GAMES | Gacha Games: A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing?
On Japanese Gacha Games writes Agnieszka Janczewska, student of the Faculty of New Media Art at PJAIT, Warsaw.
Games (G) is an elective subject that is conducted by Anil Demir within the Faculty of New Media Art of our Academy. The students of the subject discuss various theoretical and controversial topics related to video games and work towards a game studies article of their own throughout the semester. This is one of those articles in question.
Gacha Games: A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing?
Gacha games are a worldwide phenomenon, taking over the game industry by storm with more and more players picking them out of many available options on the game market, but what exactly are they?
Originating from Japanese slot game machines that offer different kinds of collectibles, gacha is a genre that besides gameplay offers its players extra content that can be obtained at random. The content is in the form of new stronger characters, more powerful weapons, or materials that are used to progress further in the game or improve the quality of the gaming experience. All of those can be obtained using the in-game currency.
So what’s the catch? Well for that you will need to step into the world of microtransactions.
What is a typical gacha experience?
For starters most gachas are free to play so you can download the game without paying any money, which is already an advantage, after all, there’s nothing to lose. You just have to make an account and then start your glorious “honeymoon phase” of gacha gaming. Excitement about all new and fresh things, countless discoveries, learning about the game mechanics, getting involved in the story but most importantly so much free content that the game provides you. New characters, weapons, extra challenges, and achievements that you can complete for even more rewards; there’s just so much to do! You even get bonuses for logging in every day! Thanks to that you can even try your luck with “rolling” or “pulling” on this digitized slot machine trying to get even more things, without having to spend any money.
This is how you fall in love with gacha games.
After playing for some time things start to change; the game seems to have run out of content and you’re not getting things for free anymore. You don’t really have much to do at that point and there even exists a system that limits the time you can play. But maybe the most noticeable fact is that you had run out of the currency that allows you to try getting new things, which until this point the game was very generously spoiling you with. But despite all of that you’re still logging in every day, why is that?
Well, that’s simple, because you played every day for some time and had lots of fun you’ve created an active habit, so just logging in and completing a few tasks in-game, that after some time and repetition are not even that enjoyable anymore feels like a part of your daily routine. And because gachas are the type of games that gradually release their content over time you stay, either for the story, new characters, gameplay, or for that little thrill of trying your luck out for free every now and then. Another reason may be the fact that maybe you decided to spend some money so now the game has become sort of an investment for you.
Either way, it would be a shame to just stop playing right?
So what’s the appeal?
The first most noticeable is the fact that gachas are initially free to play, which for most is the selling point. Other than that there’s a constant flow of extra content with updates coming every month or two. Developers usually introduce new mechanics, different types of gameplays, exciting challenges, events, and many, many more which keeps the fans hooked and makes casual players keep coming back for more.
New updates also bring another selling point for some and a vital part of a gacha experience; collectibles. From unique characters or legendary weapons to rare objects that enhance the whole experience, it caters to all different tastes and preferences which makes especially a great appeal for all the collectors out there.
Thanks to the element of randomization every player has a different set of assets and plans how to utilize them. This makes for a great space for experimentation and the ability to explore the mechanics of the game, which creates not only a unique and individual experience but also big community interaction. Players can share their experiences or help each other out.
A sense of community is important for many players and might be the reason why some chose gachas in the first place. A big part of the genre are games created for titles that already have existing fan bases like the animated series “Dragon Ball Z” with the “Dragon Ball Z Dokkan Battle’’ or even other video games like the spin-off of “Final Fantasy” series “Final Fantasy Brave Exvius”. But other than that the general model of gachas is very “community friendly”. Take the “life expectancy” for most of the popular AAA games; the game is announced, which starts the public excitement and thus marks the birth of a community or fan base; people discuss, make fan art creation and many more, but after the game finally comes out it’s only a matter of months before the whole thrill dies out and people jump onto the next game. With gachas getting constantly updated with new extra content and things to discuss the community may switch and change but it will always be there.
Speaking of the community, a lot of gacha games have multiplayer options like PvP (Player versus Player) where you can battle it out with other players using all the characters and materials that you managed to get or guild systems where you can use them to make a contribution to the team of other players, which allows you to join forces when attacking stronger enemies and completing harder challenges.
But you have to keep in mind that by playing with others, competitively or not, you will encounter someone with much more powerful assets. Sometimes winning a match or joining a team of strong players might not be the case of skills or even good luck. At some point, your obstacles in-game can only be overcome by using real money in order to gain more powerful units that will help you break the strongest of enemies and support your fellow comrades. But that would mean spending money due to social pressure, which is inherently a bad thing.
The ugly side of gacha
Let’s start with the fact that gacha games are moving in the grey zone, as not being clearly defined as a method of gambling, despite using the persuasive tactics that are designed to make the player addicted.
Most of the time the only way to obtain new content that comes out in game-like characters or weapons is by using the special in-game currency to “pull” or “roll” which basically means trying your luck in the lottery system where the possibility of you getting anything you want is extremely slim. For example, Genshin Impact, one of the highest-grossing mobile games, has a randomized reward system where you can get objects whose quality varies with the star rating system with 5 being the most powerful. Statistically speaking the chances of getting them are 0.6%. Taking into account that there could be a chance you might end up never getting the desired product, most gacha developers have implemented a system called ”pity” where after a certain amount of tries you are guaranteed to get your desired unit. In Genshin Impact your pity is the 100th attempt but in reality, if you wish to get one specific object like the mentioned 5-star character and you’re extremely unlucky you’d have to spend around $365 on in-game microtransactions.
Other than drop rates, gachas have countless persuasive tactics to motivate players to keep on trying their luck. The overall design of this digital slot machine closely resembles the systems and practices used in a casino. There are not only beautiful graphics and animation to grab your attention, flashing images and sounds while making the “pull”. The whole process is a “ritual” you don’t just click and either get a thing or not, there’s a suspenseful animation of a box opening, cards unfolding, of objects falling out of the sky especially for you, so for those few seconds you just sit in anticipation, adrenaline pumping in your veins. Didn’t get it? Why not try one more time, after all, just one more won’t hurt, right? Said everyone with gambling addiction ever. But after all, it’s not entirely the player's fault, this whole process is kind of programming for the constant action that reinforces the behavior, encourages the gambling tendencies that are in all of us to make you keep spending more and more money.
So in fact one more time does hurt in the long run.
So what’s in it for the developers? They spend millions to develop a fully functional and interesting game that the player can download for free and access most of the available content while choosing not to spend a single penny. Somehow despite all of that gachas are incredibly financially gratifying for companies, previously mentioned game Genshin Impact, one of the highest-grossing mobile games of all time making 163.5 million dollars in the month of September alone.
So why, if there’s the option to play the game for free, do people choose to spend so much money on it?
One thing mentioned before is the high cost of singular pull and it’s good to mention that when the player base points that out publicly or on the internet there’s always the argument of “If you want to spend money don’t pull!” but let’s face it you do want that new amazingly strong character.
Another thing is that this system in general relies on a smaller group of players who have the resources and willingness to spend huge amounts of money on the game. And developers cater to this kind of user base because who would spend 20 dollars on cosmetics like different variations of character outfits? Either the person who has the resources to do so or a big fan of the game that spends the money on the game all the time and is insensitive to those kinds of prices.
The last argument is probably the most widely criticized; gachas use the flaws of human nature to their advantage. They have tactics to motivate players to spend money for the long term. Praying on our impulsive desires is one of them, either by having time-limited options to obtain objects in-game or the constant “special offers” that make you think that you’re totally getting your money’s worth.
Another thing is that they never mention the real monetary value of the things you’re getting. In some gachas you have a currency that you can get by using a different kind of currency that you get with your real money. The process of changing your real-life money for the virtual thing that you actually use to buy things creates this kind of disconnection between real life and online spending on a game.
Last but not least, the whole system of randomized rewards is actually incredibly psychologically engaging and more rewarding than just simply paying for the product you desire. According to behavioral psychologists, this phenomenon is called a variable ratio reinforcement schedule. You don’t know what or when you are going to get it, but you know that eventually, you will get something. Either something satisfying or maybe even exceeding your expectations. It’s a process of rewarding the action every couple of times; not rarely for you to get annoyed and decide to quit but just often enough to make you sit on the edge of your seat. That fraction of a percentage of a chance, in theory, sounds dreadful but in reality makes our adrenaline go crazy, after all, what if now’s the time you get something good?
To play or not to play
There is no denying that the market of gacha and other loot box-based games is constantly rising in popularity. Currently an almost $30 billion industry, according to a study from Juniper Research, will reach $50 billion by 2022. Based on how lucrative and successful it’s becoming over the years it’s safe to assume that there will be only more and more titles using the randomized reward systems. With that comes the wider exposure mostly to the people who have no knowledge of how those kinds of games operate and what tactics they use to motivate their users to keep on spending on in-game transactions. Besides the monetary loss, irresponsible players are prone to some serious repercussions.
The mechanics of in-game purchases like the limited—time offers actually desensitize players in terms of future spending.
Other studies show that 60% of players that spend money on in-game purchases in those kinds of games regret doing that, but 70% of those players said that their spending habits don’t actually change.
So should you play or not?
There isn’t really one clear answer to that question, gachas are seemingly a free form of entertainment that besides initial gameplay can offer players a great rush of adrenaline and psychological stimulation which in itself can be highly entertaining for some, on the other side there is the unquestionable ugly truth that under all the shiny and flashing things that you can get hides the core of gambling mechanics that are designed to motivate and encourage destructive tendencies.
So in the end gachas are like alcohol or cigarettes, it’s a form of entertainment that can’t be just banned because of the fact that it is objectively bad, but there should exist restrictions when it comes to things like players age, companies confidentiality when it comes to algorithms or tactics they use or a clear indication of the gamling alike tendencies. Lastly, people should be educated on the game’s business model, and based on that they should make a responsible decision as to whether or not they should even begin their experience with gacha games.
