition to other things.
In either case the only warning to the player before purchase is "In Game Purchases".
The ESRB didn't want to focus on lootbox scams directly, which is the exact thing that caused the controversy to begin with (And really most of the conspiracy was wondering why they were so insistent they weren't a form of gambling. ie: a game of chance played with money. To be clear, they STILL hold to that misguided mindset. They, and the game publishers themselves, are about the only people that refuse to see it as gambling.
Their reason for not harping on lootboxes however is because "parents don't know what lootboxes are, and those who claim they do still don't know what they are."
The future of this tag is that it will be applied to 99% of all games released from here on out, and it will be so watered down that it will not do a damned thing. Granted I know at this point you'd need a full box all to it's own these days to be specific about what DLC is available in a game, but still grouping it all together under a single little line isn't helping much.
I would like to know what happens to a publisher that doesn't have the tag added to their label because they decided to go without DLC at launch, but then add DLC 6 months down the road. So maybe this will help people sue companies that try to avoid the label by delaying their plans when the customer is explicitly trying to avoid DLC.
Is this a step in the right direction? Or is it being applied so badly that it will end up doing more harm than good?
Here's the issue, this warning will be applied to any game that has ANY DLC purchases available for it. It might just be a couple item packs that are completely unneeeded, or it might be a perverse lootbox scam linked completely to character progression in addition to other things.
In either case the only warning to the player before purchase is "In Game Purchases".
The ESRB didn't want to focus on lootbox scams directly, which is the exact thing that caused the controversy to begin with (And really most of the conspiracy was wondering why they were so insistent they weren't a form of gambling. ie: a game of chance played with money. To be clear, they STILL hold to that misguided mindset. They, and the game publishers themselves, are about the only people that refuse to see it as gambling.
Their reason for not harping on lootboxes however is because "parents don't know what lootboxes are, and those who claim they do still don't know what they are."
The future of this tag is that it will be applied to 99% of all games released from here on out, and it will be so watered down that it will not do a damned thing. Granted I know at this point you'd need a full box all to it's own these days to be specific about what DLC is available in a game, but still grouping it all together under a single little line isn't helping much.
I would like to know what happens to a publisher that doesn't have the tag added to their label because they decided to go without DLC at launch, but then add DLC 6 months down the road. So maybe this will help people sue companies that try to avoid the label by delaying their plans when the customer is explicitly trying to avoid DLC.
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And them saying it isn't gambling is absurd, as is their reasoning for why they say it. They say that "the player is always guaranteed to receive in-game content (even if the player unfortunately receives something they don't want)." Oh, okay. All right then, so if I were to start running a casino and have the slot machines always pay out a penny even if the player loses, then I guess that's not gambling anymore, because the player is always getting something, even if it unfortunately isn't something they want. Fucking inane horseshit.
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The key word there, of course, being "ostensibly." The ESRB is really just an arm of the ESA, which is just a big fucking "trade association" (i.e. a lobbyist group) for the video game industry, so of fucking course they don't want people to know the truth about loot boxes.
I remember the days when we used to talk about actually wanting a lobbying group for the video game industry, so that government would be less likely to storm in and fuck up the video game industry with boneheaded legislation and shit (which is the real reason why the ESRB exists, not some altruistic bullshit about "informing people" or whatever). Just remember, the ESA is the shit one. The ECA is the
goodnot entirely shit one. I used to get the two mixed up all the time.no subject
As I'm pretty sure we also knew that if we got a lobbying group for the gaming industry to protect it from undeserved attack, that it would also end up becoming a tool used by said gaming industry serving the exact same function as the RIAA/MPAA. (And it's basically become exactly that, as predicted.)
Just can't remember if we predicted that on livejournal (and thus public record!) or only in private chats. ^_^
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And yeah, in that one also you were giving both the potential pros and cons of the lobby group.