New developments in the gaming industry have taken light these days, and the hunt for loot crate exclusives have just taken a hit. Recent regulations in China have required that developers of randomly generated loot purchases like League of Legends’ Mystery Skins, CS:GO’s skin cases, Overwatch’s Loot Boxes, Hearthstone’s card packs, and others, must now reveal the probability of receiving certain items. The new loot box regulations were posted on the Ministry of Culture of the People’s Republic of China website.

Two notable clauses of the regulation change are seen below:

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.

This clause translates that developers like Blizzard and Valve, who frequently drop loot crates for gamers to collect, must now make a public announcement online of player’s chances of receiving specific, virtual items for every single virtual drop made in game as they play through the game’s story line, no exceptions. This regulation not only includes console and PC games, but also includes mobile titles as well, which we know are quite numerous.

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.

As the clause states, this also means that the developers must keep a running log of all previous loot drops and customer draw results and publicly post them for widespread viewing, while still adhering to consumer privacy. No measures of how to maintain consumer confidentiality while still publicly posting results have been listed yet.

It’s too soon to tell how these loot box regulations will affect the gaming industry, or if these results will start being posted in English, but as of right now, we can only surmise what kind of impact this will have on gamer and developer relations. It’s easy to worry that this new law could end badly. There’s a lot that needs to be taken into consideration, like the time needed to make these public reports daily could take away from important updates or fixing system crashes, or the accidental backlash if customer records are accidentally published for the world to see. We don’t know what this could mean for games of the future, but it’s definitely going to be interesting to see what comes of this new development.

For more news like this, check out these articles below:

• Blizzard’s Latest Collectable: The Overwatch Reaper Statue *Heavy Breathing Intensifies* [VIDEO]
• Valve to Pay Up to $3 Million in Penalties to ACCC
• Pokemon GO Incorporating Daily Bonuses to the Game

What do you think of these new loot box regulations? Do you think these will be good for gaming, or will there be consequences for it? Let us know your thoughts in the comments below!