[EdgarVerona]

I think it's important to distinguish between types of microtransactions. For me, where I draw the line between ethical and unethical is when the microtransaction is built to act like a slot machine, with variable ratio schedule rewards.

If a microtransaction provides a clear indicator of exactly what you're buying and its cost - or even if it doesn't but provides an honest and upfront maximum ceiling for how much you will have to pay to get the item(s) you want - then a consumer can make an honest cost-to-value analysis and decide whether or not to buy the product. And I'm fine with that - though the latter example I'm less fine with, it at least provides a mitigation: an avenue for doing that analysis in a rational way and creating a maximum amount of spend that prevents open-ended cycles of addiction and spending.

A loot box or other fully randomized model has no such financial ceiling, and calculations of expected value have to be performed by users entirely like measuring odds in a casino. And casinos, like video game companies, take advantage of the fact that humans are intrinsically bad at that: and that people can easily become addicted to systems that provide rewards randomly and intermittently. And unlike a casino, we ask both children and adults to try to make that on-the-spot assessment when we talk about loot boxes, which as a society we have found unacceptable for other forms of variable ratio schedule-based transactions.

My thought process is pretty straightforward. If, in order for a product to survive, it has to/tries to trick a user into misunderstanding the cost-to-value of their financial transaction, then the product can't actually stand on its own merits and doesn't deserve to exist. Or the product should admit that it is a casino game: and as such it should be heavily regulated, kept out of the hands of children, and I want nothing to do with it.