Board Thread:Game Discussion/@comment-11590835-20130808070152/@comment-11948001-20130808162939

Hoots711 wrote: TwangTown wrote: Thanks Starscream. Couldn't agree more. I'm pretty sure there is gambling case law in the US that would get very, very close to considering this game gambling.

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Best of luck to you and we can now all more opening and honestly assess whether or not continuing to play and feed this slot machine is good uses of our time and money.

The gambling aspect really holds no water. It is no different than buying a pack of trading cards that has a chance for inserts at your local store. (like jersey cards or autographed cards)

Only difference could be that those are regulated and audited to ensure they are giving out the correct number of inserts for their advertised odds.

This is the same thing, only virtually. you are paying for the deck (or bridge) of X amount of cards and in those X card you have Y% of reward card.

Only grounds for legal action would be about misadvertised odds if they are saying you have y% chance and that is a lie. Of course, would be impossible to prove without code audit since you are talking virtual goods...

Saying this is gambling and illegal is just another crutch people use to defend their actions as if it isnt their fault / choice.

Know what you are spending your money on peeps!

I bet devs bank on most people not understanding that concept. This game would be classified as gambling in some countries. The definition of gambling is wagering something of material value on an something of an uncertain or unknown outcome. The "consideration", "chance" and "prize" elements all exist in this game.

Comparing TFL to anything other than another virtual environment isn't a fair comparison. You might pay £50 for a pack CCG cards and only get a load of junk, but you physically have those cards in your hand.

What Mobage hides behind is that there is no way to convert mobocoins back into cash which means they could theoretically argue that they have no material value - what we pay for is mobocoins and not cards after all. If Mobage wished to reset all of our decks, they could, but they couldn't reset our mobocoin value as that's what we "own" in a virtual sense. If Mobage were to clearly display the odds of the various cards then the game couldn't be classed as gambling as they remove the uncertain/unknown element. This is unlikely to happen though as having really poor odds (as in under 0.1%) for cards will hurt them more than all of the bad feeling.

There are numerous people who have gone "enough's enough" and have regularly spent hundreds of dollars/pounds on this game says that the game is addictive enough to detach people from real life. Yes people should be aware of what they're putting money into, but isn't that the way any addiction starts?

In truth I can't see anything changing until such time that one of the big players gives them a kick in the teeth - I'm talking about Apple, Google, Hasbro, etc. The 100 mobocoin items are actually really good value for money, people don't mind putting in a little bit of cash initially so Mobage will always have a trickle of cash if nothing else.

@StarscreamG1 - sad to see you go - completely agree with you too.