Stay winning EU.
this post was submitted on 21 Mar 2025
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Gaming
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In-game purchases should display the exact cost in the local currency. In-game currency should be completely banned.
There are many many examples of predatory uses of in game currencies, but here are some big reasons devs use them besides being scummy.
- Giving currency for free: giving people real money isn't something any dev wants to deal with, so giving in game currency allows this to happen. This also applies to games where you can convert free currency to premium currency.
- Local currencies: currency packages can be set to local prices without having to localize the in-game economy itself. This simplifies development a lot.
- Weak promotion support on distributor platforms: believe it or not, iOS and android have incredibly weak promotion and sale support. By giving in-game currency, it gets around that failing of the platforms because the game can do whatever it wants with the in-game currency.
Transparency is good, but let's not throw the baby out with the bathwater.
They can give items for free instead. Without currency they cant give you 90% of what you need and force you to overpay for extra.
A variable for a value is trivial. It already works perfectly fine in the store!
Sure sales on mobile... (sounds like Apple and Google would get some needed pressure to improve this area) but thats another problem, none of these purchases should be expensive enough to even warrant needing a sale in the first place.
The real reason they want in game currency is not any of these, it's for the deception factor, avoiding refunds, upselling etc
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What does this mean for me, a capital G gamer? /s
But seriously, will I still be able to earn gold in MTGA?
I hope it doesn't affect EVE Online. As I remember it their system didn't involve any deception or confusion, even though there was in-game currency you could spend € on if you wanted to.
Well I mean there was plenty of deception and confusion among and between the players, but none from the game itself.
The first two principles for virtual currencies that they have listed are "Price indication should be clear and transparent" and "Practices obscuring the cost of in-game digital content and services should be avoided", so if EVE is honest and up front about it then it should be fine
If the conversion rate isnt 1:1 or its not directly using € in the game then i would call that confusing or deceptive.
For real. We need to get rid of games where 10 Red coins = 2.2 mystic gems = 1256 diamonds = 1.56 flowers and you can only buy red coin and only spend flowers and each conversion has a 1 green coin processing fee and you have to convert in that order. It's predatory and so sad that people get duped by it.
As I remember it: It's an online game, so you need a monthly subscription to play. That is a set price in whatever real-world currency as normal. But you can buy as many months as you like in advance; and if you buy more than you need you can sell them in-game for whatever you can get on the open market which is controlled by players.
It was a long time ago, no idea if it still works that way. But it seemed to me like a good system, for a game in which in-game market trading between players is a big part of it.
P.S. Actually come to think of it I think they went free-to-play at some point. I wonder if my account still exists.
When I played, 1 plex = 1 month but they eventually converted it to 1000 plex = 1 month or something?
You can use ISK (in game currency) to buy plex and sell plex for ISK. The exchange rate of plex to ISK fluctuates depending on market demand so putting a hard real world currency equivalent value would be tough.
Just putting a reasonably-up-to-date real-world value estimate next to any price in parentheses would be a big step forward though.
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The CPC Network, coordinated by the European Commission, is publishing a set of guidelines today to promote transparency and fairness in the online gaming industry's use of virtual currencies.
That doesn’t seem binding.
Nah thats usually how those start out afaik. They start with a guideline and a grace period. Then when the grace period is over there is a warning period and after that it goes straight to fines.
The CPC Network will monitor progress and may take further actions if harmful practices continue.
Lets see what happens.
It is in part. They are hosting workshops and publishing these guidelines so companies can work on it on their own merit but they will also take further action if the harmful practices continue
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