British Parliament: ban all loot boxes until proven safe for children

The UK Parliament on Thursday issued a broad investigation into the rise of "immersive and addictive technologies" and what the UK government should do to recognize manipulative, unsafe and inconvenient business practices in a rapidly changing industry. The report covers a lot: user tracking, cyberbullying, esport, social media, etc.

This comprehensive report contains at least a very strong criticism of a notorious practice in the video game industry: the booty. As far as Parliament is concerned, chests should be banned in all games for minors.

"We recommend that chests containing chance not be sold to children who play, but the credits in play are earned through the rewards gained from playing games," reads the report of Parliament. "In the absence of research proving that no harm is caused by exposing children to gambling via the purchase of surprise boxes, we feel that the precautionary principle should be in place. apply and that they are not allowed in games that children play until proven otherwise. "

Not Kinder about it

This statement follows a delicate exchange between Parliament and an EE executive at a hearing in June. At that time, Kerry Hopkins, Vice President of Legal and Government Affairs at EA, gave in to the "surprise" factor related to the games chests: asking players to blindly pay for an object, a dress or a totally random reward. After comparing the chests to retail items, such as Kinder's eggs (without ever recognizing that, thanks to these eggs, customers are at least guaranteed to have some chocolate), Hopkins then qualified the booty chests of gambling "rather ethical and fun. [and] nice for people. "

Thursday's declaration of Parliament recalls this specific description of Hopkins, then replies:

This

1. UK Parliament: Ban all loot boxes until evidence proves they’re safe for kids  Ars Technica
2. UK officials call for loot boxes to be regulated like gambling  Engadget
3. ‘Ban kids from loot box gambling in games’  BBC News
4. Call for gaming loot box ban  Sky News
5. Regulate loot boxes under gambling law, Parliament committee recommends  Rock Paper Shotgun
6. View full coverage on Google News

is obviously out of step with the attitude of many players who contacted us after our audience, including those who categorically rejected his description of the packs, not as surprise boxes, but as "mechanisms of surprise" . One player called the company's testimony to us "a bare-faced lie." Another told us that the company "heavily marketed and qualified their systems as" loot boxes "for several years and. .. the system's mechanisms are exactly the same, no matter what they call it. "

Coincidentally, much of the European Parliament's comment on the box-games concerns EA, including the company's best-selling FIFA video game series. The comment underlines EA's optimistic admission that FIFA's "Ultimate Team" mode, which relies on totally random drops of cards that can be purchased, represents hundreds of millions of dollars worth of cash. 39, digital business. After quoting EA sales figures, the report explains how the annualized game series regularly wipes players' card collections when switching from one version to the other of the game. year.

"One player told us that this cycle had earned them to spend" between £ 800 and £ 1,000 a year for FIFA, "the report says." Another player told us that because the contents of a pack affected directly the game because some players were not as good as others ", this encourages people to continue buying packs in the hope of getting better players and, by therefore, better performance in the game. "

The heart of this subsection of the survey lies in a quote from a concerned British citizen, who recognizes, then clears, the "only aesthetic" common defense of the video game industry: "Children are particularly vulnerable because they do not understand that these purchases are manipulative, and their parents may not understand that these purchases are totally useless."

What should be done?

The survey takes an additional scientific look at the psychology of players attracted by surprise boxes. After citing several studies, the survey admits that a clear causal link has not yet been established between chests and problem gambling. Nevertheless, the current preponderance of evidence has at least convinced researchers that greater transparency of booty cases in games and their effective overlap with games of chance such as slot machines should be highlighted by players and their parents, unless it is used as a counterpart. slap age restrictions on these games as well as cash games.

To mitigate this argument about the qualities of the game as the acquisition of a box of malice, the study delves into the black market for the sale of virtual items, particularly related to Against Strike: World Offensive. "The volume, variety and sophistication of the advertising opportunities offered by websites for exchanging items in the game for cash indicate that qualifying as" circumvention by-laws "of" casual " considers the magnitude of this problem for some games, "says the report.

However, at least one existing UK law precludes regulation similar to that of the game of surprise locker practices. "The purchase of surprise boxes does not meet the regulatory definition of licensed gambling under the 2005 Gambling Act, as gambling objects have no real monetary value other than games", indicates the survey. (This is one of the main reasons why the survey cites so much data about these gaming objects having a monetary value on the black market.) The report therefore suggests that "the government should introduce a regulation under the Section 6 of the 2005 Gambling Act states that booty boxes are a game of chance. "From there, a new wording of the law can begin or regulators should at least be subject to public scrutiny as to why they would not do it.