It's sort of like a casino saying the chips are worth
zero because the cashier works for a different company.
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/life/2012/05/16/digital/japans-s...
That seems to form part of Valve's escape plan if they're called on this. They can claim that gamers can get the items through other mechanisms that do not require monetary input. In reality, it's vanishingly rare that it happens.
Valve gets fewer complaints because you only spend real money on cosmetic items, it's not pay to win. But I think Valve has a better reputation than every other company that makes money off of gambling in video games. I usually assume companies are exploiting their players if they have gambling with in-game currency.
Yeah, that appears to be the case. I unboxed a +$300 M9 Bayonet the other week. I think it looks pretty shitty, but hey, who can complain when you can resell it? I kinda get the impression that folks just kinda jump on the bandwagon on certain skins at this point, that they desire to have something valuable rather than something they think looks good.
Others in the thread have touched on this, but this is definitely ensnaring naive, young kids into gambling and taking risks with expensive items. Seems at least once a week I'll be in a match wherein a prepubescent kid will tell his team how he gambled away $100 worth of skins, or got scammed by a "friend" in some kind of gambling pool. Folks also are constantly trying to trade-up, to convince someone to take a skin with less value for one of greater value. I personally unboxed a +$300 knife skin, and at least once a day I get some telling me some sob story, trying to get me to trade it for whatever shit they have to offer.
The best part of that was how many of them wanted me to just give them my hats rather than trade anything for it, given my somewhat low playing stats I guess they assumed I was dumb enough not to realize the trading value of one hat in particular (which I actually do wear when I randomly play TF2, so hah). So many "Hey, I see you haven't played TF2 in a while. I like your hats, would you give them to me as I play TF2 a lot and want to look cool" messages...
Again, glad that my Steam Inventory is now private and I don't see that any more.
The things that people are buying with the "micro"-transactions are weapon "skins", which customize the ingame appearance of the weapons.
At this moment they are, in order of viewers: - Dota 2 (in-game gambling, 3d party sites for cashing out) - Heartstone (game revolves around in-game gambling, no 3d party allowed) - League of Legends (only 3d party sites!) - CS:go (in-game gambling, 3d party sites for cashing out)
So from only looking at the very top games 3/4 involves heavy use of in-game gambling. Them being popular competitive games it's natural that e-sports betting is available for all of them. In 2/4 it's trivial to cash out in the other two's you'd have to sell your account.
However, I would also distinguish the "in-game" gambling in Hearthstone from CSGO because there is no legitimate or practical way to monetize your card collection. Once (or if) you have all the cards, there is little incentive to keep buying packs as you can only play with cards. In CSGO however, there is always the potential to open a new valuable skin that can be sold.
I just found it highly interesting that 12 year old's gambling was such a recipe for success that 3 out of 4 of the most popular games out there have it as a core feature.
I tend to have a Bigger issue when it's in-game than out of game because do you really want the worlds best digital-heroin makers to run casinos where your kids are the guests?
To me, "gambling" is kind of an arbitrary concept. Would you say that universities are casinos as well? They let students assume risk with an unknown payout.
It might be that I'm not defining gambling properly. I'm curious, how would HN readers define gambling?
The majority of items in CS:GO are initially generated by purchasing a key (for $2.75) to open a case. The game tells the user that the case contains one of a dozen possible items, but not which item. The act of opening the case generates an item that can be worth anywhere from $0.10 to $10,000. The in-game UI for this process even looks like a slot machine: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WpFlpyZ4eBM&t=1m45s
If you want a specific item, (rather than a random one from a case) you can buy it on the Steam Market. But that's a secondary market where the sellers are other gamers. The items themselves were still initially generated from playing Valve's slot machine game.
Valve has a vested interest in maintaining the perception that the items have zero value in real dollars. If the items had real dollar value, then the act of opening cases would make Valve a casino.
That's why when you sell your items on the Steam Market, you can only use the proceeds for other items on Steam. The money is steam dollars, not real dollars. There is no "cash-out" mechanism within Steam.
Of course, this perception is a farce because there is a large market outside of Steam for selling the items for real dollars. Two popular websites are https://opskins.com/ and https://bitskins.com/ . I don't believe that Valve can maintain their position that the items have a real dollar value of zero when lots and lots of people are trading them for real dollars. It's sort of like a casino saying the chips are worth zero because the cashier works for a different company.
I believe that this is at the root of why Valve is so comfortable with all the 3rd-party gambling sites. Valve has established their position that the items are worthless, so normal rules about money shouldn't apply.