this post was submitted on 24 Dec 2023
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These laws will ban rewards for spending money within a game for the first time, ban rewards for buying consecutive microtransactions, and ban rewards for daily log-ins.

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[–] [email protected] 135 points 8 months ago (7 children)

I would've expected to see something like thus out of the EU rather than China, but at least somebody's making the first move against the predatory monetisation of apps

[–] [email protected] 79 points 8 months ago (2 children)

If only those "think of the children" politicians would do this instead of attempting to ban encryption.

[–] [email protected] 18 points 8 months ago

You know you look really bad when the CCP shows you up!

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[–] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago

If China's plan is successful, other countries will follow suit.

PS: RIP my free intertwined fates in Gaming (Jiaming) Impact.

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[–] [email protected] 112 points 8 months ago (2 children)

It's so destructive that even China doesn't like it

[–] [email protected] 29 points 8 months ago (8 children)

It’s so destructive that even China doesn’t like it

They probably love that it's hurting competing nations, though.

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[–] [email protected] 83 points 8 months ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 31 points 8 months ago (5 children)

Seriously seeing this come from China is

Mildly confusing, very unexpected but very much a cool move.

[–] [email protected] 28 points 8 months ago

To add onto what the others have said, the CCP isn’t shy about enforcing restrictions on digital media domestically. For instance, TikTok in China (Douyin) is quite different from the international version with strictly-enforced time limits, content restrictions, etc.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 8 months ago (2 children)

China has always been against gaming it's the money they like.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago

If it was only money they wanted they would not do this. The limitations they are imposing will cut revenue to their biggest Game companies. I mean, the laws are not in effect and there was already a big crash on Netease and Tencent stock prices.

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[–] [email protected] 16 points 8 months ago

China doing a better job regulating corporations than the west is nothing new.

Even this current one happened while Tencent was barely recovering from another regulation set last year. Kicking megacorps while they're down lol as they should.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 8 months ago (2 children)

Yeah im sad China is so far ahead of curbing predative monetization than my own country is, now.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago (1 children)

But think about the CEO's freedom of abusing gambling addicts outside of a safe environment with virtually no regulation and that can be used by kids and teens!

I actually wouldn't have anything against gacha games if they all were marked as Adult-only, even the most dumbass parents would think twice about buying EA FC if it had the AO rating.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 8 months ago

And not only AO, if it included the same required gambling-warnings other gambling system have to show every time they so much as mention their name.

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[–] [email protected] 65 points 8 months ago (3 children)

Didn't China also recently introduce a limit of hours adolescents can game?

The world would be a better place without those transactions in my opinion. It might sound extreme but in my view this is the first step towards gambling addiction.

We as humanity are becoming really obsessed with everything digital instead of spending more time physically interacting with our peers. And unfortunately I am no exception.

[–] [email protected] 35 points 8 months ago

Part of the problem is that there's no incentive for game companies to ensure that players are of an appropriate age and are gambling responsibly. It's a Pandora's box of capitalism in the same way fossil fuels, cigarettes, and big pharma are. Their customers have a demand for their product which is driven by a physiological/psychological/socioeconomic need, so they aren't subject to normal market mechanics.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago

Not recently, but yes.

Also, there's regulation to disclose the probability in getting rewards from opening "chests", which is actually gambling in nature.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 8 months ago

In 2019, it was limited to 90 minutes on weekdays and not between the hours of 10 pm to 8 am.

In 2021, it was changed to 1 hour per day, only on Fridays, weekends, and public holidays.

[–] [email protected] 58 points 8 months ago
[–] [email protected] 51 points 8 months ago (1 children)

If there's a behavior psychologist/researcher involved in the creation of a product, it's evil, simple as. Those gacha games absolutely use them.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago

I think you could go two ways with that. The psychologist could be under a mandate to give feedback to ensure your game is not going to be an addiction or they could be under a mandate to make it as addictive as possible. The latter is way more likely but I wouldn't totally rule out the value add of any psychologist to any game.

[–] [email protected] 44 points 8 months ago

God, I hope they do that here. Would clear the appstores and other stores of 90% of shovelware overnight.

[–] [email protected] 38 points 8 months ago (1 children)

The S$20000 ($15000) Genshin Impact buying spree incident in Singapore had indirectly contributed to proposed legislation.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 8 months ago (2 children)
[–] [email protected] 3 points 8 months ago

A lot of games are starting to display warnings to spend wisely when purchasing premium currency.

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[–] [email protected] 33 points 8 months ago

Limiting micro transactions and banning predatory reward schemes in video games is genuinely a good thing. We need this to spread around the world.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 8 months ago

There's so much addiction and gambling engineered into micro transactions, it's crazy. I'm glad China is regulating it.

[–] [email protected] 31 points 8 months ago (14 children)

Even a broken clock is right twice a day. Assuming it's a clock that's capable of being right twice a day, which isn't every clock.

[–] [email protected] 32 points 8 months ago

A clock whizzing backwards at 60 RPM is right 86,400 times a day!

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[–] [email protected] 31 points 8 months ago

Well done, I hope other countries will follow.

[–] [email protected] 14 points 8 months ago

Good. These kinds of transactions are exploitative and prey in the weaknesses of people with addictive personalities

[–] [email protected] 13 points 8 months ago (1 children)

Do you all expect localization is tied to laws for china? I realy don't think so. Most games are split into global and asia/chinese versions anyway. Why should they remove these mechanics when it isn't necessary for the market they operate in?

[–] [email protected] 28 points 8 months ago (1 children)

The thought process is that for many games, the majority of their revenue comes from these mechanics and from China. The games themselves will need to change to get revenue flowing. And new games won't be made with this revenue source in general.

This is similar to how eu regulations can lead to global changes sometimes, China is a big enough market to affect things globally.

[–] [email protected] 9 points 8 months ago

Yep, I'm not in the EU but thanks to the GDPR I still see the cookies thing on almost every website I go, sometimes these things have a good ripple effect.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 8 months ago* (last edited 8 months ago)

This will also make for better and more enjoyable games. I wonder if players will want to spend more times with those games then.

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