Spain to draft rules for loot box interactions

The minister for consumer affairs aims to make Spain “Europe’s pioneer” in devising safeguards against gambling-like features in video games.

Spain.- The Spanish minister for consumer affairs Alberto Garzón has instructed his ministry to devise technical regulations for loot boxes that he says will make Spain “Europe’s pioneer” in protecting minors from loot box interactions. The mechanism allows players to buy random chances of winning an in-game item.

Loot boxes were not included in the last update of Spain’s gambling legislation, which focused on protections for young people. However, Garzon’s ministry conducted a 12-month investigation into loot box purchases in video games and their potential risk for minors.

Its research found that 35 per cent of video games and 55 per cent of mobile games in Spain used loot box mechanisms as a form of monetisation. It has concluded that minors’ interactions with the devices could lead to gambling addiction.

It’s expected that the ministry will propose a registration system that will require age verification for video games and a ban on minors accessing stores where loot box credits can be bought. There will also be rules for how loot boxes and in-game promotions are advertised. Garzon has argued that if such controls are not implemented, Spain should take the approach of Belgium and Japan and ban real-money loot box purchases altogether.

Other countries in Europe have also begun tightening regulations on loot boxes. At the start of the year, Germany’s video game age rating agency Unterhaltungssoftware Selbstkontrolle began to include the use of loot boxes in its evaluations. In March, an Austrian court ruled that FIFA loot boxes are a form of gambling and must be labelled as such.