Gaming

A counter-point to this I would make is that the prescence of microtransactions can be a pretty hostile design choice with regards to folk who may be more vulnerable to it. Think people who have problems with impulse control, kids who don't know any better and buying a ton on their parents credit card or someone with a gambling addiction. One could argue that they could do certain things to mitigate the risks, like using parental controls for kids, to prevent them making purchases without their parents permission. But why should this be a thing they have to be dealing with in a game they've already paid $70 bucks for? It can be quite exclusionary if someone feels they can't trust themselves with not splurging too much and have to avoid these games like the plague, even if they would otherwise really appeal to them.

And it also feels like when people talk about the option of buying a cosmetic with real life money, that its a decision thats made in a sort of vacuum between the player purchasing the item and the game. But when you add a multiplayer game into the mix, you introduce a social pressure that can be quite a powerful motivator to pushing someone to make that purchase. An example off the top of my head would be with Fortnite, where theres been times when kids who have all the cool skins and emotes rag on those who are still playing with the default stuff you start out with, which could pressure people to make a purchase they otherwise wouldn't have.

Combine that with a lot of other little tricks that these storefronts use like making you only able to purchase in-game currency in a set number of quantities, that will more often leave you with a tiny bit left over to prod you to wanna purchase more so you don't waste the leftover currency. Or using "FOMO" with limited times to buy certain items and I'm just kinda left with microtransactions feeling pretty gross and manipulative to me.

Anyway me ranting on my soapbox over haha, but for a little extra food for thought on the topic, I'd highly recommend watching Folding Idea's video on the subject as it relates to Fortnite which has been pretty formative for me on the topic