I am alright with cosmetic microtransactions, but I think "loot boxes" should be relegated to rewards for play. Microtransactions should be to buy specific items... but leave loot boxes as a way to get random ones for free through normal play.
So those are irrelevant anyway?
Apps have no basis to deceive children into spending money. Most of their practices are outright illegal depending on the jurisdiction (latin Europe), shouldn't have mercy on them.
When all the payments are forced to go through a trusted processor with correct parental controls for all apps in the platform, you guarantee that your kid will not make any uninformed purchases.
The thing about fraud is, if you do not stop it completely, it grows exponentially.
What’s the alternative? I’m in love with the micro transactions model because the alternative is experience destroyed by ads or high upfront fees.
On the games I play I rarely buy anything, don’t see ads but their business is healthy and the games are fantastic and regularly updated with new content.
I casually play Asphalt 9, SimCity BuildIt and PUBG, probably have hundreds if not thousands of hours on each and spent probably less than $20 till now. If that’s not a great deal, I don’t know what is.
I also bought games like Monument Valley or Limbo and similar. While the experience is also top notch, the upfront payment feels steep and the developers don’t update the games so the play time is considerably less.
Where do you think the money comes from, then? Ultimately, your `fantastic' experience comes at the cost of innumerable singular sites of suffering from the children and addicts _who do_ buy them.
Some people taking the tab for the rest isn’t new. Some people have more money than sense, that’s alright.
These games are high quality entertainment, if some people want to spend money on them, that’s not a bad thing.
It should he easier to stop children spending money on them but equally I don't mind adults spending their money on new things. A new Fortnite skin or dance etc. does have a cost to produce (I am not in favour of PTW-style microtransactions though)
My experience is exactly the opposite. IAPs encourage developers to make the default experience sufficiently broken (e.g. requiring absurd amounts of grinding) so that you'll pay to fix it.
Because these games are multiplayer, you peer with people that are also not high spenders(mostly).
In Asphalt 9, for example It’s not realistic fir me to unlock some cars by free playing but I would not say that the experience is broken, Years later I still enjoy a few races every day because they introduce new items and gaming modes almost monthly.
Anecdotally, I think a single purchase can also eliminate a feedback mechanism from the players to the designers, in some scenarios.
Heck, I never put in mine, I am perfectly fine with free apps that cover vast array of my usage. I don't game on the phone though. If my kids won't either, I can call it a small victory in parenting. If they will, either they earn the money themselves, receive gift (not from me that's for sure), or they will have to suffer subpar free-to-play variant of the game. Still a win.
I know, peer pressure and all that, but what happened to proper parenting and guiding children a bit through life?
Again, I don't have a kid nor spend a single dollar on these apps. As a developer of other kinds of software I can see the dark patterns and psychological games in these apps and it is pure evil.
Sorry, nothing else new to add to the topic, just venting and have absolutely no sympathy to apps tricking kids to spend money on tiny cellphone games.
My niece begged her mother to buy a roblox dress for $60, it is in a game, not a real dress. Another neighbor's kid spent over $600 for a game called soccer stars. The game is literally gambling. When I hear gaming apps with micro transactions removed I celebrate, no matter what the reason is.