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Comment by d4mi3n | Hacker News Reader

100% agree with you, though I'm skeptical that we'd see an improvement in quality of content if loot boxes and their like become untenable.

Aside from getting people hooked, loot boxes tend to feed into a larger aspect of a kind of collection game. I don't see that stopping, and it'll likely continue to be a cheap way to keep people engaged in whatever platform is available.

Instead of a loot box, I'd expect to see more stuff like EA's Apex Battlepass or Blizzard's War Chest in Starcraft 2.

PS: I would happily throw money at any reasonable attempt to expand on Half-Life or Portal. C'mon Valve!

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> though I'm skeptical that we'd see an improvement in quality of content if loot boxes and their like become untenable.

Yeah, I agree. Once you get used to the easy and cheap workflow of creating the loot boxes it's going to be a hard sell to go back to paying premium talent to create engaging an original content that takes longer to produce and has a lower chance of appealing to arbitrary markets.

Of course in the non-video game world there are companies that create sodas and cigarettes and slot machines. And there are companies that create high quality food, cancer battling drugs, and entertainment that stays relevant for centuries.

I think with a little regulation we'll get the same sorts of divisions in the video game industry.

A coworker and I went to lunch randomly a number of months back and I discovered that he and his wife are avid WoW players on the server that I played on nearly 10 years ago. This sparked me to impulsively purchase 30 days of game time on my character, which was surprisingly still available on my Battle.NET account. I happily dinked around for a bit, leveled up my character from 70 to 90, and discovered the VAST amount of collectables that are present these days, which was quite shocking.

When I stopped playing WoW, players could collect pets by redeeming tokens/codes from blizzcon or other real world fan or collector activities, but today there is an entire mini-game surrounding battle-pets which can be collected in-game and also purchased via earned gold or simply cash. Additionally, Raid or PvP gear sets can be supplemented with purchased "cosmetics" and "heirlooms" which again can be purchased through earned gold or through the store with cash. It seems like every side-game activity has some kind of purchase available to "speed up" the time it takes to "earn" the appropriate currency required to redeem the reward. I've been out of the gaming loop for far too long to really see how bad it's become, but it was absolutely shocking to see it.

literally the only game I intend to buy on release day at full price from now until the the day I can't hold a mouse/game controller would be either Portal or half life or even better, "Half Port Life" ;) I rarely have time to play any of the games in my steam library (and there are many, most of with have not been played once - gee thanks, humble bundle!) but just as when portal 2 came out, I will make time for the next Black Mesa/Aperture Labs game. but it seems, Valve no longer want my money (unless it's tied to VR it would seem...)

At least for Portal, there are user-created levels. I had played a few, some were really good.

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