A Critical Thought on 'Gacha' Game Design

Today's Critical Thought is about the use of Gacha as a form of game design. Typically seen in free to play games, it is an effective, and frightening monetization model that can hook people for a number of reasons._
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At Noon est on most days, there will be a vlog video. Either a Critical Thought, Industry Insight or update to the channel. Around 6:00 PM est, a video looking at a video game. Either part of a let's play, or a spotlight on a game.

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ABOUT ME:

I'm Josh Bycer and I run the site Game-Wisdom, where I examine the art and science of games. Here on Youtube, I put out a variety of videos that consists of let's plays, examinations and more.

[XxRavenx]

Hey man, I really enjoyed your analysis of the gacha game design.

I feel like it's difficult for those game studios, who make gacha games, not to be predatory when the gacha game system itself is predatory by design.
However I'm sure there's tons of ways they could do without, it's just not in their interest to do so.
Which is a shame because judging by the quality of games we get now and the excitement people have talking about them, I genuinely think people would gladly pay money to support the studios who put them out.

One of the major flaws and cash grab of the gacha system is the energy system.
I believe that just removing that could greatly improve the quality and fun of gacha games.
Some games allow you to complete missions which give you energy but theres always a pay wall which hinders your progress.

I think limiting game currencies to two or three is another one that could help.
Taking the time to have a tutorial for each currency and explaining what they do is crucial.
Having too many currencies is really confusing at best and a trap at worse.

I also find it incredibly annoying when I see games offering progress packs or currency packs priced really high without any explanation as to what the benefits are to the player and you have to figure it out yourself. It's not fun to try not to be scammed.

[rmt]

I love gacha games. Though THE gacha game I want to make is pay-to-lose. If you've played Custom Robo(GC), in the story they describe the Parts Generator. It doesn't work like that as each part is prescripted with no randomness, but that is the core inspiration to my system.

Pay to lose? Let's simplify this. Imagine Currency X, and 5 guns take 10 X which can only be gained from pvp. You had 11, and got the first gun by random with 1 left. In the store, there's a sale of 100 Gold Currency to get exclusive gold skins for those 5 guns. You buy it, nothing seems to happen. But when you get 10 more X, instead of a 4 in 4 chance of a mechanically new gun, you now have a 8 in 9 chance, because 5 copies cost 10 X and 10 Gold. If you get a mechanically new gun, your next chance with be 6 in 8 instead of 3 in 3. Assuming you get lucky, then goes to 4 in 7 instead of 2 in 2. BUT, The store just got Onix, Silver, and Ruby currencies. So you buy them. Now you have 10 in 22 instead of 4 in 7, or the original 2 in 2, of getting a new mechanical option, assuming you got the mechanical advantage every single pull.

The actual system is more complicated than this. Think there's like 6 and 17 base currencies from pvp and some pve, with the 17 needing 2 of the 6 respectively to fain after battle, and other pvp exclusive currencies, and many pve and event currencies. Shop currencies can also be won from pvo, just slowly, if the opponent has an equipment with that currency, as with many others. But the example sums it up. Buy one shop Currency, and DOUBLE the work you need for each gun until you run out.

Currencies owned are hidden, and when you go to [[basically Parts Generator]], it will generate a random part if possible that you'd be able to purchase, and keep going till you run out. Each unique gun can only be bought once, and cannot be lost, but skins like from shop currencies count as separate guns, at least halving the chance of getting whatever it is you want. If you have 1001 dragon Currency, 160 Meteor, and only one gun left to buy at 900 dragon and 150 Meteor, it'd be 100%. IF you buy a new shop Currency, then that is one, and EVERY part you already have but not in that color has a chance to, potentially dropping it below 0.1%. If it generates a part that uses 102+ dragon or 11+ Meteor, that is a 0%, and it'll keep generating parts until you don't have enough Currency for even the 10 dragon and 10 Meteor Parts.

There will be a warning.

[JM-vlcy]

I remember an awesome game called Terra Battle. Just like many gatcha farming premium currency was super slow and drop rates of high rarity characters (it was going B -> A -> S -> SS -> Z) were pretty low, BUT there was a big twist to the system.
Basically each character you get is unique (you can't sell it or "sacrifice" it, once you have it you keep it forever in one single character spot with no limit to how big your roster can be).
Each character had an SB value (a statistic that increased the probability of your character triggering its skills) that was increased through playing (0.1% by 0.1%). Pulling a character you already had increased this value by 5%. And when a character hits 100% SB value you completed his growth and can't pull it anymore, wich means that you are sure to only pull characters that you haven't finished SB maxing. Wich means that you can "complete" the gatcha of the game if you are dedicated enough to the game. So farming SB for every B character in the game will insure you that you will never get a B character again. Then completing SB for every A character in the game will insure you to only get S characters or above. And when you finished maxing S characters you enter what players called the "golden road" where you only get SS and Z characters when pulling, wich is pretty awesome.
And later they even introduced a Luck stat, worked the same but was used to get extra reward after a mission, and used the same system as SB but only required to go up to 70% and was faster to farm.
So yes this required you to farm a loooot but it was pretty easy to do, was accessible to any player, made you try every character in the game, making them stronger, was infinite (there was an energy system but it recharged faster than you spent it) and closing the gatch bit by bit, and could also be achieved without farming but also by just connecting everyday for an extended period of time.
Even if the farming was really too long it was a very good system rewarding loyal players. I know some players completed the whole gatcha and so had a 100% chance of only getting the new characters when pulling.
And the game was actually very good.

[DoomBeeKey]

I have been playing Idle Heroes for a while too, and I am burned out. Gacha games have interested me lately. All the games I have played start out fun, but that fun quickly degrades. Gacha is designed to make money. I wonder how Gacha games could be designed differently.

[marwapranata]

I know this is an old video, but you should look at the Granblue Fantasy gacha system. After the monkeygate, i found they're the most ethical out of the other gacha games. Pity/spark systems, 1 banner only gacha system, teambuilding that you can still get from grinding, a not so character reliant gameplay, and a cooperative based pvp makes them (at least for me) reduce the predatory aspect of the gacha

[pekkagenesis]

I know this video is old, but if you think 5% is bad...

Oh ho ho! You haven't seen Fate: Grand Order or Girls X Battle 2, have you?

[nulog]

Hi! Recently discover your channel and is pure gold. Usually theorical approach and debate is hard to fine when it comes to games. You can find one million unity tutorials but this is much harder to learn, but as a programmer I know that code is only a tool and not the end goal when you're working on a product. Btw, asking your question about games that works well with gacha system: I think games like Heartstone or Legends of Runaterra are great examples of combining a random system with a pvp focus. Even with the best meta deck you will not pass from low elo without knowing how to play your deck. As well, you can dismantle any card to get a currency X, and use that currency X to craft any existing card. Also, the amount of time you need to craft a meta deck is considerable short and any f2p player can get to high elo without spending even 1 usd.
My english is not the best, hope you understand.

[MMMMM]

What an underrated channel this is, subbed

[ryuban]

For my case i Play F2P music game from The IDolmaster Series which have rarity of N, R, SR, and SSR and in this game i still could get a high score on difficult song only using R OR N card or even to clear an event since the game do not have a direct PVP., and the premium currency that the game have is easy to get from daily login, mission, event and give away which could give me a around 500 to 1000 gem for one event and the gacha only need 2500 to roll multi summon which guaranteed one sr or above and for 3 months they have fes gacha which increase to 6% rarity of ssr that usually wait for. Currently I already have 20 + SSR card and havent spend any money for any gems. in my other game like Fate Grand Order doesnt have PVP only story and in the story there a lot F2P player prove that even using 2-3 star they could still clear the game or event a event. in my opinion it is back to player whether they spend money or not since i already playing both game without any real money. OF course not all game is like this but there are game that force us to gacha and the others like FGO and THe Idolmaster THeathre days that not force player to gacha because player could beat them Without higher rarity card.

[justusphillipsthecartoonki]

Thank You For This Video GW This Was A Well Thought Video For Gacha I Love It Keep Up The Awesome Work Man Much Love

[Apatheia]

Hey Game wisdom! This was a really good video and I learned a lot! I Know I'm 5 years late to the party but would you consider making a video about how good game design would be handled in a gacha? For example non-predatory systems that offer relatively equal opportunities to both paying and non-paying players? I'm interested in the possibility of this existing.

[diegocaballero]

I like FFBE war of the visions. Its a huge grinding but I like the grind. I got a mxed character in 2 months. That may seems like a lot, but my problem with regular games was that they took like 2 to 10 hours to beat. I'm looking for this long run games. The advantage of having more Ultra rare Characters is basically that you can battle against a more types of compositions. But you only need at least 1 maxed character to do something and 3 for have good PVP matches.

[zanewareham]

The game "The Battle Cats" does it decent.

[brutussmithers]

No one is forcing anyone to play these games. I love thé gâcha system.

[NS-esjz]

I know this is an old video but how do you think this idea translates into blockchain gaming?

I think it can be a good way to slowly build a game world or metaverse. In my mind, The developer is able to create the core system and keep progressively adding content that can reward the player for the time put into the game. Of course ethics is always a concern but if a game is designed around play-and-earn then it seems to be a much more tolerable concept to have to deal with. Too much constant progression will make the game boring so I think randomness with good routes of progression could be fun and fair if done right

I think gatcha isn't a bad concept to have in a game that would actually be able to pay you back. I think it's just unfair because gamers are never a part thought process in the economy other then to fund it, which is a time sink, and in the real world time = money. At least this way games could add some additional value to people's lives

[pbjracingyearsago]

War Robots is a another example! The developers are essentially selling power to paying players.

[andonstankov]

For me dislyte is the most fair gacha game

[duralumin_]

Dokkan Battle is the best gacha game in my opinion . Im playing it for 5 years now and i have spend 0€ into the game and i have one of the strongest chars. Love you nice Video