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The casino in your pocket

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Re: The casino in your pocket

#121

Post by kawhah »

xcdzvyn wrote: post #76
hristov wrote: post #37

This is pretty screwed up, because it kind of trains your brain to be a gambling brain. To crave the instant gratification, the high of risk taking etc. I think the time has come when android and ios should make a special versions of their online shops for children and teenagers and simply ban those types of games from those shops. This will at least prevent children from having their brains rewired. Of course this w…

> I think the time has come when android and ios should make a special versions of their online shops for children and teenagers and simply ban those types of games from those shops. IMHO this shouldn't [have to] be any of Apple or Google's business. It's a parent's responsibility to parent their child, not some conglomerate's.

Do you think that it should be legal, or illegal, for people to sell drugs to teenagers? Genuine question.

Re: The casino in your pocket

#122

Post by kyteland »

vintermann wrote: post #85

> In a casino, any rational adult expects this. Whoa, no way we don't. I do expect that while the game has a house edge in a casino, if something seems random (roll of dice, draw of cards) then it's random in the way it seems, e.g. that there's a 1 in 6 chance of rolling a 6. I'm pretty sure that's regulated in most places. That online casinos and casino-like games rampantly cheat is another matter, I do expect that…

It is regulated. If it looks like a die in a game of chance then it is a fair die. If it looks like a deck of cards, it is a fair deck of cards. This is written into the gambling laws of each regulated gaming jurisdiction.

And like most regulations, these rules exist precisely because someone tried exactly this scheme at some point. And the regulators saw it and said "Oh hell no" and made a rule. As the saying goes, regulations are written in blood.

Source: Casino game developer and mathematician for 20+ years.

Re: The casino in your pocket

#123

Post by kawhah »

meheleventyone wrote: post #92
anonymous_sorry wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a meatspace casino, if someone shows you 4 face down cards, asks you to pick one, and then turns them all up to reveal 3 prizes and 1 "you lose" card, you can be fairly sure you had a 25% chance of losing. If the croupier used sleight of hand or secret e-ink cards to turn your card into the "you lose" card after you'd picked it, that would be fraud. The dark patterns and dopamine manipulation are bad enough, but i…

In that specific case sure, but Casino slot machines do a loooooooot to present distorted odds.

But they do it within, often, quite tight regulation on game mechanics. People compare loot boxes to slot machines, but often loot boxes are allowed to be much more manipulative than would be allowed for a casino slot machine in many jurisdictions. For example, slots can juice the number of near misses (two cherries, and the third reel has a cherry that's just offcenter), compared to what would arise naturally if the reels were independent. But they might not be allowed to vastly increase the likelihood of near misses just as the player gets to the last few spins before inserting more cash (each spin has to be essentially the same game). Mobile game monetization does stuff like this all the time.

Re: The casino in your pocket

#124

Post by otikik »

bakugo wrote: post #96
TedDoesntTalk wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don’t most games have those now?

99% of mobile games do. If you want to keep your children away from these things, you don't really have much of a choice beyond not letting them have a phone at all.

One possible alternative to banning the phone or total surrender could be finding proper games for them, instead of these slot-machines-in-disguise.

One would need alternative App browsers for that, the default ones don't allow filtering out apps with in-app purchases since they are too lucrative. Here's one:

https://appapp.io/us/genre=Games;has_iap=false;supported_dev...

Re: The casino in your pocket

#125

Post by [deleted] »

vintermann wrote: post #85

> In a casino, any rational adult expects this. Whoa, no way we don't. I do expect that while the game has a house edge in a casino, if something seems random (roll of dice, draw of cards) then it's random in the way it seems, e.g. that there's a 1 in 6 chance of rolling a 6. I'm pretty sure that's regulated in most places. That online casinos and casino-like games rampantly cheat is another matter, I do expect that…

[deleted]

Re: The casino in your pocket

#127

Post by aezart »

narag wrote: post #47
fbdab103 wrote: post #2

Vegas machines are calibrated with a certain win rate. The author surmises that this game has something more like a loss rate at pre-determined points. Would such a machine be legal in the regulated real-world? Or only in the wild-west of online casinos?

Would such a machine be legal in the regulated real-world? I live in Spain. I dislike slot machines and, a long time ago, while a friend was wasting his money, I made a quick calculation. Given the number of options and the prizes, if you assumed randomness, one in three coins he inserted would have produced a prize, even the smallest, that was reimbursement. But that wasn't what happened. It was more of a prize for…

> the question was to wait for the moment the machine was loaded

"Stacker" arcade machines work like that. It's always possible to win the minor prize (a little plastic toy generally), but if you refuse the small prize and keep playing for a major prize (game consoles, gift cards, etc.), it's impossible to win until the machine has banked enough money for the operator to make a profit.

Re: The casino in your pocket

#128

Post by bakugo »

lmm wrote: post #51
lsmeducation wrote: post #23

You're gonna be able to easily get these kids to lock into all kinds of financing structures in the future.

I think it's just the opposite. Kids who've grown up with this crap will be wise to the tricks. Those who don't get exposed until adulthood have no resistance. Just like how the younger generation is pretty good at using social media responsibly and prioritizing stronger relationships, whereas the older generation get hooked and spend their whole lives yelling in newspaper comment sections.

> Just like how the younger generation is pretty good at using social media responsibly and prioritizing stronger relationships

I legitimately can't tell if this comment is meant to be ironic or not.

Re: The casino in your pocket

#129

Post by jasonjayr »

xcdzvyn wrote: post #76
hristov wrote: post #37

This is pretty screwed up, because it kind of trains your brain to be a gambling brain. To crave the instant gratification, the high of risk taking etc. I think the time has come when android and ios should make a special versions of their online shops for children and teenagers and simply ban those types of games from those shops. This will at least prevent children from having their brains rewired. Of course this w…

> I think the time has come when android and ios should make a special versions of their online shops for children and teenagers and simply ban those types of games from those shops. IMHO this shouldn't [have to] be any of Apple or Google's business. It's a parent's responsibility to parent their child, not some conglomerate's.

Google + Apple's responsibility as store operators is to label clearly + unambiguously the features of the product they are selling.

If the apps offer gambling real money for in-game progress, they should say that upfront.

Re: The casino in your pocket

#130

Post by malteof »

ehnto wrote: post #32

It has been fascinating and demoralizing to watch monetization roll out. To younger generations like my brother, they don't know any different, it's just part if gaming for them. But at least something like aesthetic loot crates are a sideshow to the actual game. Some games are good at keeping the separate and you can understand that it's just how they choose to fund the game. When the whole game is just a loot crate…

You’re talking about mobile games. I have to kids, 4 and 6, and the only games we’ve introduced them to are 1) board games and 2) Nintendo Switch games. This largely avoids the problem (for now!)
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