What’s up Nerds!

As an avid mobile gamer, I’ve had this question for a while now. Are Gacha systems helpful to mobile gaming? If you need a refreshers gacha systems are similar to loot boxes in games like Fortnite. They are based off of the gaming vending machines you would see in arcades that would randomly give you a prize. This is basically the same concept in mobile gaming except you , the player, would have to buy the in-game currency to have an opportunity to get the prize. Most of the time the rewards are tiered. This means that when you participate in the gacha you have a higher chance of receiving a low-tier character or weapon (depending on the game) and a low chance of receiving a high-tiered character.

Now in some mobile games like Kingdom Hearts Union X, there are some deals where you can recieve a higher tierd character the more pulls you make. For instance say you wanted a 5 starred Axel medal, you may be guaranteed this medal if you pull the gacha 10 times. I have mostly seen gacha systems in games like Genshin Impact, the adventure action RPGs. Recently, I have encountered it in Ikumen Prince and Obey me when trying to get stronger cards for your otome battles. Now that I’ve given some context, who is the gacha system benefitting?

First we have to acknowledge that the party getting the most benefit is the developers and/or distributers of the game. Most of the time (as I don’t know if this is always the case) the games that have gacha systems are games that are free to play. This means you don’t have to pay anything to play the game and you can download it for free. As a person who hated the idea of spending money on mobile games, I spent a lot of time trying to play games with what was provided to me for free. And don’t get me wrong, I understand this set-up. This is a way for the developers to continue to make a profit from the game indefinitely. It’s completely understandable since a lot of time and effort (and even blood, sweat, and tears) have gone into making the games we love. The developers and all involved deserve to get their coins. Time for the flip side of this gacha system coin.

As a player of many mobile games with gacha systems, it is hard to see the benefit. As someone who for a long time really was not able to spend money on mobile games, it is difficult to level up in the game. For mobile games like Union X and Obey Me, you need to have high level cards to beat battles to progress in the game. I had to stop playing Obey Me, for other reasons as well, but the main reason was because I couldn’t progress past a certain point without putting money into it. I literally could not progress without buying the currency needed to strengthen my cards, since I couldn’t pull a top tier card. Honestly that took a lot of the fun out of it for me. I understand that if I choose to not put money into it, the game can be more difficult to complete. This should not mean that the game is impossible. Again, every person that plays may not have the ability to spend money into the game. I don’t think this type of player should be penalized because of their lack of money.

It also seems that gacha systems have more than one type of currency. Genshin Impact has Primogems, Genesis crystals, Mora, Stardust and Starglitter and a few more. I don’t know about you, but this was super confusing when I first started playing. To honest I still don’t quite understand the point of having all of these different types of currencies. I don’t quite understand how this would add to enjoyability of the game. Pretend for a moment that you are a player that can afford to buy maybe two or three rounds of the gacha. You’re not rolling in money but you have a couple of dollars you can spend. There’s nothing more frustrating than when you can actually pull a gacha and you don’t get any quality characters or weapons. I’ve had times when I’ve pulled the gacha in Genshin Impact to only get basic weapons and no characters. It almost feeds into a need to keep pulling to try to get something better the next go round. I’m not saying that it’s gambling, however I can definitely see how people could get sucked into that kind of trap.

I think a way to improve the gacha system would be to add tiers. If you want a chance of getting a tier 4 or 5 character, then maybe pay $3. But if you’re fine with the randomization then keep it at the base level. Or just let the players buy the characters they want. You could put it behind a level cap. Maybe you can’t receive this kind of character until you reach a certain level. I like how Genshin Impact allows some characters to be collected by completing events. I think we could tweak this by letting players do certain events to have the option to pick the character they want.

I know that gacha systems aren’t going anywhere for a while. I hope the mobile game industry will continue to improve and try out different systems that will benefit both the developer/creators and the players. Overall I think gacha systems are helpful for the developers, but not so much for the players. But we deal with it because we love the games so much. What do you guys think? Do you love gacha systems? Do you think they can be improved? Let me know in the comments and keep nerding out!