Tarnish in dutch

Dutch Gaming Authority calls out four games as violating its lootbox policies

If you had expected the Netherlands to be leading the fight against lootboxes, you may be more clairvoyant than the rest of the population. After investigating 10 games, the Dutch Gaming Authority has found that four of the games tested feature lootboxes that violate the Better Gaming Act. That may not sound too serious until you consider that the offending games have eight weeks to make changes to the lootboxes to comply with the law. Failure to do so can result in fines or just straight-up forbidding the games from being sold in the Netherlands. That’s a pretty big deal. While the DGA did not specifically name games, the Dutch paper reporting on the situation cites FIFA ’18, Dota 2, PlayerUnknown’s Battlegrounds, and Rocket League as the offending titles. The remaining six titles are not in violation of the law but were still sharply criticized for the lootbox implementation, which is said to target younger players and encourage gambling. It’s also worth … [Read more...] about Dutch Gaming Authority calls out four games as violating its lootbox policies

Dota 2 apes Path of Exile with transparent lockboxes for Dutch players

Remember when the Dutch gaming authorities effectively threatened to prosecute prosecute companies like Valve for vending and trading lockboxes the government agencies considered a clear violation of Dutch law? The result of that, as we wrote earlier this month, was that Valve turned off all trading for Dutch players, and then turned it back on again with the caveat that Dutch CSGO players can’t physically open any of the boxes. Dota 2 is another story: It seems Dota 2 has caught up to GGG’s Path of Exile in effectively offering players in the restricted region transparent lockboxes. As RPS reports, Valve didn’t mention this in the game’s patch notes, but here’s how it appears to work: “When Dutchlanders now look at Dota 2’s loot boxes, which contain cosmetic items, the wizard ’em up simply tells them which item they would receive if they bought it. No hoping, no dreaming, no fancy animations or pounding drums as it shows you the fabulous … [Read more...] about Dota 2 apes Path of Exile with transparent lockboxes for Dutch players

Tarnished Hope

Yesterday was a bit of a trying day for me personally. I’ve personally been bought into this notion that Mastodon provided a kinder gentler alternative to Twitter, but yesterday largely proved that notion completely wrong. The Fediverse has been the welcome home of the disenfranchised and marginalized, which is awesome since Twitter has not done a great job of protecting that group in any way. However some events happened recently and because of them I am glad that I joined up several weeks ago rather than right now at this time. I was able to see what I thought was the ActivityPub community in its native state, talking about interesting things openly and publicly and willing to friend each other just as easily. I was able to get settled in quickly with the help of a whole slew of people who offered useful advice as I docked myself into a corner of this big maelstrom of interesting things. I started out on Mastodon.cloud which was a large … [Read more...] about Tarnished Hope

11 Helpful Websites To Make YourSelf Smarter

If there is one thing that could be said of our online activity in this modern digital age, we are always ‘Wired in‘. The amount of time we spend in front of screens is exorbitantly high and that is definitely a good sign for these digital organizations but is a cause of concern for our own mental well-being. The way we are bombarded with information the moment we are plugged in causes serious disruption to our way of thinking and perceiving everything around us. While the Internet and its other digital accomplices in this crime are often labelled as tarnishing our mental abilities, all of them are not responsible for your mental degradation on the web! The way you spend your time on the Internet, says a lot about you, your personal goals and the way it affects your mental abilities. While some pass away their time flocking through Profile pictures of their friends on Facebook, the others are acquiring skills that place them in the industry of their choice and … [Read more...] about 11 Helpful Websites To Make YourSelf Smarter