Loot Boxes: Difference between revisions

However, this game mechanic is not without controversy. No small number of gamers hate Loot Boxes because they feel the mechanic detracts from game play. They argue, with some justification, that making Loot Boxes (or the means to unlock them) a cash commodity turns a game from roleplaying into [[Pay to Win]], especially when boxes contain exclusive rewards that outrank those acquired in normal play. Players with money to spend focus their effort on [[Munchkin|buying boxes to collect ever-more-powerful rare items to gain an advantage over other players]], leaving those who cannot or do not want to invest money in Loot Boxes. Even when the boxes do not provide exclusive and overpowered items, the race to buy one's way to the best equipment can turn into the ''raison d'etre'' for playing the game, rather than the game content itself.

 

 

Then there are the legal issues raised during 2018 and 2019 -- loot boxes came under fire in multiple jurisdictions like Belgium, which have designated them as gambling, placing them alongside online casinos in terms of regulation, and Japan, where the ''kompu gacha'' loot boxes are banned outright by the Consumer Affairs Agency. Questions were raised not only about circumventing gambling regulations but also the effect of random reward systems on personalities already prone to addictive behaviors. Then there were concerns about a growing underground market for selling loot from boxes for real money at often exorbitant prices, driven by the legally-grey "gold miner" industry based out of the far east.