Referring to the problem of “blood-sucking” games, people often immediately think of classic names like Star Wars Battlefront 2, FIFA or NBA 2K. However, the main character in this story is Runescape, a game belonging to the “old man” row, was first released nearly 20 years ago. Because of the addictive nature of the game, a young man baked more than 50,000 pounds (nearly 1.5 billion) in less than 1 year just to buy in-game items. This number would probably continue to increase if not for the purchase policy of the developer Jagex.
According to Kotaku, in the UK’s latest investigation into “Immersive and Addictive Technology”, Jagex’s Runescape game has faced accusations and criticism for its blood-sucking deals. Specifically, a male gamer Britons burned up to 1,000 – 5,000 pounds (30 – 150 million) a month playing Runescape before going over the limit set by the developer.
As alleged, this money has “caused serious financial harm” to both the gamer and his family. Worth mentioning, the young man in this story is an adult, not a child, so he is fully aware of what he has done. Facing accusations. Jagex said it was unable to “take direct action” to address concerns raised by parents for “data protection reasons.”
Although it’s not clear what the player spent a lot of money on, Runescape has a system called Treasure Hunter that provides treasure chests with random items in them. Keys to these chests can be purchased with real money. In addition, the game also has a pay-to-win mechanism, allowing players to recharge to pass the stage, … All of this makes young men unable to resist the temptation and throw a large pile of money into the game.
Earlier, British officials had suggested that the mechanism should be considered loot box in the game is a form of gambling because of its random nature, lack of transparency. Games for children completely ban the appearance of loot boxes.
After this investigation, although the British government has not yet made any confirmation on making this proposal official law, it is likely that it will happen soon in the future. Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo have said that they are working on new loot box policies and will reveal the percentage of items received for player purchases. This will help the game industry become healthier as well as limit unfortunate cases like the young men in this article that can happen.
Source link: Too much money doesn’t know what to do, young people “baked” more than 1 billion just to buy in-game items
– Emergenceingames.com