Is it really legal these type of shop?

No, seriously and without falling into “$ 26 of skins is too much / but all other games do it”, is it actually legal to put the full price “on sale” without actually being able to buy the separate version?

If I want to buy kiriko Witch at 1.900 I cannot objectively do it, nor could I ever do it for Sojourn Cyberdetective nor for Zen Cyberpunk skin. and so I’m seriously starting to wonder if this kind of deceptive advertising of a discount that doesn’t exist is not 100% ILLEGAL. it is? can it be reported?

and I add this info too: watch these two videos on kiriko witch and Ashe warloc, min 4:50:

“Get it there, beelzebob!” (Ashe) and “Enter the spirit world.”(kiriko)
they are two voicelines that can be heard in the new PVE, but in the gallery it is not specified that these two skins, if purchased … do not make these voicelines. it’s a stupid info, but not really: it’s part of the little additional values that make you think “woah, the skin does that too”, but the reality doesn’t: whoever bought the skin and made videos proved that neither kiriko witch nor ashe warlock have those voicelines in the ultimate. Wouldn’t that be misleading advertising too?

In Heroes of the storm, for example, they ALWAYS indicated which ones had special effects, and obviously for Overwatch this need never existed. But in OW2 we’re talking about money, and that’s a LOT of money to be able to regret a wrong choice after a wrong thought. Isn’t this kind of advertising illegal too?

More example: do you know that an epic skin in OW2 costs 1000 coins? guess how much a 26% bundle discount costs when you already have everything but the epic skin:
https://www.reddit.com/r/Overwatch/comments/yeon40/new_thats_what_i_call_a_discount/

I am not a lawyer, but if anyone can tell me which limit is exceeding or not BLizzard …

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Just wait how the herd of forum lawyers will explain you how it isn’t legal.

It is. As much as players hate corpos, there’s one thing corpos always get as good as they can: legal.

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The “discount” is no discount at all. Its gaslighting to make you think that its a good deal. From a legal standpoint, they are covering themselves with the disclaimer with the relation to prices of items in similar tiers.

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eh, in fact this is what I am saying: it is a discount, but in order to exist, a full price must first be available, right?

And with blizzard BLOCKING non-shop / bundle content … what is it discounting? of full prices at the start?

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Yes, which is why i said its gaslighting.

I do not know where you live. But probably technically yes. Because you know the old system with buying loot boxes is technically gambling. Because you spend money and are not sure what you are getting out of it. And many countries started applying laws to prevent underaged people from gambling. So no loot boxes anymore in games, thats why this came into place. You know exactly what you are getting even trough its overpriced. It is overpriced because you are getting what you want directly. Instead of buying 30 loot boxes and still not getting that one thing you wanted. So you needed to buy 20 more.

Like you have laws that make it illegal, but they are partly right as if you read the laws they are talking about they all exclude digital products.

Only reason my country even banned lootboxes is because they are equally as greedy and just wanted gaming companies to pay gambling taxes which back fired as instead companies disabled the option to buy loot boxes.
And if there are keys involved you can buy the key and the lootbox and only then the game will tell u that cuz legal reasons you can not open the box :joy:

Hell remember the toy machines that u put a coin in and u twist and a random toy comes out? Havent seen one of those in years now, wont be suprised at this point if they ban happymeals cuz the toy is random.

Dang, 190 bucks? You might want to edit that one OP.

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The idea is that you technically can, you just have to wait for it to appear in the store.

The fact that the skins don’t come with the custom voicelines shown in the event itself tied to the characters as you use them, is blatant false advertising and ruins what little good the event had, if any.

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I assume it’s legal that is what the disclaimer is for.
It’s a bundle discount on items you can’t buy separately based on what items like it would cost separately.

But yeah Blizzard tricks .
designed to trick the most FOMO-prone people and forcing them to pay it is disgusting really.

Ok but … how can there be a discount without selling the full price anywhere of the single product? I don’t understand this, frankly. :neutral_face:

Im no lawyer. But it feels/seem illegal atleast in holland. I remember mediamarkt selling things on " discount" during christmass etc. While all they did was just up the prices beforehand and then put it on sale for the " normall before" price. I believe that is now forbidden here ( dont know the fine details). This is obviously the same practise. Now who cares I supose… But it feels so anti consumer nonetheless. A stab in the back.

I actually paid for lootboxes in ow1. When ow1 released and u wanted everything, there was no other way. So much to grind for! ( + support to game in mind, servers don’t work for free) But later when content was less, and you owned a lot… you could spend less money on lootboxes or skip buying at all cuz it was easy enough to grind 4 skins you did not own instead of like 16 during the first 2 years. ( Not to forget that recieving dupes was also possible back then!)

I am not dirty to spending on cash shops. 6-8 euros for a legendary skin, maby 10? Fine. but 20… wow. Not in a million years. But I guess blizzard recieves money from the real whales, and dont care about ppl like me who spend 20-30 euros every event on lootboxes that initally just helped me a bit to farm everything from said event. Its a shame. But I guess that was not enough in the end for them.

Ill happily buy skins again for 6-8 euros or lootboxes. But for some reason I can’t bring myself to spend 20 bucks on a skin knowing thats 1/3th of a fully released tripple AAA game like cyberpunk or hogwarts legacy or whatever. It just feels wrong. And that comming from a " semi" whale I guess.

Maby youngsters think differently then I am, I also got rent to pay etc etc. I earn decent salary, but we also live in uncertain times. Maby the current targetted audiance thinks different then my mindset. I guess thats okay, when I was 16 I threw away money too to senseless things. Its only that I feel as long time blizz supporter , I feel stabbed in the back by this. Feels like im in a abusive relationship atm and yeah… guess I need to see a shrink LOL :smiley:

They just base it on what does a legendary skin solo cost.
What does another voice line solo cost.
What does a weapon charm solo cost.
So they add up what it would be and then compare it with the price and add - 29% or whatever.

There isn’t anything else to understand you aren’t missing anything it is just a convoluted way of doing things with the sole goal to be able to add -29% in the picture to trigger certain people.
It is a loophole because fake discounts are illegal in many places.
I am also petty sure they never mention discounts as it is more like potential projected savings masquerading as a discount the optics are the same and that is the goal.

It’s not illigal to sell overpriced goods. Apple does it all the time.

Not sure if you get what I point out. Overpriced stuff is not illegal. But pretending something to be on a discount while it really is not, that is forbidden in my country I believe. It was big on the news back then. Basicly before something is allowed on sale here, it needs to be full price atleast 3 months. Because you mislead consumers and trick them into buying something fast without thinking. that is against law here.

But at other hand, doubt that counts towards buy in a bundle and pay less! things, nonetheless its still tricks to make you buy because tomorrow it goes away! This is the first time I actually hope my country is gonna ban these practises. Immortal is already forbidden to play here , ( I disliked that, but maby it is for our own good) or a statement against said company policies. Because this basicly is triggering " gambling addiction " on a whole other level.

You are Dutch right? Hallo! Ik ook :slight_smile:

Yess I missed that, you are right. The Dutch consumentenbond would not be happy about this. And indeed the Dutch government did introduce some laws to protect people from “sales” like this. But than again before any action is taken… I know ibood.nl had to change their advertisements and show realistic “before” pricings.

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Its not an OW2 only thing. For example in the OW1 Junkenstein McCree said “Its time to meet your maker!”, Soldier said “The enemy is within my sights!” and Ana said “I have empowered you, attack!”

but the difference is that in those mode you must have the skin first to notice these voicelines. here you have skins you don’t own that give you a false clue as to what they say.

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Here in Norway it’s not allowed to put a new item “on sale” on release and advertise it as a “on sale” product. The product has to have at least 4 weeks of shelf-time on sales on the regular price, before they can lower the price and advertise it as “on sales”.