EU Regulators Preparing to Address Loot Boxes; SL Gachas Likely Affected

Pictured: Popular SL Gacha from 2014

If you're a developer or consumer of Second Life's incredibly popular gachas, keep your eye on this upcoming regulation:

15 gambling regulators from Europe and one from the US have together announced they will "address the risks created by the blurring of lines between gaming and gambling". The collaborative effort, organized at the 2018 Gambling Regulators European Forum, includes signatories from the UK, France, Ireland, Spain, and even the US (via the Washington State Gambling Commission). The key focus for the parties involved appears to be "tackling unlicensed third-party websites offering illegal gambling linked to popular video games"

As PC Gamer reported earlier this year, any regulation this forum proposes will likely impact SL gachas:

On the surface there's little difference between gachas and the controversial loot boxes that are appearing in many games like Star Wars Battlefront 2, but there's several key distinctions. For one, these items have tangible value. Each play is always rewarded with an item, and any you win can be resold on Second Life's Marketplace for Lindens and then converted into US dollars. Secondly, the proceeds of these items goes to their respective creators, not Linden Lab (though it does collect a small transaction fee for items sold on the Marketplace). And for those who hate the gambling aspect of gacha games and loot boxes, many creators also offer a buyout price to purchase the set in full.

I'm not a lawyer (though I play one on the Internet), but if major legal EU bodies regulated lootboxes, it's likely Linden Lab would preemptively ban gachas from the SL Marketplace. Also notable that the US state of Washington is involved in this new deliberation -- that's where Valve and its Steam game platform is based, so any local regulation impacting loot boxes may impact all games on Steam.

Hat tip: Ysabelle Stewart

Comments

[Marianne McCann]

"Pictured: Popular SL Gacha from 2014"

The picture has the word "2013" right on it. Also, that doesn't look at all like a gacha item, especially not at that price point. Did you post the wrong photo?

[Hamlet Au]

Yeah I'll update that. Iris blogged it Jan 2014, a New Year's release that extended into 2014: http://nwn.blogs.com/nwn/2014/01/fukubukuro.html

[sirhc deSantis]

No dog in this for a change but how does "tackling unlicensed third-party websites offering illegal gambling linked to popular video games" have anything to do with gacha stuff within SL? I mean - what unlicensed 3rd party websites? Curious, as the way it is worded I would think the Lab would have already been down on them like a tonne of rectangular building things.

(I did read the earlier piece but still have a confuse as that was about the ripoff scum)

[Aliasi Stonebender]

It's not just 'stuff from third party websites', as in-game lootboxes are being investigated and found illegal as well, as much as Electronic Arts is desperately shouting "CAN'T HEAR YOU!" in that regard.

I think SL Gachas might actually be on better ground, although I also won't be sad if they vanish. No-copy is death for people who like to kitbash and modify, so they really aim more towards the ready-made fashion market than what I think of as the more 'traditional' SLer who might not be a builder but at least has enough familiarity with the tools to change textures and play Primtionary.