The EU wants to order the jungle of micropagues

Virtual currencies are the order of the day in some of the most popular games of the moment. Absolutely pointers such as’Marvel Rivals‘,’Overwatch 2‘ either ‘Fortnite‘They base their success and strong penetration capacity on their gratuity, but this is only simulated: its lucrative business is in microtransactions, which is a topic whose toxicity It has been arguing for a whilesince the loot boxes They became a symbol of everything pernicious that the system has. Now, the European Union has taken letters in the matter with a prohibition that could change the video game panorama in the continent.

Boarded atmosphere. Just a couple of months ago, in mid -January, the developers of one of the gruel most popular in the market, ‘Genshin Impact‘, had to face a Fine of twenty million dollars and the prohibition of allowing kids under 16 to make purchases without paternal content. The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) said that the game deibestly pointed to minors with its payment system by loot boxeswithout revealing how much money you had to spend to get to the desired objective: get rare playable characters. Cognosphere accessed to harden your age control system and paternal consent.

What does the law say. New EU research He has focused on a Swedish game entitled ‘Star Stable online‘, and that undertook practices that are defined in the report as “especially harmful to children”, which has led to generate a search for “greater protection” for European consumers. To achieve this, they are established Seven key principles that must be followed from now on:

• The price indication must be clear and transparent.
• Practices that hide the cost of digital contents and services should be avoided.
• Practices that force consumers to buy unwanted and virtual currency within the game should be avoided.
• Consumers should receive clear and complete pre -contractual information.
• The right of withdrawal of consumers must be respected.
• The contractual conditions must be fair and written in a simple and clear language.
• The design and gameplay of games must respect the different vulnerabilities of consumers.

The most important change will be given in what is a prohibition of one of the key characteristics of virtual currencies: these may continue to exist, but the correspondence with real world currency should be clearly seen. That is, virtual currencies become a cosmetic issue of the game, not a way to hide the authentic price of items.

And all this will be mandatory? No: it is a mere orientative guide published by the European Union, but not adjust to what it recommends makes companies into a objective of possible demands, and where they will carry out: the plaintiff will receive support from the European Commission and the Cooperation Network for Consumer Protection. That is, companies should take note, since Europe “can take new measures if harmful practices continue.”

The fight against loot boxes. These types of measures had a precedent in the search for formulas to legislate loot boxes. Since 2019, the International Videogame Community warned of his dangers for what they had of slips camouflaged by the element of chance that is implicit in their mechanics. In fact, Spain was One of the first countries to legislate against the loot boxesannouncing in 2020 that use by minors would be controlled through the ID. In June of last year the draft law that this prohibition will implement was approved.

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In Xataka | The consoles are still the stars of the video game. Real money is on mobile and microtransactions