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Lotta billionaire sucking in this thread. Just because you like his platform doesn't make GabeN a good person.
Everyone say it: There's no such thing as an ethical billionaire.
They should sue Epic Games because Fortnite greatly popularized loot boxes and Microtransactions. Also other games which are the real culprit such as Overwatch, League of Legends, and more. Though granted Valve did make CSGO which was one of the first big games to popularize buying and selling video game skins. But of course lots of other games do it much worse like Gatcha games and mobile games.
Can start with the OG loot boxes of Magic the Gathering amd Pokemon? So much gambling & its targeted at children.
The fun part is that a lot of trading cards have their roots in the early movements for cigarettes. Same idea for the most part, except it was typical for pinups instead of monsters or magic. You bought tobacco to get the cards, so tobacco became popular amongst kids. If you wanted to collect em all, you would buy more boxes of cigarettes, so imo it's even more of a parallel than just calling out TCGs
The fact that the idea swapped to hooking kids on gambling is honestly a no brainer, especially since the cards were the things helping sell the cigs anyhow.
Reminder: this was Epstein's idea.
Okay, but who do you want the NY DA's office to go after? Jamie Dimon? Bill Gates? Steve Bannon? Half of Activision/Blizzard?
Valve was the obvious choice.
All of them.
A good few years ago now, I watched as my two cousins, Steam voucher in hand (and he didn't even have a gaming PC btw), faffed about with one of those sites promoted by shady Youtubers.
Codes went in. Buttons were pressed. Glances were exchanged.
"Now what?" asked the younger one who's Steam voucher it was.
"Oh nothing," said the older one. "You lost."
I think it was only teenage emoism that stopped him bursting into tears right there.
He's an accountant now, so I assume he learned an important lesson about gambling that day.
He's an accountant now, so I assume he learned an important lesson about gambling that day.
Or it fully broke his spirit.....
Why not both?
I've never been a gambler because I've only ever lost. I'd say I'm down ~$30 in the last 30 years.
I'm not really a gambler either. I've been to the casino a few times in my 20s with friends, but either for one of their birthdays or they were celebrating something. I only ever brought like $50 to drink with and another $50 to play with, knowing full well the most enjoyment of that hundo I was getting was the beers.
I did however win exactly once. Turned my last $10 of the 50 into $900. And that was also the last time I ever gambled.
I did once have someone give me a roll of quarters and I walked out with $70. I figured the only reason I won was because it wasn't my money.
I mean, that's pretty sweet!
It's like me and lotto tickets. If I buy one, I lose every time. If someone buys me one I win either a free play or the value of the ticket....then lose on the free play
Gambling is pointless.
I enjoy low stakes gambling. I'll walk into a casino with $20-40 bucks for gambling, buy a few drinks, and see what I can get. If I win enough to break even and pay for the drinks, I came out on top. I'll throw 5 bucks down on a parlay during Football season once a month or so. Outside of that, I couldn't imagine the stress of higher stakes. I do it for fun and maybe turning 5 bucks into 30.
Not for the House. It's sort of their bread and butter.
Valve doesn't make the games. You'll need to take this up with the game developers. They're the ones who inserted the "surprise mechanics" into the game.
this is about Counterstrike loot boxes, so Valve absolutely makes the game in question
Valve did make CSGO and other games in the past which did have heavy microtransactions though yes I do agree that other companies such as Epic Games are much more liable for this
Is this a joke or did you not read the article?
Finally someone standing upto Valve for the right reasons.
They're not wrong, it is gambling.
country finally starts cracking down on gambling
oh no wait nevermind they just want to sue a videogame company