Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Diablo Immortal won't release in the Netherlands and Belgium due to loot box law

gamereactor.eu

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 145 posts

Re: Diablo Immortal won't release in the Netherlands and Belgium due to loot box law

#41

Post by femiagbabiaka »

javajosh wrote: post #29
hh3k0 wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not fair, it's predatory behavior aimed at addicts and children. I hope the rest of the EU will follow the fine example set by NL and BE.

it's predatory behavior aimed at addicts and children. Have you played the game? I saw the OG YT video on this, and I was expecting to see lots of in-your-face tactics, but wanted to be fair before passing judgement. I really don't think it's predatory. At least, not yet. Maybe things change at higher levels - they sometimes do. (I'm looking for points where you can't progress in the mainline quest without spending m…

They give out daily free items to draw you into the cash shop and then have small purchase offers to break the first purchase barrier. They sell in game currency to obfuscate the money you're spending and sell it in random amounts so you need to overbuy or make multiple purchases. They set dubious cost savings measures of 500-800% value on items to make them more artificially tantalizing.

Re: Diablo Immortal won't release in the Netherlands and Belgium due to loot box law

#42

Post by nightski »

parentheses wrote: post #38
javajosh wrote: post #12

Immortal can be played for the mainline story without spending any money at all. So far, at least up to level 40 (about 12 hours of gameplay) I haven't felt the urge to spend money. It's a little like Path of Exile in that you can enjoy the base game and the story for free; it's only if you "get into it" that you start spending money (I never "got into it). I can't help but feel it's fair to give away a really nice g…

I agree with this. Not a popular opinion, because it's not railing on a company. Free to play with legitimate and enjoyable content is a gift. I don't think I can enjoy a game so much that I'd spend more than $100 for 40 hours of play. Beyond that dollar amount, it's really $/hr for me. If I'm sitting there spending $50 in a play session, then I will not be able to continue doing so without guilt and self-loathing.

Games, particularly RPGs are about optimizing characters and builds. Especially Diablo/ARPGs. The campaign was never the meat of the game. It's a part of it, but not the core. You can't actually participate in the core gameplay loop without spending decades in game or spending tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars. Actually in the case of Immortal some things are simply not possible by only playing.

That's not a game anymore, it's a skinner box.

Re: Diablo Immortal won't release in the Netherlands and Belgium due to loot box law

#43

Post by tjpnz »

Pelam wrote: post #9

I wonder if it would be ok if the player age was verified to be above the ”gambling age limit”?

That would result in a PEGI 18 classification which is also something the publishers of these games have been fighting tooth and nail.

Re: Diablo Immortal won't release in the Netherlands and Belgium due to loot box law

#45

Post by adra »

kbenson wrote: post #13
RandomBK wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Where did "free digital goods" come from? People have to pay money - sometimes a lot of money - for these loot boxes. I'm fine with random loot tables, but the moment I need to pay to roll the dice it stops being a "random item drop" and starts looking awfully like a "slot machine".

To be fair, the last sentence in GP comment makes it fairly obvious they're just trying to understand the context in which this applies. "Lootboxes" means different things to digfer people, depending on their experience with the genre, even if those that have been following along think of it as "pay for random item roll", as I believe is the case here.

They boost the chance of getting rare loot in dungeons and possibly (no confirmation without posted loot table odds) some items can only ever be acquired with the boost active. It's loot boxes with more steps.

Re: Diablo Immortal won't release in the Netherlands and Belgium due to loot box law

#46

Post by wincy »

femiagbabiaka wrote: post #41
javajosh wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's predatory behavior aimed at addicts and children. Have you played the game? I saw the OG YT video on this, and I was expecting to see lots of in-your-face tactics, but wanted to be fair before passing judgement. I really don't think it's predatory. At least, not yet. Maybe things change at higher levels - they sometimes do. (I'm looking for points where you can't progress in the mainline quest without spending m…

They give out daily free items to draw you into the cash shop and then have small purchase offers to break the first purchase barrier. They sell in game currency to obfuscate the money you're spending and sell it in random amounts so you need to overbuy or make multiple purchases. They set dubious cost savings measures of 500-800% value on items to make them more artificially tantalizing.

They got me for $7 with the small cheap purchases. Then I hit level 60 and found myself thinking “well $100 is something I can easily afford, why not spend it?”.

I then uninstalled the game. My wife was glad and said I’d been a grumpy zombie all weekend, ignoring her and my kids.

Re: Diablo Immortal won't release in the Netherlands and Belgium due to loot box law

#47

Post by smegma2 »

jwmoz wrote: post #44

I hate how games nowadays have credits and tokens and gambling things. Totally ruined the purity of games, I'm a millennial ex-gamer and recently got back into games via a PS5 and noticed how everything has changed now for the worst.

Agree to disagree maybe, but I'm happy that many games are free because of microtransactions.

Re: Diablo Immortal won't release in the Netherlands and Belgium due to loot box law

#48

Post by wincy »

lijogdfljk wrote: post #40
javajosh wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it's predatory behavior aimed at addicts and children. Have you played the game? I saw the OG YT video on this, and I was expecting to see lots of in-your-face tactics, but wanted to be fair before passing judgement. I really don't think it's predatory. At least, not yet. Maybe things change at higher levels - they sometimes do. (I'm looking for points where you can't progress in the mainline quest without spending m…

I don't think it matters _when_ it becomes predatory. Whether or not gambling should be legal aside, if gambling for minors is illegal in a jurisdiction then i'd expect any game that becomes predatory at any point to be managed as gambling. All of this is subject to the definition of gambling, predatory, etc - of which i'm not trying to argue. Just saying that befriending children with the goal of handing them drugs…

Diablo Immortal is wild too because Diablo 2 primed me 15 years ago to be a gambling addict. It took them awhile but the finally turned the casino of my teens into a real casino. I hate it, I wish I could get my teen hours back that I played Diablo 2.

Re: Diablo Immortal won't release in the Netherlands and Belgium due to loot box law

#49

Post by diob »

smegma2 wrote: post #47
jwmoz wrote: post #44

I hate how games nowadays have credits and tokens and gambling things. Totally ruined the purity of games, I'm a millennial ex-gamer and recently got back into games via a PS5 and noticed how everything has changed now for the worst.

Agree to disagree maybe, but I'm happy that many games are free because of microtransactions.

Given how microtransactions are typically there to reduce time / grind, I'd hardly say they're free though. Time is money.

Re: Diablo Immortal won't release in the Netherlands and Belgium due to loot box law

#50

Post by water554 »

falcolas wrote: post #32

Just remember folks: According to ABK this game took as many resources as a mainline PC game. So, instead of having a D4 release, with a D5 release on the horizon, we got Diablo Immoral.

Nah this one was developed by Chinese devs.
Post reply on HN