I’m very happy that developers finally get guidelines on in-game items.
A lot of times it always seems as if they were trying to scam children, obviously this is not always the case, but some really do. Having such guidelines force people to have to make honest probabilities.
Some may see this as a negative thing that cause less players to buy in-game items as now they may be discouraged too. However I believe that giving honest numbers will create a better user experience.
However there are poses the question of loot box percentages. Sites such as csgo gambling sites also show percentages but are actually wrong. They manipulate the system to make the odds seem large but actually make it smaller. They just force multiple small items in compensation of the bigger item creating an unlikely percentage. Guess we’ll see how this goes, hm.
And for the analytical mind? Maybe they’ll crack the code.
I was planning on implementing a loot box-like system where you don’t get duplicate items.
Do I need to dynamically update listed odds for each player depending what they have gotten from loot boxes in the past? Or can I just list the initial odds?
From what I understand from your response, you don’t need to give the player the god item for both the first and second try, you just have to write in the 50% chance on getting a godly item and the other 50% however you like it and then you’re set from any moderation action!
Sorry if I didn’t understand your response.
I find something interesting about this rule. We’re required to display the numerical odds of what users may receive by opening a random virtual item- but rarity levels (such as “Common”, “Uncommon”, “Rare”, “Ultra-Rare”, or “Legendary”) such as the ones used the examples are sufficient? At the end of the day, this isn’t really providing the user with a better idea of what item they will receive.
Let’s say there is a premium “crate” in my game that only awards items from two “rarity levels” being “Rare” or “Legendary” whereas there are items of lower rarity levels. There could be hundreds of items within these two rarity levels. Items, even given the same “rarity level,” are not equally valuable or desirable. Users still have pretty much no idea what the chances of getting a specific item are.
If displaying the odds of getting an item by rarity level is sufficient, users really aren’t going to be any more well informed than they were before. At the end of the day, rarity level isn’t necessarily indicative of the value of an item. Especially in games with in-game economies where items can be traded. In fact, people could effectively circumvent this rule by simply adding a few rarity levels, giving the user equal chances of unlocking an item from each “rarity level,” but throwing undesirable items in with the tiers anyway. At the end of the day, the user still can’t make an educated decision as to what the chances are that they unlock a valuable item are.
In any case, the introduction of this rule is probably inspired by legal compliance or precaution more than it is by trying to regulate the market. If that is the case, I guess the effectiveness of the rule isn’t relevant.
Firstly I am extremely happy that this has finally happened BUT it’s the entirely wrong course of action to take. Roblox is duty-bound to protect kids and should have taken a hard stance of banning loot-boxes outright.
Lootboxes are nothing but “get rich quick” like schemes and it’s extremely un-ethical to do so hoping to promise Timmy aged 9 a super duper rare chance of getting a super duper rare item that you’ve set to only be awarded 0.000001% of the time.
Belgium Ban, Belgium Ban, Belgium Ban
Countries such as Belgium have already banned lootboxes outright. How are Roblox going to “expand and go national” if they break the law in a country? Are developers going to be held responsible for not being able to filter out Belgium players? Does this then mean Roblox developers are going to break the law because they’re still allowing Belgium players to buy/consume lootboxes? Questions indeed worth thinking about carefully.
It seems to be other countries are currently heavily investigating into lootboxes. What happens in the future when more countries decided to ban/restrict lootboxes? There’s no way we can filter players by country so how can I make sure my game is legally compliant with Belgium players if I do decide to continue to use loobtoxes?
Not-an-industry-first
We’ve already seen some pretty big heavyweights having to stop/remove lootboxes. Roblox wouldn’t be “industry first” to stop/remove them. Because of the greatest assets of Roblox where anyone can come along and make anything it’s also a huge vulnerability. Developers could go to great lengths to avoid disclosing the odds of winning items and frankly there’s no proof of those odds. I can’t see their code, I’m taking their word for it. Unless there’s reports and suspicion of the odds not being real nobody will ever know the true odds.
The Flip Side
I explicitly wanted to state that I’ve seen numerous examples of good behaviour when it comes to lootboxes (pre-warning) of this thread. A very select handful of developers already displayed the odds of winning such items in the lootbox itself and with a extreme few even displaying all the box possible contents.
Finally
Roblox needs to ban lootboxes going forward ASAP. It would allow breathing room for all developers on the platform to casually start planning workarounds or different methods of generating income for their game without the use of lootboxes. A long deadline could be established to ensure people have time to carefully sit down and re-think how they’re going to monetise their game going forward.
Complete disagree. Lootboxes are not gambling (as you never open a box and get nothing). I don’t think many people really mined them, this update is just letting consumers be more aware.
Consumers are now aware, they can make a decision on their own.
Disagree from me there. I think as long as you aren’t forced to buy loot-boxes to level up, or get better at the game with, it’s completely fine. Loot-boxes that give optional cosmetics are 100% okay.
I agree with @KieranChamberlain because most games offer gamepasses that you have to pay robux to receive, but not loot-boxes. For example, Murder Mystery 2 allows you to purchase crates that can be bought with coins, or diamonds which are purchasable via ROBUX. These crates only give cosmetics such as knives, guns, and pets. While I don’t believe that pay to win crates/developer products/gamepasses should be disallowed, I still stick by mostly cosmetic items in loot crates, as to not ruin gameplay for other players. If you really have to put something in a loot crate that would enhance gameplay for specific players, please make it subtle with something like a timer until a temporary ability runs out, or the effect not being completely overpowered.
In my game players purchase a lootbox with bucks in the game. You can earn bucks for free by winning rounds of killing other players in a match. However, you can also buy bucks via robux on the shop. Do I still have to show the odds?
I have serious doubts about this. It’s not necessarily straight-forward information. It’s fairly likely that many games don’t have a simple table of items and their odds written down. This means that the moderators would have to follow through hundreds or thousands of lines of code manually in order to determine the actual odds.
Does Roblox even have consistently available moderators who are also programmers? Who would check the inner-workings of code to determine the percentages manually? From a business point of view, would it be worth the amount of time it would take to investigate each game?
An amazing step forward in the whole lootbox controversy! Obviously it doesn’t eliminate the lootbox problem entirely, but it definitely helps. That being said, how is this going to be enforced? Is it going to be based on if a user reports a game for not displaying accurate info? If so, how would a player know if the numbers are accurate (seeing as numbers are random and you could just get very (un)lucky.)
Plus I’ve already been showing the odds for most items for years. The boxes are:
Cosmetic only
Entirely earnable for free easily
Guaranteed an item every time
Odds clearly displayed
All rewards are tradeable so you can trade if you get something you don’t want giving it inherent value, no crappy untradeable filler items like Overwatch for example
Items are grouped into series so the rewards are somewhat selectable
Not sure how this is comparable to losing hundreds or thousands of dollars (maybe a life destroying amount) at the casino and leaving with literally nothing under the guise that you may win an amount of money from a jackpot that could change your life (AKA actual gambling). I understand what the word gambling means but comparatively it’s such a broad spectrum that thinking they deserve the same kind of legislation makes no sense.
Anyway, I guess by default I support this ToS change because I was already doing it anyway.
I guess that this was a fairly good call, but people can easily lie about the chances, and people will always find a way to get around it. If you did look at the source code, I know that I wouldn’t be happy. Restating the fact though, even if you did look at the source code, I’m sure that people will find a way to get around it.
I’m just stating my opinion though. I guess that something is better than nothing.
is asking a bit much if you ask me. There is nothing wrong with loot boxes if the developer implements them in a non predatory manner. Loot boxes have been a part of the games industry for years with little or no fuss made
over them. Not only would this be unnecessarily drastic but it would without a doubt have a noticeable impact on developer revenue for many on the platform.
I understand the issue of international laws is complicated but I doubt it is something that is without a work-around.
Anyway all we’re really trying to do is give our players a sense of pride and accomplishment.
Even if they had enough moderators to monitor the source code (which is almost impossible), I probably wouldn’t be happy if they looked and/or changed my source code.
Now i understand it.