Currently, paid loot boxes are very popular in multiplayer games. With these boxes players win a variety of rare and useful things for the characters, and the developer earns a large amount of money.
In spring the Belgian government has equated loot boxes to gambling. According to them, the system of obtaining trophies violates the laws of the state, since the contents of such containers are unknown and the resulting things can give an advantage to gamers who have invested money. Initially the case was instituted against several projects: Overwatch, Counter-Strike Global Offensive, StarWars Battlefront II and FIFA 18. The requirements were to completely remove the boxes from the video games, otherwise the developers were threatened with a fine of 800,000 euros, as well as a five-year prison term. StarWars Battlefront II successfully avoided the conflict by removing the microtransaction mechanism before the release. Following this, Valve and Blizzard also reacted with understanding to the statement of the Belgian gaming Commission.
Special attention was paid to ElectronicArts, which doesn’t hurry to follow the imposed rules. The head of the EA company believes that containers in FIFA are not analogous to gambling and do not cause dependence, since the players know in advance the rank and degree of a rarity of things, and the possibility of selling items and withdrawing money is absent. Earlier it was reported about the compliance of the games, all the laws and regulations of the countries in which they were produced. This way, players can still buy game boxes in FIFA 18. Moreover, restrictions in the future game FIFA 19 are not planned. As a result of this decision of EA the Belgian Prosecutor’s office opened a criminal case.