Spain’s loot box rule changes designed to protect minors will allow most types of in-game purchases to remain unregulated, according to an academic researcher of video game law.
Leon Xiao, PhD fellow at the Center for Digital Play, IT University of Copenhagen, warned the government not to “mislead the public” into thinking that embedded-isolated loot boxes will be regulated by the draft law.
He recommends that the government “immediately publish a press release highlighting this distinction and noting how children would not be protected in relation to the vast majority of popular games with loot boxes, particularly on mobile platforms”.
There are two types of loot boxes, with around 80 percent of games on mobile platforms using the embedded-isolated version, whose prizes can not be traded, compared with embedded-embedded ones, whose prizes can be traded, and therefore gambled.
In June 2024, a representative of the Dirección General de Ordenación del Juego (DGOJ), Spain’s gambling regulator, confirmed to Xiao that the draft Article 5 in the new law will only regulate embedded-embedded loot boxes.
“I believe both types of loot boxes should be regulated to the same degree because they can cause financial harm in the same way. There is no evidence that the embedded-embedded type is worse than the embedded-isolated type,” Xiao’s consultation states.
When the Spanish government announced the new draft law on June 4 its headline read: “The Ministry of Consumption prohibits access by minors to ‘loot boxes’ in video games to avoid addictive behaviour.”
“The Ministry led by Pablo Bustinduy has included in this draft law an express prohibition on girls, boys and adolescents accessing random reward mechanisms in video games, known as ‘loot boxes’. A restriction that will also prevent these mechanisms from being active among minors,” its announcement stated.
Similarly, the Council of Ministers claimed: “The regulation prohibits minors from accessing random reward payment mechanisms in video games and platforms (loot boxes), and forces influencers to join the measures to protect minors. It also raises the minimum age at which consent to the processing of personal data can be given from 14 to 16.”
Xiao fears this wording could lead to parents and schools assuming the problem has been addressed and putting less effort into actively discussing this issue with young people when they can still experience harm.
“The public’s concerns have mostly not been addressed,” he said.
However, the prohibition would seem to make it harder to access skins betting, where prizes received in loot boxes are wagered and purchased on the secondary market.