ArticlePloS one2020
The changing face of desktop video game monetisation: An exploration of exposure to loot boxes, pay to win, and cosmetic microtransactions in the most-played Steam games of 2010-2019.
Article in PloS one, 2020. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 19 papers.
What it found
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The trial behind it
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Who cites it
19 citing papers in PubMed.
- Psychological mechanisms in video game monetization: A typology of contemporary strategies beyond loot boxes.Journal of behavioral addictions · 2026Review
- Pay to Play or Pay to Lose? The Impact of In-game Spending in Digital Games on Gambling Problems.Journal of gambling studies · 2026Article
- Article
- Associations between alcohol consumption and spending on gambling like mechanisms in video games.Scientific reports · 2025Article
- Preventing gambling-related harm among adolescents (PRoGRAM-A): an embedded multi-modal process evaluation in a pilot cluster random control trial.BMC public health · 2025Article
- Colliding harms of gambling and gaming: A four-wave longitudinal population study of at-risk gambling and gaming in Finland.Nordisk alkohol- & narkotikatidskrift : NAT · 2024Article
- The associations between autistic characteristics and microtransaction spending.Scientific reports · 2024Article
- Investigating gaming structural features associated with gaming disorder and proposing a revised taxonomical model: A scoping review.Journal of behavioral addictions · 2023Article
- Skin Gambling Contributes to Gambling Problems and Harm After Controlling for Other Forms of Traditional Gambling.Journal of gambling studies · 2023Article
- Spending Money in Free-to-Play Games: Sociodemographic Characteristics, Motives, Impulsivity and Internet Gaming Disorder Specificities.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- No effect of short term exposure to gambling like reward systems on post game risk taking.Scientific reports · 2022Article
- Pay-to-Win Gaming and its Interrelation with Gambling: Findings from a Representative Population Sample.Journal of gambling studies · 2022Article
- Adolescents Who Play and Spend Money in Simulated Gambling Games Are at Heightened Risk of Gambling Problems.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- Response to the Regulation of Video Games under the Youth Media Protection Act: A Public Health Perspective.International journal of environmental research and public health · 2022Article
- Loot boxes use, video gaming, and gambling in adolescents: Results from a path analysis before and during COVID-19-pandemic-related lockdown in Italy.Frontiers in psychology · 2022Review
- Loot box engagement: A scoping review of primary studies on prevalence and association with problematic gaming and gambling.PloS one · 2022Article
- What's in the box? Exploring UK players' experiences of loot boxes in games; the conceptualisation and parallels with gambling.PloS one · 2022Article
- Loot Boxes, Gambling, and Problem Gambling Among Young People: Results from a Cross-Sectional Online Survey.Cyberpsychology, behavior and social networking · 2021Article
- Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors.
Funding
No grant is acknowledged in the PubMed record.
Abstract
It is now common practice for video game companies to not just sell copies of games themselves, but to also sell in-game bonuses or items for a small real-world fee. These purchases may be purely aesthetic (cosmetic microtransactions) or confer in-game advantages (pay to win microtransactions), and may also contain these items as randomised contents of uncertain value (loot boxes). The growth of microtransactions has attracted substantial interest from both gamers, academics, and policymakers. However, it is not clear either how frequently exposed players are to these features in desktop games, or when any growth in exposure occurred. In order to address this, we analysed the play history of the 463 most-played Steam desktop games from 2010 to 2019. Results of exploratory joinpoint analyses suggested that cosmetic microtransactions and loot boxes experienced rapid growth during 2012-2014, leading to high levels of exposure by April 2019: 71.2% of the sample played games with loot boxes at this point, and 85.89% played games with cosmetic microtransactions. By contrast, pay to win microtransactions did not appear to experience similar growth in desktop games during the period, rising gradually to an exposure rate of 17.3% by November 2015, at which point growth decelerated significantly (p<0.001) to the point where it was not significantly different from zero (p = 0.32).
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Registered trials
Read under generation 80e0d062 · epoch 390. Bibliography from PubMed, PubMed Central and OpenAlex; grants from NIH RePORTER; trial links from ClinicalTrials.gov; estimates, votes and beliefs from the OpenQuestion graph.