It’s so destructive that even China doesn’t like it
China announced new laws to limit microtransactions, affecting major corporations like Tencent.
Submitted 11 months ago by cyd@lemmy.world to games@lemmy.world
https://gamerant.com/china-gaming-laws-microtransactions/
Comments
toiletobserver@lemmy.world 11 months ago
woelkchen@lemmy.world 11 months ago
It’s so destructive that even China doesn’t like it
They probably love that it’s hurting competing nations, though.
USSEthernet@startrek.website 11 months ago
Things like this and the screen time laws are why I foresee China as a huge threat in the future. Every other country will be mindless zombies staring at their screens and stupid. Easy to take control of.
Cannacheques@slrpnk.net 11 months ago
Even Big China man no happy with your business Mr Wei-song, what should we do?
“Tell him to fuck himself”
Aielman15@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Very rare China W.
Sheeple@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Seriously seeing this come from China is
Mildly confusing, very unexpected but very much a cool move.
wonderfulvoltaire@lemmy.world 11 months ago
China has always been against gaming it’s the money they like.
Carighan@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Yeah im sad China is so far ahead of curbing predative monetization than my own country is, now.
filister@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Didn’t China also recently introduce a limit of hours adolescents can game?
The world would be a better place without those transactions in my opinion. It might sound extreme but in my view this is the first step towards gambling addiction.
We as humanity are becoming really obsessed with everything digital instead of spending more time physically interacting with our peers. And unfortunately I am no exception.
bionicjoey@lemmy.ca 11 months ago
Part of the problem is that there’s no incentive for game companies to ensure that players are of an appropriate age and are gambling responsibly. It’s a Pandora’s box of capitalism in the same way fossil fuels, cigarettes, and big pharma are. Their customers have a demand for their product which is driven by a physiological/psychological/socioeconomic need, so they aren’t subject to normal market mechanics.
Konraddo@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Not recently, but yes.
Also, there’s regulation to disclose the probability in getting rewards from opening “chests”, which is actually gambling in nature.
EssentialCoffee@midwest.social 11 months ago
In 2019, it was limited to 90 minutes on weekdays and not between the hours of 10 pm to 8 am.
In 2021, it was changed to 1 hour per day, only on Fridays, weekends, and public holidays.
kSPvhmTOlwvMd7Y7E@lemmy.world 11 months ago
yamanii@lemmy.world 11 months ago
If there’s a behavior psychologist/researcher involved in the creation of a product, it’s evil, simple as. Those gacha games absolutely use them.
Dark_Arc@social.packetloss.gg 11 months ago
I think you could go two ways with that. The psychologist could be under a mandate to give feedback to ensure your game is not going to be an addiction or they could be under a mandate to make it as addictive as possible. The latter is way more likely but I wouldn’t totally rule out the value add of any psychologist to any game.
Wahots@pawb.social 11 months ago
God, I hope they do that here. Would clear the appstores and other stores of 90% of shovelware overnight.
southsamurai@sh.itjust.works 11 months ago
Even a broken clock is right twice a day. Assuming it’s a clock that’s capable of being right twice a day, which isn’t every clock.
Maven@lemmy.sdf.org 11 months ago
A clock whizzing backwards at 60 RPM is right 86,400 times a day!
Damage@slrpnk.net 11 months ago
Y’all should temper down the sinophobia and just take a good thing for a good thing
MolochAlter@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Lol where’s the sinophobia? They didn’t even mention China.
Snowpix@lemmy.ca 11 months ago
Sinophobia? Bullshit. Being critical of the Chinese government is not being hateful towards its people. Find something better to be offended over.
Tangent5280@lemmy.world 11 months ago
What if the clock is broken because someone blew it up with a block of C4?
JohnDClay@sh.itjust.works 11 months ago
There’s so much addiction and gambling engineered into micro transactions, it’s crazy. I’m glad China is regulating it.
ahriboy@lemmy.dbzer0.com 11 months ago
The S$20000 ($15000) Genshin Impact buying spree incident in Singapore had indirectly contributed to proposed legislation.
Nacktmull@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Well done, I hope other countries will follow.
notannpc@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Limiting micro transactions and banning predatory reward schemes in video games is genuinely a good thing. We need this to spread around the world.
Nephalis@discuss.tchncs.de 11 months ago
Do you all expect localization is tied to laws for china? I realy don’t think so. Most games are split into global and asia/chinese versions anyway. Why should they remove these mechanics when it isn’t necessary for the market they operate in?
echo64@lemmy.world 11 months ago
The thought process is that for many games, the majority of their revenue comes from these mechanics and from China. The games themselves will need to change to get revenue flowing. And new games won’t be made with this revenue source in general.
This is similar to how eu regulations can lead to global changes sometimes, China is a big enough market to affect things globally.
yamanii@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Yep, I’m not in the EU but thanks to the GDPR I still see the cookies thing on almost every website I go, sometimes these things have a good ripple effect.
Stovetop@lemmy.world 11 months ago
I haven’t had a look at the original text from China, but wondering how much they accounted for. Any of these rules could be easily circumvented if they didn’t account for multiple scenarios.
- Rewards for spending money within a game for the first time
"We don’t have a reward for spending money for the first time, but everyone does have a digital coupon for $5 off of their first $10 purchase when they make an account."
- Rewards for buying consecutive microtransactions
"The players don’t get any extras when they buy more of our digital currency, but every gacha pull does make the next 5 pulls a bit cheaper."
- Rewards for daily log-ins.
“No, we’re not giving rewards for daily log-ins, but players can buy this bonus that adds a gift-giving NPC to the main town for 30 days, who will trade a small parcel of premium currency for a single gold coin once per day.”
yamanii@lemmy.world 11 months ago
I guess we just shouldn’t make any law about anything since people can go “well akshually” about it.
Stovetop@lemmy.world 11 months ago
That’s not what I’m saying. I was just hoping this law has teeth, because companies who are greedy for money will always try to circumvent whatever new restrictions are sent their way.
I’m thinking back to earlier policies set by China like the restrictions against showing undead/human remains in video games. World of Warcraft set up all these euphemistic workarounds to circumvent the law while realistically changing as little as possible, basically defeating the purpose of it.
China outlawed loot boxes, but then season passes and gatcha models were implemented in short order to continue exploiting consumers. If the law doesn’t account for all sorts of scenarios that can be abused, it’s just going to be a game of cat and mouse.
ByGourou@sh.itjust.works 11 months ago
This is China, their CEO will misteriously disappear if they try something so obvious.
lolcatnip@reddthat.com 11 months ago
How do Chinese judges react to transparent attempts to circumvent laws that have the same effect as just breaking the law?
kaffiene@lemmy.world 11 months ago
Good. These kinds of transactions are exploitative and prey in the weaknesses of people with addictive personalities
xePBMg9@lemmynsfw.com 11 months ago
this will also make for better and more enjoyable games.
BaardFigur@lemmy.world 11 months ago
[deleted]Zeroc00l@sh.itjust.works 11 months ago
Just to add to your profound insight, water is probably wet.
Resol@lemmy.world 11 months ago
The Chinese government actually does something right for once? My year is saved.
Cybersteel@lemmy.world 11 months ago
A broken is right sometimss
Tier1BuildABear@lemmy.world 11 months ago
It’d be nice to see that come to rocket League. You know, the game where they removed crates because of the gambling, then removed trading to get kids to spend more money in the shop. So much better :/
Th4tGuyII@kbin.social 11 months ago
I would've expected to see something like thus out of the EU rather than China, but at least somebody's making the first move against the predatory monetisation of apps
redcalcium@lemmy.institute 11 months ago
If only those “think of the children” politicians would do this instead of attempting to ban encryption.
flambonkscious@sh.itjust.works 11 months ago
You know you look really bad when the CCP shows you up!
XTL@sopuli.xyz 11 months ago
There’s no money in it
ahriboy@lemmy.dbzer0.com 11 months ago
If China’s plan is successful, other countries will follow suit.
PS: RIP my free intertwined fates in Gaming (Jiaming) Impact.
CosmoNova@lemmy.world 11 months ago
The Chinese government has started it‘s witch hunt against video games years ago and we have yet to see any of their draconic laws being enforced. It looks like they made them just so they can cherry pick and suppress whoever disagrees with them one way or another. This will be no exception. Gambling, prostitution and porn are all illegal in mainland China but it has always been a huge and open business in every part of the country.
fosforus@sopuli.xyz 11 months ago
What’s predatory about this? This seems like the least forced purchase in the world – nobody needs the things they’re selling.
Aasikki@sopuli.xyz 11 months ago
Predatory as in they literally employ psychologists to help design them to be as addictive as they can be, then they market it towards kids or at the very least don’t really do anything to prevent kids from gambling in them (yeah it’s also partially a parenting issue but can’t really expect all parents to be tech savvy enough to understand all everything about gaming).
Then there’s the other sucky, but just not sucky enough for it to be an illegal side of things: games that these mechanics suck ass and we are getting less and less objectively good games because more and more games seek to make some quick buck by making their games casinos of sorts.
It’s only as luxurious as being addicted to cocaine in hopes that the next line will hit like the first one, or in game terms, hoping that the next loot box gets you the skin/character/whatever you wanted and releases that quick dopamine rush. Rinse and repeat.