England's National Health Service Decries Loot Boxes

As you’re probably aware, Loot Boxes started as a thing on Team Fortress 2, migrated to mobile, exploded on Overwatch, and have been suffering a slow and humiliating death after EA decided to push their luck in Star Wars Battlefront 2. It’s been a long time since that game’s now-famous controversy, but even still companies are reeling as an increasing number of governments around the world have pushed for the banning – or at least the restriction – of these irritating money generators.

The UK is one of those places that has gone on-record saying that it doesn’t like Loot Boxes, but that dislike hasn’t yet manifested as any legal action, the way it has in other European countries. Voices have been loud on both sides – “both sides” being people who hate loot boxes vs the gaming industries expensive lobbyists – but now a new voice is entering the fold: Claire Murdoch, the mental health director of England's National Health Service (NHS).

This is what they had to say:

"Frankly no company should be setting kids up for addiction by teaching them to gamble on the content of these loot boxes. No firm should sell to children loot box games with this element of chance, so yes those sales should end."

They also called on game publishers to ban loot boxes, introduce spending limits, share odds, and to do a better job telling parents about the risks of in-game spending.

Now, Claire Murdoch has no power to force the issue – they kind of missed the vote, as loot boxes are currently given a pass on account of the fact that their contents cannot be monetized (which is only true on paper, not in practice) – but their words still hold enough sway to get people’s attention. Enough to re-ignite the debate? Probably not. But embolden people who may be having the debate elsewhere?

Probably.