The Sickening Truth Behind Cosmetic Gaming Microtransactions
3. It's A Majorly Slippery Slope
Cosmetic MTX are a textbook "slippery slope" business practise - one which already invites its fair share of skepticism precisely because it's so blatantly open for abuse, with publishers free to move their established goalposts.
Beyond the fact that it normalises excess spending on addiction-orientated content and sells off items that gamers should largely be getting for free, on a broader level it gets players more comfortable with the idea of opening their wallets for frivolities.
After all, beyond raising DLC prices or introducing loot boxes, what's to stop publishers starting with cosmetic MTX before slowly but surely shifting over to a pay-to-win model?
Fortnite has even been accused of making some subtle pay-to-win moves in recent months with the release of skins which grant players arguably "unfair" advantages over their opponents.
With the mobile games market being a veritable wild west of games which will charge players for every last feature imaginable, the fear that this could ultimately clog up the console and PC games market is totally understandable.
But it's also important not to ignore the other means through which cosmetic MTX have had a significant impact upon both the industry and players...