New Gacha Policy Discussion

[Prokofy Neva]

43 minutes ago, Mollymews said:

yes they can. The question for Linden is, why would they bother to do this? 

each game and game operator has to be licensed. The next question for Linden is: Who is the game operator? Linden or the resident ?

which is an important question, as a provision of the penal code is that a premise owner commits a misdemeanor when they allow other people to run unlicensed games on their premises

ps. I did say that some lawsuits have been dismissed (like the Apple one you mention) and some (like one against EA) have been referred to mediation

i did also say that I think the argument raised by the plaintiffs in these cases was immaterial. Apple successfully defended their case by arguing that lootboxes weren't gambling as the plaintiffs alleged. The judge agreed with Apple on that

 

 

You didn't specifically mention Apple or link it and should have.

The judges agreed with Apple's contention which is the same kind of contention LL should have made!

How is that LL is more timid and less progressive than Apple?

 

[Cinos Field]

2 minutes ago, Rosekin1982 said:

It is cute you think this will happen. What do you consider "reasonable price"? 10 times what they charged for a gacha pull? 20x? More?

Non-gacha creators have been doing it for... well, since SL first launched really. They set a realistic but profitable price for an item, and people pay it. In fact, did you know that real life works like that, too? People do pay for things if they know what they'll receive!

Some creators set the price too high and don't sell anything. Some set it too low to make much profit. It's up to each to find the sweet spot. That's just how life goes!

Edited August 3, 2021 by Cinos Field

[Rosekin1982]

4 hours ago, Kyrah Abattoir said:

Probabilities tells us that someone, has to be left holding the bag at the end of the day, you're just hoping it won't be you.

Gacha creators rarely published the odds on their "rares" (and never the machine's internal working which might not even be random at all) because the point of a gacha is to delude you into thinking that it might actually only take a single spin for you to get what you want.

As a frequent player of Gachas I can confirm it CAN take only 1 pull to get the item you want. Will it be every time? Nope. Most Gacha vendors ran honest machines. It is sad that the small minority that cheated gave the entire Gacha creator pool a bad rep.

[Kitty Barnett]

20 minutes ago, Deathly Fright said:

as I understand it, an avi lock could be made where if in 1 minute the person who just purchased has a chance to buy more and only they can buy

Lock-in would just prevent the automation from stealing someone's rare; someone will at some point leave up the common you want. Either because they don't want it, or because they've gotten it 5 times already and are fed up and let their lock-in time expire.

It can then be bought, you get a roll of your own for one of the other items you want - including the rare - and then it goes back to sleep to wait for anything else on the list to become available.

18 minutes ago, Kricket Calamity said:

There are usually time limits at events, most big events would have the bot kicked out well before it could snipe things. I've been at an event camming around and was kicked out for inactivity after 30 mins. 

Different scenario then: someone registers X amount of accounts to swap them in and out as the timer hits. They also advertise their service and for a small mark-up to be paid on delivery will attempt to get you the exact item you want. For diserable gachas the bot might grab most of the items since at least one person is a 'guaranteed' buyer of the item which gives the operator a very large amount of rolls for rares to sell at a heavy mark-up.

People can get the item they want at the almost at-cost price without having to bother searching the marketplace and you can still get individual rares (for a mark-up) as is the case now.

Which would actually be an improvement and I guess I'll stop arguing against it and wait for someone to set it up 😁.

Edited August 3, 2021 by Kitty Barnett

[Sukubia Scarmon]

I'm happy about this. I hate gachas, mainly because they've become increasingly predatory and anti-consumer. I'm glad most of my favorite brands quit doing them some time ago. There's only that still does this, and to make it worse, they're one of the most predatory. I'm *still* salty about the gacha with two bland commons that are just two of the 5 Rares without the decoration, and at least one of the rares has a much lower chance of getting (ultrarare) without it ever being disclosed somewhere.
(And I'm fairly sure they've been talked about as a bad example on here, without namedropiing, of course)
@Adeon Writer mentioned in the beginning that he took a look at some of those scripts - them rarely being simple dice rolls, abysmall low rates, and apparently even a *scripted in* chance to get a duplicate. Let that sink in please. In a game of chance, where even if all items had the same chance of dropping you'd likely get duplicates anyway, some scripted in a higher propability to get a duplicate on top.  (At least that's how I understood it. Correct me if I am wrong, please)
The way gachas started out, I was fine with it. You know, the same item different colours, or different items - but all had the same chance. I was fine with the rare being a fatpack of the stuff. But I've become increasingly unhappy over the time. Complete outfits getting dissassembled and the single items barely usuable on their own, because they matched with nothing else.. yeah, nice. Ever increasingly rarer tiers with ever dropping chances.. yeah. Of course crap like that is successfull, because it exploits human imperfection.
Sell me the stuff directly. I'm okay with increased prices. But make them goddamn mod and copy.

[Scum Pond]

2 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

How is that LL is more timid and less progressive than Apple?

$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$

 

Apple has a literal raft of money that could make an aircraft carrier, the Lab does not have Apple money to sit in litigation hiring more lawyers because it's fun and they're bored.

Edited August 3, 2021 by Scum Pond

[Rosekin1982]

2 minutes ago, Cinos Field said:

Non-gacha creators have been doing it for... well, since SL first launched really. They set a realistic but profitable price for an item, and people pay it. In fact, did you know that real life works like that, too? People do pay for things if they know what they'll receive!

My point is that what you consider "reasonable" and what the creator considers "reasonable" likely vastly differ. I cannot name all the times I have passed on buying a really nice item from a normal vendor due to the ridiculous price they wanted.

[Little Hexem]

Hello! I know that many peoples are creating scripts for creators, events and vendors. I and many of my friends (product creators) have encountered a problem and are very upset about this situation. Due to the recent change in Linden Labs gacha policy, many designers have trouble coming up with something with their old gacha products. 
I have a great idea how to continue using the gacha and not violate the rules of the  Linden Labs policy. 
We can add an indication of the prize to the gacha script. That is, above the gacha machine or in the additional window there will be an indicator "next prize + name / number of the prize "then the person will see what he is paying for and there will be no violation of the rules. Maybe you can make such a script? It could help many sl designers  ❤️ 

With best wishes, Little Hexem

[Chris Corvinus]

32 minutes ago, Deathly Fright said:

if it's a new gacha, then people will wait

No, they won't. You have to factor in lag. No ones gonna wait in line for potentially an hour and a half or longer for a chance at something. Would you?

[Faly Breen]

i actually got a system in mind how future "gachas" will kinda work like, it would basicly work nearly like an "blueprint" system.

To explain that:

- Insteed of gachas, people have to buy (or get) different "materials"

- Said materials can be traided in for the item they wanted.

- Depending of "rarety", the item needs X materials.

 

I think games like rocket league did that since they tried to get away from lootboxes that you "basicly" know what you will end up with but have now to farm materials for it.

[Cinos Field]

1 minute ago, Rosekin1982 said:

My point is that what you consider "reasonable" and what the creator considers "reasonable" likely vastly differ. I cannot name all the times I have passed on buying a really nice item from a normal vendor due to the ridiculous price they wanted.

Well, if the buyer and the creator disagree on a reasonable price, the creator won't sell anything and the buyer will buy from elsewhere. I don't see how this is a problem!

[Lark Lemongrass]

Gambling???!!!  Gacha machines are basically like the little machines in car washes, grocery stores, etc. where a kid puts in a quarter and doesn't know, ahead of time, which toy or what color gumball will come out. I will miss gachas.

Edited August 3, 2021 by Lark Lemongrass

[Deathly Fright]

Just now, Chris Nova said:

No, they won't. You have to factor in lag. No ones gonna wait in line for potentially an hour and a half or longer for a chance at something. Would you?

I don't do them in the first place, so no, I never wait. but people will wait

[Kytteh Wytchwood]

18 hours ago, jwenting said:

gachas are gambling, just as are lootboxes in mobile games.
That's illegal according to the law of several countries LL operates in, and seriously frowned upon in many others.

What surprises me is how it took them so long. Maybe they finally got a cease and desist letter from the EU.

Gachas are NOT gambling. When you gamble in a casino, you are not guaranteed a win after putting up your money in the form of a bet amount. Gachas were inspired by the Japanese gachapon machines that you put coins in and get a prize in a plastic ball package. Those machines are placed in retail stores in malls. They show a picture of what you can get. Just like those machines in grocery stores, where you can get cheap little toys.

You don't lose out on anything. The bonus was that you could resell the gacha on the marketplace or in-world, with the creator's permission. Then you are earning your money back for a common and making double or more back on rare products.

I think because there is a gacha frenzy going on, it could be why LL wants to put a stop to it. Especially when people complain and say they want to buy a specific color/ pattern, but wanting it at the super cheap price of a gacha.

This is actually helping creators to earn more profit with the actual value of the product's pricing point, instead of bending over backwards and selling under value.

Edited August 3, 2021 by Kytteh Wytchwood
typing errors

[Cinos Field]

5 minutes ago, Sukubia Scarmon said:

@Adeon Writer mentioned in the beginning that he took a look at some of those scripts - them rarely being simple dice rolls, abysmall low rates, and apparently even a *scripted in* chance to get a duplicate. Let that sink in please. In a game of chance, where even if all items had the same chance of dropping you'd likely get duplicates anyway, some scripted in a higher propability to get a duplicate on top.  (At least that's how I understood it. Correct me if I am wrong, please)

Yes, and that's not the height of scummy scripting either. I had an acquintance who made gacha scripts. These included features such as "make it impossible to get the ultra rare before X number of rolls" to guarantee a definite minimum payout, said bias towards duplicates, and features such as getting a guaranteed early but low desirability rare to get the buyer to spend more trying to get the one they actually want later... which wouldn't appear for quite a while because the odds lower after the first one.

And so on. It's all black box scripts, nobody knows what they do. We can probably assume most sellers were honest, though... I hope.

[Faly Breen]

"The level of chance does not matter, or if you disclose it, including the ratios, percentages, etc, if the output is unknown (chance based in any way), that combination of mechanisms is what will be prohibited moving forward."

SO with that in mind, basicly 7seas (and other fishing games), collecting cards, breedables (where you NEED food or a "key item" that your breeds create a new random breedable), blind/blackboxes are forbitten. Literally everything now where you can get something "random" out of it, will be forbitten.

 

So think about that for a moment guys: It will not only be gachas at this point, all and everything which is based on random chances "similar" to gachas "somewhat", will be against the rules.

 

[Cinos Field]

2 minutes ago, Kytteh Wytchwood said:

Gachas are NOT gambling. When you gamble in a casino, you are not guaranteed a win after putting up your money in the form of a bet amount. Gachas were inspired by the Japanese gachapon machines that you put coins in and get a prize in a plastic ball package. Those machines are placed in retail stores in malls. They show a picture of what you can get. Just like those machines in grocery stores, where you can get cheap little toys.

You don't lose out on anything. The bonus was that you could resell the gacha on the marketplace or in-world, with the creator's permission. Then you are earning your money back for a common and making double or more back on rare products.

I think because there is a gacha frenzy going on, it could be why LL wants to put a stop to it. Especially when people complain and say they want to buy a specific color/ pattern, but wanting it at the super cheap price of a gacha.

This is actually helping creators to earn more profit with the actual value of the product's pricing point, instead of bending over backwards and selling under value.

So you'd argue that a slot machine that always returns at least one coin is not gambling because you always guaranteed a "win"?

[Denis Cloud]

When you are going to some arcade place in RL, you can find there good number of the machines that are giving you a random prize and it's perfectly legal even at the regions where gambling is prohibited, so I don't see how gacha machines are violating gaming policy.

Now, if gachas are violating the gaming policy, why they could not remain at Skill Gaming Regions, as well as all gacha shopping evens that could move there instead of just die?

[Kyrah Abattoir]

7 minutes ago, Rosekin1982 said:

As a frequent player of Gachas I can confirm it CAN take only 1 pull to get the item you want. Will it be every time? Nope. Most Gacha vendors ran honest machines. It is sad that the small minority that cheated gave the entire Gacha creator pool a bad rep.

It can but it generally won't, a 1 in 100 rare people try to get at 50L$ a spin will on average bring back 5000L$ per copy delivered. It doesn't matter if one day it takes you a single spin, over a long period of time, it will average to this.

[VergilISparda]

2 hours ago, Kytteh Wytchwood said:

Gachas are NOT gambling. When you gamble in a casino, you are not guaranteed a win after putting up your money in the form of a bet amount. Gachas were inspired by the Japanese gachapon machines that you put coins in and get a prize in a plastic ball package. Those machines are placed in retail stores in malls. They show a picture of what you can get. Just like those machines in grocery stores, where you can get cheap little toys.

You don't lose out on anything. The bonus was that you could resell the gacha on the marketplace or in-world, with the creator's permission. Then you are earning your money back for a common and making double or more back on rare products.

I think because there is a gacha frenzy going on, it could be why LL wants to put a stop to it. Especially when people complain and say they want to buy a specific color/ pattern, but wanting it at the super cheap price of a gacha.

This is actually helping creators to earn more profit with the actual value of the product's pricing point, instead of bending over backwards and selling under value.

There are many forms of gambling though.

Edited August 3, 2021 by VergilISparda

[Sammy Huntsman]

5 minutes ago, Lark Lemongrass said:

Gambling???!!!  Gacha machines are basically like the little machines in car washes, grocery stores, etc. where a kid puts in a quarter and does know, ahead of time, which toy or what color gumball will come out. I will miss gachas.

Yeah when it first started out. Now that is not the case. When Gachas first started out in SL, you would get a trinket within the same specs, but different colour. Nowadays, it has become everything is different. Especially when you factor in, that today people were literally selling homes and all the interior and exterior decor. I would beg to differ that it is the same as that. At least with a gumball machine, I knew I was getting a gumball that was the same size and weight, but a different colour. 

[Marianne Little]

1 hour ago, rainbow Fairymeadow said:

Thanks for the answe  I am just trying to figure out WHY they are modfiable in the first place.. help me out

And also, a color like "teal" can be an almost infinite number of nuances. If I will match a pair of shoes with a purse, and both are no modify, I am stuck with your pick of teal in the shoes, and another creators pick of teal in the purse.

I would not be able to take one of them and tweak the color so it matches better to the other parts of my outfit.

Same goes with brick red, firebrick, wine red and fired brick, all who are close and if you look them up in Pantone they are "almost" the same.

[Ellie Gilmour]

Why don't they just restrict it to certain places like they do with actual gambling sims instead of taking it out completely? I personally don't see it as gambling when you receive something for every payment unlike the "skilled gaming" machines.. at least with gacha you have a chance to make your money back by reselling on market place.

[Sammy Huntsman]

4 minutes ago, Cinos Field said:

So you'd argue that a slot machine that always returns at least one coin is not gambling because you always guaranteed a "win"?

I would have to agree with you, Gacha machines are more comparable to Slot Machines and last time I went to a Casino and this was when I was 18. I constantly won a small denomination, whether it be a cent up to 10 cents. 

[Mollymews]

2 minutes ago, Prokofy Neva said:

You didn't specifically mention Apple or link it and should have.

The judges agreed with Apple's contention which is the same kind of contention LL should have made!

How is that LL is more timid and less progressive than Apple?

 

yes you are right. I should have linked the Apple case. The lootbox is gambling argument is also being pursued in California against Google and EA in separate class action lawsuits also. And I think that argument is doomed as well given the Apple case outcome

altho to be fair to the Apple case plaintiffs the judge in that case gave them leave to appeal the decision, even tho the judge said they didn't see any merit in appealing given the plain textual reading of the statute