Valve are being sued by New York attorney general Letitia James, with the lawsuit alleging loot boxes in games like Counter-Strike 2 violate gambling laws,
On top of that, casinos and betting apps and race tracks tend to have their own extra tax rate to pay, which valve is assuredly not currently paying on their illegal gambling revenue.
I think technically, yes. However, the one potentially redeeming point those have that these skins do not are that they’re actually a functional part of the game.
These skins serve no purpose, and have turned into the same loophole that those Japanese pachinko bars use to get around the gambling laws there - give a useless trinket as a prize and just coincidentally be located next door to a place that will buy certain useless trinkets for absurd amounts of money.
Have you seen MTG players? There’s literally a site that tracks card prices like a stock market.
I’ll give TCG’s one iota of credit. If Hasbro goes bankrupt and shuts down, nobody can stop you and a friend from playing magic with the cards you have.
If Valve shuts down, or shuts down CS2, your and your friend’s skins disappear forever and you have no way of playing with them again.
These are state laws, not federal.
On top of that, casinos and betting apps and race tracks tend to have their own extra tax rate to pay, which valve is assuredly not currently paying on their illegal gambling revenue.
So would you classify Pokemon/MTG/Yu-Gi-Oh/etc. as illegal gambling as well?
I think technically, yes. However, the one potentially redeeming point those have that these skins do not are that they’re actually a functional part of the game.
These skins serve no purpose, and have turned into the same loophole that those Japanese pachinko bars use to get around the gambling laws there - give a useless trinket as a prize and just coincidentally be located next door to a place that will buy certain useless trinkets for absurd amounts of money.
Have you seen MTG players? There’s literally a site that tracks card prices like a stock market.
I’ll give TCG’s one iota of credit. If Hasbro goes bankrupt and shuts down, nobody can stop you and a friend from playing magic with the cards you have.
If Valve shuts down, or shuts down CS2, your and your friend’s skins disappear forever and you have no way of playing with them again.