Hawaii State Rep to Video Game Industry: Regulate Loot Boxes Before We Are Forced to Legislate

Started by Legend, Dec 01, 2017, 03:33 AM

previous topic - next topic

0 Members and 1 Guest are viewing this topic.

Legend

Hawaii State Rep to Video Game Industry: Regulate Loot Boxes Before We Are Forced to Legislate | ResetEra

 
Quote
Quote
The Attorney General of Hawaii is weighing the legal issues potentially surrounding Electronic Arts' Star Wars Battlefront II and its use of what politicians there describe as predatory practices and the dangers of encouraging children to gamble. At least one of the two state lawmakers who raised the issue a week ago is also considering introducing a bill that could ban the sale of the game in Hawaii to minors.Click to expand...
Quote
"The fear when you introduce government legislation into private enterprise is that we are going to overreach," Hawaii State Rep. Sean Quinlan tells Glixel in a phone interview. "That is my fear. Ultimately, it's best for the industry to self-police." In Quinlan's view, a better outcome would be for the Entertainment Software Ratings Board to address the use of loot boxes and microtransactions in video games with higher ratings and warning labels.Click to expand...
Quote
Quinlan said that fellow state legislator Chris Lee, who also has long played video games, also came across the issue on Reddit and contacted Quinlan to discuss what they should and could do. "Full credit to Representative Chris Lee," he says. "It didn't register that we could make a difference." The two discussed their plan of attack and then released a video-taped press conference a bit more than a week ago to discuss their concerns about the game and how it might impact children. In particular, the concern that the game's loot boxes were essentially a form of dressed up gambling.Click to expand...
Quote
While Quinlan acknowledged today that the interactions in the game might not constitute traditional gambling, but said so with a caveat. "I think the mechanism is so close to gambling, when we talk about psychology and the way addiction and reward works, I think whether or not it means the strict definition of gambling, it's close enough and the impact is close enough," he says. He also addressed the reasoning behind going after this particular game now, when many games before Battlefront 2 have uses similar systems. "This is the straw that broke the camel's back," he says. "EA and Disney are two of the largest companies not just in America, but the world and Star Wars is such a beloved property. That it is being used for evil is especially upsetting." Quinlan and Lee passed information on about the game to Hawaii State Attorney General Doug Chin for an official opinion about the legal issues surrounding the game's use of microtransactions and loot boxes, Quinlan says. For now, the two are waiting to hear his opinion.Click to expand...
Read the in-depth follow up by Crecente in full @ https://www.rollingstone.com/glixel...dress-battlefront-ii-loot-via-ratings-w512718 I did dump this in the catch all Hawaii topic, but given the size of the article I think it's fresh enough news to have a follow up topic. It's 3 days old, but I fired in a few keywords to reset search and no results (another apology if this is a dupe). A notable mention to how they'd prefer the ESRB to self-regulate, so I guess, shots fired at them. Plus, the sass in these statements from Quinlan
Quote
And while EA has paused the use of that mechanic in this game, Quinlan says he isn't convinced the company won't return to the practice. "For this particular game, I think EA is between a rock and a hard place, but we as consumers have a short memory," he says. "I'm sure they will try something like this very soon. As someone who has watched EA develop over the years and consume some of my favorite studios and destroy so many franchises, I don't think this is going away. And I'm definitely going to stick to this. It's an important issue for me."Click to expand...
Quote
"EA and Disney are two of the largest companies not just in America, but the world and Star Wars is such a beloved property. That it is being used for evil is especially upsetting."Click to expand...
(​IMG)/