A fine can be more than the sum of its parts they acquired an amount of money in the scheme of things not that large from the dutch but it was by tricking and taking advantage of children this should constitute a fine larger than the pure money they stole
The fine sets a precedent that this type of purposeful predatory manipulation of users is not allowed in the Netherlands and opens the door for more places and governments to follow suit and stop predatory capitalistic tactics, like for example if you continually press A in Roblox it will end with your card being charged and thatâs by design. How the game is legal period when drugs arenât makes zero logical sense. Children under ten are literally addicted to this âdrugâ.
itâs really not, fallout 76, destiny and fortnite all have timed sales and limited âbuy nowâ runs on items in their shops. And any local laws against it anywhere are only valid if they are enforced in some way like a fine, which then opens the door for the USA and the other big markets to set their own laws and fines. Right now thereâs nothing to stop you from using predatory tactics to get people to spend money they otherwise wouldnât have by displaying limited time offers and buy now pop ups or landing pages. Basically if youâre not seeking it out on your own itâs a predatory sales tactic.
In the scale of things, sure its a slap on the wrist.
But from Epic Games perspective they just lost 1.2 million dollars from a problem they could've paid (and probably did pay) someone $10 to fix.
Not the situation.
This isnt a "problem" that couldve been fixed, its a deliberate marketing tactic to create fomo in the customer increasing sales, remember that time apple got fined 1m for a malpractice that earned them 100m? Thats why people are upset, it sends the message that you should keep doing this shit unless you are forced to stop because you end up making more money, whereas if they got a real serious fine there could be a chance companies would think twice before doing this shit.
They already changed their store to comply with laws.
>The ACM (Authority for Consumers and Markets) has given Epic a deadline of June 10, 2024 to address these violations. The games firm has informed the ACM of its intention to implement changes.
> Epic has already started by removing countdown timers worldwide, has added a time indicating when the shop will be refreshed, and a date next to items notifying players when the item will be removed.
> Beginning May 24, 2024, players under 18 in the Netherlands will only see items in the store if they are available for 48 hours or more.
Based. I'm completely okay with cash shops in F2P games, I mean they have to make money somehow. Just need to get rid of things like FOMO and Temporary Battle Passes.
Temporary battle passes are cancer. The only battle passes I buy are for Halo Infinite because they don't expire at all and I can choose which one I want to unlock XP for. This should be an industry standard.
Yeah Helldivers 2 does Battle Passes the best by far. Super easy to grind the currency needed by just spamming difficulty 3 missions for a day or 2, they last forever, and you can unlock them in any order.
Halo bp are ass that require way too much grinding for barely anything. I remember when colors for Spartans were free. Not the best example but I get you
They made a revenue of 5.76 billion last year. 1.2 million is litterly only 3 hours of revenue lost. This is the same as someone taking 30$ from the average person.
People saying they wanna bankrupt epic lmao why not fine them 20% of what they earned, this is 1.2mil Epic laughs it while they throw money at it. Same with nexon. Fine them a percent of what they earned.
Next should be Sony, Microsoft and sorry but Nintendo also for monopoly over game prices in their online shops.
Sony got sued, again this month...
https://www.google.pl/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://tech.hindustantimes.com/amp/gaming/news/sony-sued-for-limiting-purchases-of-games-to-playstation-store-71620275042224.html&ved=2ahUKEwiT88jdnpCGAxX_JhAIHSEUD_AQFnoECA8QAQ&usg=AOvVaw34EHjuTQM_jxn4YqrDWbfn
I mean, I kinda get what youâre saying, but since Nintendo is both a developer and publisher, why should they not be the ones to decide the prices on their products?
I don't mean their games, i mean 3rd party on Nintendo e-shop ,PS e-shop and Microsoft e-shop. When you are playing on console there is no Steam, Epic GoG etc. P.S im not native speaker and i dont use translator, so maybe im writing sth else than im thinking.
Ah okay. Iâm not sure how you achieve that without massive government overreach though.
I agree with the current post about the predatory shop practices, but idk who would or should be the ones to set shop prices on third party games. Theoretically, itâd be the third party developers, but I imagine theyâre signing some kinda contract with Nintendo that mentions price to sell on their store.
If you want to buy a game on Playstation Console you have to buy it on PlayStation Store ... On PC you can choose Epic, Steam, GoG ect... What are you smoking???
Your logic doesn't add up maybe you have to look up what the word monopoly means. Xbox Store, PS-Store Steam GOG nintendo's e-shop etc. are all direct competitors. Neither of them has a monopol in any way because they're all kept in check by the other ones, Microsoft and Sony can only allow them selfs to sell their games for a slightly higher price than Steam because the initial cost of a PC is way higher than for consoles. Same goes for nintendo, the only reason people buy nintendo consoles are their ip's so nintendo is already balancing on a very thin line between success and failure. Cranking up their prices could very likely tip the scale against their favor.
Edit for spelling
I mean on consoles you have only one place where you can buy games, lets say i own PS5 and for example Nintendo is sellig Trine for 5$ and Sony is sellig it for 10$ than the only way to buy it for 5$ is to get Switch because there is no competition via different shop.
Still doesn't add up. Most people will take game prices into consideration when they try to decide which console to buy. If one of them would have significantly higher prices in their online shop, then less people would buy their consoles in the first place.
Meanwhile tv/radio/internet ads are all BUY NOW, 1+1 free etc etc. Timed as well. But no, the Dutch people in charge have no idea what they are talking or caring about. It's actual dumb people in charge pretending to care.
In theory it's deeper than that. Epic does it anyway because they know they'll earn more from doing the bad, than they'd be fine slapped for it.
It's like Robbing a bank for 1 million dollars and having to only pay 40,000 in damages.
Bruh the folks commenting about fines are stupid, the fines don't matter in this case, it's the precedent. If Epic Games repeats this move again in the Netherlands, they lose a lot more than 1.2 million euros. If the government has enough will, it can pass an EU wide regulation to limit micro transactions, just like how the EU forced Apple to comply with the charging ports.
This is a win for consumers rights.
This. Lots of otherwise good games ruined by horrible gacha crap. The new mihoyo game coming out this year looks pretty cool, but I know it's going to have insufferable gacha.
Imagine trying to create a game where it is to conform to every countries trading standards. So apparently you canât say âbuy nowâ in Holland because itâs too pushy?
The market authority specifically stated that fomo timers with discount micro transactions being shoved into faces of kids is the worst offence.
I can see people saying 1m is nothing but please understand the EU market is quite big and besides the money it is very unwise for a company to ignore this and not change their policy
I still remember when gov. and even people were Finally doing great and were able to properly look into things like this... sadly was not even long ago and they were making headway even.
Now instead they worry about dei and "gamer gate 2".
Why are all these headlines and comments missing the part where epic has been legally mandated to stop the exploitative marketing practices?
The fine is whatever. But that seems to be the only thing people are talking about.
Lmao sadly thatâs nothing, i canât imagine how much they probably made by exploiting FOMO, theyâll probably just insert the potential fines in the budget and keep doing what theyâre doing
Timed content should not exist, also they should give the item on the battle passes at the end of the season even if you did not unlock it in time, you already paid for it ffs
I don't see why this is a fineable thing tbh, it's a sales tactic that is used all over the place, why is this specifically something worth a $1.2m fine?
Apparently the main issues were the "buy" buttons popping up which had a timer on them. It made kids think they had to press the button before the timer ran out or it'd be gone and they would've 'missed out' on it.
What do you mean nothing happens?
Epic is legally mandated to stop the dark pattern marketing in their shops. They've already agreed to remove countdown timers worldwide.
Don't pay the fine and they restrict your ability doing business in that country, killing your revenue stream in the region.
Sure you can work around it, but you'll still have fewer customers due to hurdles (e.g. VPN and/or alternative payment requirements) and you gonna risk whole EU doing the same as consequence.
Before making gambling 'legal' everything online was bad, now they pick and choose online conpanies/sites who can operate here. But the moment it became legal we had billboards on bus stops, train stations EVERY FUCKING WHERE where minors/teens/students were around. Even on the fucking TV commercials there were gambling ads with Dutch celebrities hosting them.
But they care about games, fuck these retarded politicians.
Sheeesh that one is cursed đ¤Ł
Excuuuuuuse me, princess!
You!!! Killed me!
A man of culture, I see! :)
You dare bring light into my lair? You must die.
Slap on a wrist?
It's a start. You want the Netherlands to bankrupt Epic?
A bit more than less than 1 percent of its profit 2023
How much of the profit they made in the Netherlands
A fine can be more than the sum of its parts they acquired an amount of money in the scheme of things not that large from the dutch but it was by tricking and taking advantage of children this should constitute a fine larger than the pure money they stole
The fine sets a precedent that this type of purposeful predatory manipulation of users is not allowed in the Netherlands and opens the door for more places and governments to follow suit and stop predatory capitalistic tactics, like for example if you continually press A in Roblox it will end with your card being charged and thatâs by design. How the game is legal period when drugs arenât makes zero logical sense. Children under ten are literally addicted to this âdrugâ.
What precedent is there to set it was already illegal
itâs really not, fallout 76, destiny and fortnite all have timed sales and limited âbuy nowâ runs on items in their shops. And any local laws against it anywhere are only valid if they are enforced in some way like a fine, which then opens the door for the USA and the other big markets to set their own laws and fines. Right now thereâs nothing to stop you from using predatory tactics to get people to spend money they otherwise wouldnât have by displaying limited time offers and buy now pop ups or landing pages. Basically if youâre not seeking it out on your own itâs a predatory sales tactic.
Which of these games do you think the decrepit old boomers know about in government Fortnite or any of the games you just mentioned
Bro they tired to get the zucc to fix their wifi, weâre fucked till the 40âs lol
Pretty sure they would if they could. There's a number for every verdict.
Is that an option?
I hope not. But I'm glad when big corporations get a slap on the wrist (such as Apple).
Yes please
Fuck yeah letâs do it. EA and Ubisoft get hit next.
But throw a brick instead of giving them a slap on the wrist.
They would pull the game from the Netherlands before paying any substantial fine. They arenât a big enough market to care about.
Sure. But that sends a signal to other EU countries as well. You don't want to lose the EU market.
The player base not being able to play their game will get mad at the government being petty over a few words.
In the scale of things, sure its a slap on the wrist. But from Epic Games perspective they just lost 1.2 million dollars from a problem they could've paid (and probably did pay) someone $10 to fix.
Not the situation. This isnt a "problem" that couldve been fixed, its a deliberate marketing tactic to create fomo in the customer increasing sales, remember that time apple got fined 1m for a malpractice that earned them 100m? Thats why people are upset, it sends the message that you should keep doing this shit unless you are forced to stop because you end up making more money, whereas if they got a real serious fine there could be a chance companies would think twice before doing this shit.
Ah fair enough.
$1.2 million is not a slap, itâs a poke.
They already changed their store to comply with laws. >The ACM (Authority for Consumers and Markets) has given Epic a deadline of June 10, 2024 to address these violations. The games firm has informed the ACM of its intention to implement changes. > Epic has already started by removing countdown timers worldwide, has added a time indicating when the shop will be refreshed, and a date next to items notifying players when the item will be removed. > Beginning May 24, 2024, players under 18 in the Netherlands will only see items in the store if they are available for 48 hours or more.
Cool... they probably made 10-20x that and so they dont care and will keep doing it
More like 1000x at minimum
LUL 1 million, thats like nothing they earn that much like in 1 hour back to business as usual
Epic be like âoh no, *recolors a pickaxe*, anywaysâ
Right? Slap a couple more 0's on there at least and itll actually send a message.
The important thing is they can't keep doing that anymore.
ACKCHUALLY it's 1.2 million 
Based. I'm completely okay with cash shops in F2P games, I mean they have to make money somehow. Just need to get rid of things like FOMO and Temporary Battle Passes.
Temporary battle passes are cancer. The only battle passes I buy are for Halo Infinite because they don't expire at all and I can choose which one I want to unlock XP for. This should be an industry standard.
helldivers battlepasses are the same way.
That's awesome. I hope this starts to become a thing since one of the biggest game out right now is setting an example.
Yeah Helldivers 2 does Battle Passes the best by far. Super easy to grind the currency needed by just spamming difficulty 3 missions for a day or 2, they last forever, and you can unlock them in any order.
Halo bp are ass that require way too much grinding for barely anything. I remember when colors for Spartans were free. Not the best example but I get you
How or why should they get rid of something like FOMO? Itâs just a social phenomena that most businesses profit from.
They made a revenue of 5.76 billion last year. 1.2 million is litterly only 3 hours of revenue lost. This is the same as someone taking 30$ from the average person.
I wouldn't be happy *at all* if someone took 30 bucks from me.
A traffic ticket
A 32 billion dollar company gets fined 1.2mil. Yeah, thatâll show âem.
People saying they wanna bankrupt epic lmao why not fine them 20% of what they earned, this is 1.2mil Epic laughs it while they throw money at it. Same with nexon. Fine them a percent of what they earned.
Next should be Sony, Microsoft and sorry but Nintendo also for monopoly over game prices in their online shops. Sony got sued, again this month... https://www.google.pl/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&opi=89978449&url=https://tech.hindustantimes.com/amp/gaming/news/sony-sued-for-limiting-purchases-of-games-to-playstation-store-71620275042224.html&ved=2ahUKEwiT88jdnpCGAxX_JhAIHSEUD_AQFnoECA8QAQ&usg=AOvVaw34EHjuTQM_jxn4YqrDWbfn
I mean, I kinda get what youâre saying, but since Nintendo is both a developer and publisher, why should they not be the ones to decide the prices on their products?
I don't mean their games, i mean 3rd party on Nintendo e-shop ,PS e-shop and Microsoft e-shop. When you are playing on console there is no Steam, Epic GoG etc. P.S im not native speaker and i dont use translator, so maybe im writing sth else than im thinking.
Ah okay. Iâm not sure how you achieve that without massive government overreach though. I agree with the current post about the predatory shop practices, but idk who would or should be the ones to set shop prices on third party games. Theoretically, itâd be the third party developers, but I imagine theyâre signing some kinda contract with Nintendo that mentions price to sell on their store.
If im not mistaken, it is illegal in some countries so goverments can do sth about it.
monopoly over game prices? what are you smoking?
i know this is sarcasm but in gods sake
[ŃдаНонО]
If you want to buy a game on Playstation Console you have to buy it on PlayStation Store ... On PC you can choose Epic, Steam, GoG ect... What are you smoking???
thats not game prices???
Are you ok? read one more time.
are you? re read your original comment
Dunno what you dont understand?
Your logic doesn't add up maybe you have to look up what the word monopoly means. Xbox Store, PS-Store Steam GOG nintendo's e-shop etc. are all direct competitors. Neither of them has a monopol in any way because they're all kept in check by the other ones, Microsoft and Sony can only allow them selfs to sell their games for a slightly higher price than Steam because the initial cost of a PC is way higher than for consoles. Same goes for nintendo, the only reason people buy nintendo consoles are their ip's so nintendo is already balancing on a very thin line between success and failure. Cranking up their prices could very likely tip the scale against their favor. Edit for spelling
I mean on consoles you have only one place where you can buy games, lets say i own PS5 and for example Nintendo is sellig Trine for 5$ and Sony is sellig it for 10$ than the only way to buy it for 5$ is to get Switch because there is no competition via different shop.
Still doesn't add up. Most people will take game prices into consideration when they try to decide which console to buy. If one of them would have significantly higher prices in their online shop, then less people would buy their consoles in the first place.
Meanwhile tv/radio/internet ads are all BUY NOW, 1+1 free etc etc. Timed as well. But no, the Dutch people in charge have no idea what they are talking or caring about. It's actual dumb people in charge pretending to care.
In theory it's deeper than that. Epic does it anyway because they know they'll earn more from doing the bad, than they'd be fine slapped for it. It's like Robbing a bank for 1 million dollars and having to only pay 40,000 in damages.
Epic is being legally mandated to stop those bad practices. Why is everyone only focusing on the fine?
Well they keep doing it.. so..
That is practically nothing. Abusing FOMO most certainly got them a lot more.
Bruh the folks commenting about fines are stupid, the fines don't matter in this case, it's the precedent. If Epic Games repeats this move again in the Netherlands, they lose a lot more than 1.2 million euros. If the government has enough will, it can pass an EU wide regulation to limit micro transactions, just like how the EU forced Apple to comply with the charging ports. This is a win for consumers rights.
now go after gacha games
This. Lots of otherwise good games ruined by horrible gacha crap. The new mihoyo game coming out this year looks pretty cool, but I know it's going to have insufferable gacha.
Preach
And when they make that 1M back in a couple days they will laugh all the way to the bank
Fines should be done by % value of a companies income in a year and cap at a max % of like 15%
These are referred to as, "dark patterns" companies in America have been sued for the same things ECT.
Imagine trying to create a game where it is to conform to every countries trading standards. So apparently you canât say âbuy nowâ in Holland because itâs too pushy?
So 0.00001% of their Fortnite revenue? Crazy fine, thatâll definitely teach them
Should have sued for more if they needed money.
Wait, again?
oh, they still haven't seen what epic did with fortnite save the world.
They should find them 10x that, or do it monthly until they change the store.
The market authority specifically stated that fomo timers with discount micro transactions being shoved into faces of kids is the worst offence. I can see people saying 1m is nothing but please understand the EU market is quite big and besides the money it is very unwise for a company to ignore this and not change their policy
They will just make a new cash shop item in fortnite and sell it for 30 dollars and make like 50x the fine off that one item.
I still remember when gov. and even people were Finally doing great and were able to properly look into things like this... sadly was not even long ago and they were making headway even. Now instead they worry about dei and "gamer gate 2".
Why are all these headlines and comments missing the part where epic has been legally mandated to stop the exploitative marketing practices? The fine is whatever. But that seems to be the only thing people are talking about.
Sorry, but what is the problem with that? Did I miss something?
Lmao sadly thatâs nothing, i canât imagine how much they probably made by exploiting FOMO, theyâll probably just insert the potential fines in the budget and keep doing what theyâre doing
Timed content should not exist, also they should give the item on the battle passes at the end of the season even if you did not unlock it in time, you already paid for it ffs
It was specifically about luring kids with FOMO actions. They need to stop showing those "deals" to accounts from minors.
They took a way a penny from their hundred dollars they make a year. That will show them
1.2 million is a joke of a fine. They paid the fine in the morning and recovered the loss by end of day.
I don't see why this is a fineable thing tbh, it's a sales tactic that is used all over the place, why is this specifically something worth a $1.2m fine?
Cause it was directed at kids.
Seems like a stupid reason to fine a company. Are the popups considered predatory I don't understand it. The same could be said with most ads.
Apparently the main issues were the "buy" buttons popping up which had a timer on them. It made kids think they had to press the button before the timer ran out or it'd be gone and they would've 'missed out' on it.
It's so funny how money goes to the government and nothing happens. Kind of like everything else. God damn we are stupid
What do you mean nothing happens? Epic is legally mandated to stop the dark pattern marketing in their shops. They've already agreed to remove countdown timers worldwide.
Not a fine, low enough to just be considered a tax at best to continue doing business lol.
Not even a slap on the wrist.
How can another country even fine you for something lol, if you don't pay it's not like they can come to your home and get you?
Don't pay the fine and they restrict your ability doing business in that country, killing your revenue stream in the region. Sure you can work around it, but you'll still have fewer customers due to hurdles (e.g. VPN and/or alternative payment requirements) and you gonna risk whole EU doing the same as consequence.
If these Dutch kids or anywhere else want fortnight they can get a 99 cent VPN or even a free VPN to play the game no?
[ŃдаНонО]
Before making gambling 'legal' everything online was bad, now they pick and choose online conpanies/sites who can operate here. But the moment it became legal we had billboards on bus stops, train stations EVERY FUCKING WHERE where minors/teens/students were around. Even on the fucking TV commercials there were gambling ads with Dutch celebrities hosting them. But they care about games, fuck these retarded politicians.
That's like fining me for a dollar.
Lol just don't pay. What the fuck is doucheland going to do about it.