Chinese government passes law forcing loot box games to disclose probabilities

The Chinese government is sick and tired of video game loot boxes, so they’re forcing developers to disclose the odds of potential prizes inside.

The country recently passed a law requiring developers to disclose the probabilities of all virtual prizes in loot boxes in games like Overwatch, Counter-Strike, and Hearthstone.

You can check out the actual document that lays out the rules here. Fortunately, NeoGAF users have helped translate for us:

2.6 …Online game publishers shall promptly publicly announce information about the name, property, content, quantity, and draw/forge probability of all virtual items and services that can be drawn/forge on the official website or a dedicated draw probability webpage of the game. The information on draw probability shall be true and effective.

2.7 Online game publishers shall publicly announce the random draw results by customers on notable places of official website or in game, and keep record for government inquiry. The record must be kept for more than 90 days. When publishing the random draw results, some measures should be taken place to protect user privacy.

The measure officially goes into effect in May 2017. While it sounds like another case of China overreaching its communist powers, this actually doesn’t sound too bad for gamers. Nothing is more frustrating than spending hours – or real money – trying to level up your character only to get some crappy common items from a loot box.

What do you guys think? Let us know in the comments below.