Game companies don't just trick people into spending money; players actually create their own social reasons to keep blowing cash.
We usually view 'dark patterns' and 'loot boxes' as a top-down trick by developers on victims. This research reveals that players co-produce this environment by developing shared 'self-regulation' and 'rationalization' strategies that make extreme spending feel like a normal, logical hobby.
Play, Spend, Eat Sand: How Gacha Design and Player Communities Normalize Spending
SSRN · 6467261
Free-to-play and games-as-a-service (GaaS) models have consolidated monetization strategies built on microtransactions, recurring events, and reward systems. In this context, the notions of gamblification and dark patterns help explain how specific design choices steer players toward recurrent—and potentially problematic—spending. This article presents a case study of Watcher of Realms (Moonton, 2023) with two aims: (1) to identify monetization-related dark patterns embedded in its design and (2