Display real money value next to Crown cost in store

CanAPanda

The value of items in the Crown Store should show the real money cost next to them so you can make informed decisions on what you are purchasing. This is important for everyone but specifically helps children who are preyed upon by these predatory practices in games. Using a secondary currency in games is fine but omitting how much items cost based on real values is malicious.

The value shown next to Crown items should also be based on the lowest value crown pack not to include any of the bonus crowns from higher value "incentive" packs. This means that in the US the lowest value crown pack is 750 crowns for $7.99 so one crown is worth $0.010653(3)

Here are a few examples of Crown Store items with their current Crown value and the USD value next to them based on the above information.
Buraniim Isle Ornaug - 3000 Crowns ($31.96)
Voskrona Guardian Crate Bundle - 8000 Crowns ($85.23)
Name Change Token - 2500 Crowns ($26.64)
Appearance Change Token - 1000 Crowns ($10.66)

In all honesty though, children shouldn't be playing ESO, depending on where you live the age to gamble is 18 or 21 and the existence of crown crates introduces gambling with real world money into the game. Regardless adding these values to Crown items is still necessary.

Danikat

In theory I agree this would be useful information. I'm not sure how it could be done accurately though, because crowns don't have a consistent price.

(I'm not going to use the American prices because I can't see them on the website and I know from past experience it's difficult to find a complete list online, but the difference is similar.)

For 1000 crowns the prices are:
750 crown pack: £7.99
1500 crown pack: £7.33
3000 crown pack: £6.33
5500 crown pack: £5.45
14000 crown pack: £5.36
21000 crown pack: £5.24

Then all of those packs can be discounted, reducing the price per crown.

There's also crowns included with ESO+, where again the price varies depending on how much subscription time you buy, ranging from £4.08 to £5.45 for 1000 crowns.

There's also one-off purchases like the housing and mount packs which include crowns, I think they still sell crown cards through 3rd party retailers and maybe other sources too.

Once the crowns are in game they all go into the same pool, I'm not sure even ZOS could trace them all back to their original purchase to calculate the price (and if you buy through another site they wouldn't even know what you paid).

I always work out the real money cost of crown store items when I'm thinking about buying them, and even just doing it for myself with my own account I can't work it out exactly because I honestly don't know where all my crowns came from or what exactly I paid for them. I estimate it using the standard price of the 5,500 crown pack because that's the one I buy most often, but I know it's not always right, especially recently when I usually buy crowns on sale.

CanAPanda wrote: »

In all honesty though, children shouldn't be playing ESO, depending on where you live the age to gamble is 18 or 21 and the existence of crown crates introduces gambling with real world money into the game. Regardless adding these values to Crown items is still necessary.

ESO is rated 18+ in Europe and "M" (which means 17+) in America. I think it has equivalent ratings in other parts of the world as well, so no, children shouldn't be playing it at all and so shouldn't be encountering crown crates.

CanAPanda

@Danikat
The prices aren't variable though. The price is the lowest priced crown pack and if you buy more you are getting bonus crowns. That bonus isn't a factor, that's why its called a bonus. I'm being slightly sarcastic here btw but it still is valid.

The entire system is deliberately designed to influence consumers to think exactly as you described. It obscures the true value of the in-game currency, making it easier to justify spending more money on a pack that appears to offer a better bonus.

If the Crowns are on sale then they are on *sale*, this doesn't change the value of them because they are a consistent currency. The only time a value would be changed on an item is if that specific crown item was on sale itself and therefore it costs less Crowns meaning it also costs less currency irl.

In March the EU passed legislation clarifying this, here is a quote from it relevant to the value changing based on discounts/sales and bonuses.

"When in-game digital content or services are offered in exchange
for in-game virtual currency that can be bought (directly or indirectly via another
in-game virtual currency), their price should also be indicated in real-world money.
> The price should be indicated based on what the consumer would have to pay in full,
directly or indirectly via another in-game virtual currency, the required amount of in-
game virtual currency, without applying quantity discounts or other promotional offers
>Although consumers may acquire in-game virtual currency in different ways and
quantities, for example through gameplay or due to promotional offers, this does
not change the price of the in-game digital content or services itself. The price must
constitute an objective reference for what the real-world monetary cost is, regardless
of how the consumer acquires the means to purchase it"

You can read more on this here if you're interested.

Eternity_Was

I don’t remember seeing any bonus verbiage on larger packs. Simply a straight deal for 21,000 crowns.

Regardless, this request is almost never going to be something they include. With all the different currency values and the changes in local taxes.. all the variables that would need to be accounted for and completely tailored to each individual player would quickly make this a much larger problem in an attempt to solve a problem that doesn’t quite need to be one.

It’s like asking McDonald’s to show the value in $, £, €, and every other foreign currency. The American $ is simply a form to standardize value across a system (America). Because ESO spans many countries, their in-game currency (crowns) becomes the new standardized currency symbol.

In my opinion it could be “nice” to see how much each item cost in dollar amounts, but it’s never been something I didn’t do quick math in my head. To me 5,000 crowns is $50. I think it would just clutter the User Interface and cause an immense amount of tailoring to different regions and countries. Further complicating the matter is the truth that individual crowns carry different values depending on how you get them…. ESO+, small crown pack, large, etc. do they add a value for the normal price and then an eso+ sale price value? It’s just too much ask with no real problem being solved in my personal opinion.

whitecrow

I think the whole point of having crowns as currency is to obscure the real world cost of everything, so they would never do this.

Aylish

This will be mandatory in the EU soon anyway (EU-Omnibus 2019/2161 if you're interested). In fact it already is mandatory in some states (Germany for example since may 2022) but they simply don't seem to care.

Elsonso

I am pretty confident that the gaming industry will lobby hard against this in the United States. If players know how much the cash shop items are worth in real money, they might not be happy.

I would also wager that the Crown Store is one place Addons are forbidden to modify the UI to add such things.

I have thousands of Crowns obtained from ESO Plus over the years. I am not sure how much those would be worth in US Dollars.

NoticeMeArkay

Aylish wrote: »

This will be mandatory in the EU soon anyway (EU-Omnibus 2019/2161 if you're interested). In fact it already is mandatory in some states (Germany for example since may 2022) but they simply don't seem to care.

German here. What is it you are referring to, because my ESO client has never displayed the actual value of a shop item in euro and I'm a bit confused over your comment.

Aylish

NoticeMeArkay wrote: »

Aylish wrote: »

This will be mandatory in the EU soon anyway (EU-Omnibus 2019/2161 if you're interested). In fact it already is mandatory in some states (Germany for example since may 2022) but they simply don't seem to care.

German here. What is it you are referring to, because my ESO client has never displayed the actual value of a shop item in euro and I'm a bit confused over your comment.

§§ 5a and 5b UWG. It‘s not executed in the crown store yet. But actually they have to.

NoticeMeArkay

Aylish wrote: »

NoticeMeArkay wrote: »

Aylish wrote: »

This will be mandatory in the EU soon anyway (EU-Omnibus 2019/2161 if you're interested). In fact it already is mandatory in some states (Germany for example since may 2022) but they simply don't seem to care.

German here. What is it you are referring to, because my ESO client has never displayed the actual value of a shop item in euro and I'm a bit confused over your comment.

§§ 5a and 5b UWG. It‘s not executed in the crown store yet. But actually they have to.

Thank you very much, I found it!

By the divines, what a great day it is to be literate!

https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/englisch_uwg/englisch_uwg.html

Gadamlub14_ESO

Elsonso wrote: »

I am pretty confident that the gaming industry will lobby hard against this in the United States. If players know how much the cash shop items are worth in real money, they might not be happy.

I would also wager that the Crown Store is one place Addons are forbidden to modify the UI to add such things.

I have thousands of Crowns obtained from ESO Plus over the years. I am not sure how much those would be worth in US Dollars.

1000 crowns is about 10USD so 1 crown is one cent

aneova_ESO

Macro-transactions are getting out of hand like everywhere else. Yes I said Macro, cause a micro-transaction was supposed to be CHEAP, I don't have 10 dollars to give you for a robe. Of course we all slurp up the pig slop cause we like the pretty things and want to make our characters look special and cool. Even with a cash amount posted it's like cellphone games showing off the 1800% off an item that's still 10 dollars, that discount should be making that dev pay me to take that item. Store fronts are a rip off in games, always have been always will be and since it's legal to do so they aren't going to change it any time soon.

OH and the FOMO, even the in game events are designed to give you FOMO "Log in or you'll miss out on our new timed thing" "It's ok to repeat all these quests over and over they're actually really fun on the 100th time you do them we promise" "OH and that big world event coming in the fall that you all have to grind to get the free pre-planned thing that you'll work so hard for we'll have a store version of it later you can buy"

Ramble done, sorry.

Katheriah

Eternity_Was wrote: »

It’s like asking McDonald’s to show the value in $, £, €, and every other foreign currency. The American $ is simply a form to standardize value across a system (America). Because ESO spans many countries, their in-game currency (crowns) becomes the new standardized currency symbol.

It wouldn't be difficult. Make currency a setting, so everyone can change their currency ingame and then they just have to show me how many €€ a house or a horse is based on the €€ price of a crownpack.