Introduction
Why Microtransactions Need Studying
Regulation of In-Game Purchases
Players as Stakeholders
Methodology
Design
Participants
Analysis
Results
Game Dynamics Designed to Drive Spending
Pay or Grind
In Darkorbit you have to either spend insane amounts of money, spend insane amounts of time grinding or buy a third party software that grinds for you. (P239)
Upgrades to skip grinding defeats the purpose of video games that give feeling [sic] of achievement. (P276)
Pay or Wait
Everything you did had obsorbetently [sic] long wait times with the option to speed them up by spending premium currency.” (P927)
The Nerf Cycle
On the other hand War Thunder by Gaijin offers a wide range of premium vehicles, which break the game balance upon release, to make them more attractive, and then are “nerfed” (weakened or rebalanced) which is very questionable. It seems that Gaijin wants WT to earn money by selling more and more tanks which are slowly nerfed, while new overpowered tanks are released again soon after. (P717)
Game Builds Dependency on Microtransactions
When mobile games offer some premium currency in abundance at the beginning of your exposure to the game, and then decline the amount available as time moves forward. This practice misrepresents the abundance of this resource, driving the player to make a transaction to gain a sense of normalcy and power which they had at the start of the experience. (P140)I generally know what I'm getting into when spending real money, but dramatically escalating in-game costs are what annoy me. Ex. You buy magic bucks to get an upgrade only to find out the next upgrade would require significantly more magic bucks to accomplish. (P584)
Unfair Matchups
Back when I played mobile games including player vs player elements (such as C.a.t.s., and Clash royale) I oftentimes found myself matched up with players that had opted to buy into the microtransaction store and found myself at an unfair disadvantage. (P780)
Game Experience is Underpowered Without In-Game Spending
Division 2. Dlc was for new york, game update is for the whole game, with or without any dlc. Basic Content is always released late or not at all to people who only have the base game. Honesty [sic] quite disgusting, not to mention the number of bugs that every update introduces. (P559)
Payment is Needed to Avoid Negative Consequences
In Fire Emblem Heroes there is a game mode in which you are temporarily given four units that as you play levels will access to the best skills in the game without their base cost, usually the sacrifice of the original unit that has the skill. The only way to keep those characters is by spending 30$ on an item called a “forma soul.” (P284)
Product Does Not Meet Expectations
Sale of Useless Products or Duplicates
On Love Nikki there was a rather low cost promotion which was a comeback, the problem was whoever had already bought it would not be warned, making a second unnecessary purchase. (P62)Buying equipment not yet usable by my character (ad said you could use the same day) - Warframe. (P740)
Product Does Not Incorporate Everything the Player Believes
It was sold as you would get all post launch content but they recently released a truck that isn't a part of the season pass and they implied they're gonna do it again. (P897)
Early Access Content—End Up with Something Different to What was Paid for
A limited edition version of the game at purchase that got you early access to play and more stuff to be named later but never was. (P620)
Buying Something Not Wanted to Get a Desired Product
RPG's or gacha's [sic] where you have to get multiple of the same unit to level up said unit so you get 4 or 5 so you can level up your 1 main dude but "o no turns out every character needs to be at the same level as your top man for them to fuse and level up" so now your 5 or so hour journey to get a good character just turned into a 35 or 40 hour trip for 1 character. (P757)
Separate Re-Release of Product as Free, Cheaper, or Easier to Get
In general: buying the DLC and then developers giving it away. Mafia 3 recently put out a free update which gave out the entire DLC catalogue for free. Why buy games the year they come out, if they'll be fixed and in-full 12 months down the line, for cheaper? (P43)
Monetisation Strategy Changed Partway Through the Game Lifecycle
Crash Team Racing Nitro-Fueled - the devs behind this game made it clear that there would be no micro transactions in the game before release. About a month or so after I purchased the game and it got good reviews, the game got micro transactions in the form of an in game store for skins. People like me who try to avoid games with micro transactions ended up purchasing the game because the developers behind the game lied about their intentions, waited for the reviews to come out so the reviews won't mention the microtransactions, and then put in the micro transactions. (P757)
Monetisation of Basic Quality of Life
‘Core’ Aspects of Game Monetised
They then added quality of life improvements behind paywalls like bottomless inventory. summonable storage and vendors without wasting time managing limited inventory, or traveling to sell, restock on items. I purchased a lot of these admittedly and regret doing so now. (P237)
Parts of Game Locked Behind Paywall
Pokemon sword and shield DLC felt very miss placed [sic], as a fan for over 16 years it felt dishonest to lock specific Pokemon behind a paywall...It felt misleading to try to exploit fans like this the slogan is gotta catch em all not pay to catch most of them… (P86)Forza Horizon 4: In that game if you don't have all the dlc expansions, you will get missions on your map that you can travel to, but will not be able to participate because you're missing that content. This is extremely misleading and frustrating when you travel the whole size of the map only to realise that you cannot do the race. (P903)
Limited Inventory Space Without Paying
Elder scrolls online, and now Fallout 76, creating quality of living issues (inventory space) that are remedied by pay services and subscriptions. (P174)
Game Unplayable Without Spending Money
Creating an event which has 20 stages. 18 stages of which you can fulfill for free (just spending loads of your time) and for the last 2 you have to pay in-game currency to get the final reward. This is very very sneaky tactics. Even if you're notified at the start of the event you still feel like you're being robbed in plain sight. (P705)
Predatory Advertising
Unrealistic Presentation of Product
Cosmetic microtransactions in Path of Exile are often announced via showcase videos that use slow motion, an unnaturally zoomed-in camera, and otherwise situations that are impossible or not reflective of actual gameplay. (P706)World of Tanks frequently sells premium vehicles for real money by exaggerating the strengths and not discussing the weaknesses of said vehicles. (P9)
Lack of Information About Conditions of Product
Mobile games do this a lot. “Free Gems/turns/skins” then you click it and it’s “when you buy this starter pack! (P391)
Aggressive Advertising
The most egregious microtransactions come from mobile games. For instance, Candy Crush - it has microtransaction prompts that “get you” right after you were so close to completing a level. (P381)
In-Game Currency
General Existence of In-Game Currency
Anything involving buying in-game currency in order to require certain resources or items. (P336)
In-Game Currency Disguises Actual Price
False currencies in-game obfuscate the cost of purchases, making it difficult to make a reasonable decision as to something's value. (P778)
Multiple Currency Types Cause Confusion
Multiple premium currencies. These (such as in Heroes of the Storms currency for playing, currency for real money) make it very difficult to gauge what is required to obtain said items without knowing how much you are spending/how much the item costs. (P404)
Fixed Purchase Rates are Unfair
I think League of Legends again, in how they price their in game currency. It is intentional so that when you spend £10 worth it ends up only allowing you to buy 1.75 items. It feels incredibly blatant that being left with nearly enough for another purchase should encourage more spending. (P591)
Pay to Win
Advantage over Other Players
Anything that makes paying opponents stronger than non paying is unfair. In dominations this is with troops and museum. (P369)
Subscription Features
In Fire Emblem Heroes they added a subscription service for $10.00 a month called “Heros Pass” which basically gave people who buy it, 3 free 5 star Heros, a bunch of quality of life improvements that people had been asking for since launch, higher stats on specific units, and more. (P462)
Boosts
Boosters in puzzle games, many free to play mobile games have a set of boosters that extend turns remaining or clear large parts of a level. Candy Crush is the one I played. (P228)
Pay to Play Competitively
Lord's mobile, West game. The games are Pay2Win. If you're not paying tons of real world money you don't have a fair chance to compete with those who are. (P570)
General Presence of Microtransactions
Microtransactions as a Business Model
Team Fortress 2 and Counter-Strike: Global Offensive. Great games ruined by greed, I can't even think how could a virtual, non-existant [sic] item could cost almost like a used car. Ironically or sadly, the same company who made my favorite game is also the one responsable [sic] to have brought in this system. And TF2 is the ground zero of this. (P223)
Payment Mechanisms in Paid Products
The assassin creed games have that and I turned me away straight from the start. XP boost, skins and other random money sucking stuff that don’t make sense after you pay a bunch for the game. (P990)
Overpricing
Crash team racing nitro fueled micro transactions are insane. Some karts (cosmetic items) cost upwards of 25 dollars and the game only costs 40 bucks. Fortnite is just as bad with 40-60 dollar skins (cosmetic item) for a free game. (P757)
Other
Teasers
A harvest diary event where you get bonus rewards for daily missions, and a special character. However, in order to get the character, you need to pay. Non-playing [sic] players will just end up with a pile of shards for that character that isn't enough to unlock them. (P729)
Limited Time Offers
They're time gated so you can only buy one weekly, giving the impression that they're a good deal to buy, but generally aren't worth their contents. (P252)
Battle Passes
Around £10 for the battle pass where you have to play a lot to get any decent rewards, it traps you into playing that specific game to get your money’s worth out of it. (P598)
Dark Interface Design Patterns
Makes it too easy to click - like putting the button to buy under a screen that you have to push ok to advance. I have my buy locks on because of this but if someone has them auto approved they might not even realize they made a purchase. (P444).
Subset of Players Not Affected
I think I’ve been given choice by the games and it’s completely up to myself if I spend the money or not. There are games that require more in-game transactions but it’s my own choice if I would be willing to continue playing the game in a way its company wants me to. (P951)Equality or Justice? It's a game, you can just uninstall it. You have no rights to play video games and therefore no expectations of “fair” pricing. (P957)
Loot Boxes
Discussion
Application to Consumer Protection
Monetisation technique as identified by players | Reason for inclusion |
---|---|
Misleading: misleading actions include misleading advertising, artificial scarcity, false information, and misleading omissions, in the case of which certain information about the product is withheld | |
Unrealistic presentation of product (in predatory advertising) | Commercial practices which contain false information are specifically prohibited under the Unfair Trading Regulations |
Lack of information about conditions of product (in predatory advertising) | Information which may be important to making a purchase decision is perceived as being obscured |
Product does not incorporate everything a player believes it to (in product does not meet expectations) | Players assert that they have been misled into a purchase through false promises about content |
Sale of useless products or duplicates (in product does not meet expectations) | Players assert that they have been misled into a purchase through false promises about content |
Early access content where players end up with something different to what they paid for (in product does not meet expectations) | Players assert that they have been misled into a purchase through false promises about content |
Unfair: practices which contravene “the requirements of professional diligence” and “materially distorting or likely to materially distort” consumer spending | |
In-game currency | The perception of obfuscation and deliberate distortion of prices, leading consumers to spend more than they may have intended |
Aggressive: impairing “the average consumer's freedom of choice or conduct … through the use of harassment, coercion or undue influence” in such a way that said consumer takes a transactional decision that they would not otherwise take | |
Aggressive advertising (in predatory advertising) | Players reported advertisements on the behalf of industry that may be classified as harassment |
Dark interface patterns (in other) | Players perceived patterns which coercively impaired their freedom of choice regarding spending |