Predatory as hell. Almost impressive how Valve manages to simultaneously be one of the best and one of the worst companies in gaming.

Stop paying for stupid shit in games or just stop playing these games. Donate to charity instead.

Best or worst, aim for No. 1!

“Best of the worst”.

Just goes to show the dire state the rest of the industry is in.

I would never pay for a cosmetic or loot box. but if that’s the story of thing someone wants to do, I think this new system is fine

Don’t hate me for asking a question. I don’t endorse loot boxes and do think they suck. But help me understand:

Isn’t this better than loot boxes?

You get to see what you’re paying for before you pay. You pay more for rarer items that clearly have very high monetary value and you’re allowed to sell on items for real money of you want.

Valve also still sticks with a cosmetics only model and no gameplay affecting transactions. Selling cosmetics only is probably the best way to monetise.

I don’t play CS, but…

I dunno, bit better, bit worse, little bit of column a and b. To me this reads like “surprise-fomo-store”: congratulations, you found the rarest of things, good job, now fork over this months rent money, you’ll probably never get this lucky again!

Sure, you don’t need to pay, but same argument applies to lootboxes in general.

The prices of these rarer items are just silly. TBH.

I’ve been saying for years that valve is an extremely predatory and scummy company but don’t let the gamers hear that. Queue downvotes

This is pretty disgusting. Just make a normal skin store where people can buy the skins they want at whatever price you(valve) decide they are valued at. No fomo. No gambling.

Wow look at this bait! So fresh!

Best of both Worsts.

Not bait. I’m just morally opposed to the normalization and encouragement of gambling especially for underaged populations but really for anyone.

Its PEGI 18

That means nothing?

Its a parenting skill issue.

Addiction is a disease. No amount of parenting can prevent it. You know what could? Regulating corporations

The fact that the skins don’t affect gameplay is really nice, but you can’t ignore that the lootbox system is just a slot machine and that they allow skins to be gambled on the web.

Also their moderation is fucking awful

I mean, this is just cosmetic stuff and you can see what you’re getting before you buy, plus you can sell the stuff for real world money. This is the least scummy way to do it.

They shot themselves in the foot in my opinion. I just won’t play video games that have that gambling aspect to them. I already spend enough on trading cards for that thrill