Parents Sue Gaming Companies Over ‘Video Game Addiction’, Because That’s Easier Than Parenting::Video game addiction. Sigh. Big sigh, even. Like, the biggest of sighs. We’ve talked about claims that video game addiction is a documentable affliction in the past, as well as the pushback that claim has received from addiction experts, who have pointed out that much of this is being done to allow doctors to get…
Absolutely. This isn’t just that kids like games and that’s bad, it’s that games are literally being made with conditioning tactics to get people playing them as a habit and paying. Not only they have loot boxes that are psychologically identical to a slot machine, but games as a service have mission and reward structures designed to get people returning as a habit, not because it’s fun. Look how many games have players going “I need to do my daily missions”, not because that’s fun, but because of a sense of obligation and Fear of Missing Out over trickling rewards.