With casino with real money, gambling steps up to a new level…

The new update in Rockstar Games’ Grand Theft Auto V (for GTA Online, to be exact), named The Diamond Casino & Resort, is worth a mention – Los Santos’ new casino is no joke. BBC reports that you can buy the casino’s coins with real money. One Diamond Casino coin costs one dollar. For ten dollars, you can buy half a million GTA dollars (the in-game currency), so there’s some monetization involved here. Thankfully, there is a limit to the casino. Each hour (which is a day in Grand Theft Auto V’s time) allows you to spend only fifty thousand GTA dollars, so each hour, you can only spend ONE US dollar. That is fair: so if you play GTA V for 24 hours, the maximum amount you could spend is 24 USD.

There’s a reason why you could avoid the casino: the coins (as well as the in-game currency) can NOT be converted into real money! So it’s nothing more than another monetization method. The in-game money can be spent on cars, weapons, or character customization. A few countries have blocked gambling minigames in Grand Theft Auto V, though. (The Benelux states seem to be the most against the loot boxes – more countries could follow their example.) And, interestingly, Red Dead Redemption 2’s special in-game gambling currency can NOT be bought with real money. So is the publisher considering the GTA monetization this important?

Despite Britain’s MPs saying that FIFA’s card packs and loot boxes are not considered gambling, it still is that in Grand Theft Auto V’s case. You pay for coins but get no money back. If you could, then we might say it’s fine (limit it to one dollar per hour and then you’d lose nothing…).

Source: Gamesindustry