Almost a year after the UK government's investigation into loot boxes, UKIE, the UK's gaming industry association, urged the nation's gaming industry to address people's concerns about children purchasing loot boxes. the UKIE issued 11 "industry principles" to "improve protection for all players" and declared that it would make the entire loot box purchase process more transparent and less accessible to children.

Though announced with the participation of UK Creative Industries Minister John Whittingdale, the UKIE's 11 principles are privately driven: an attempt to subject the nation's gaming companies to best practices that would eliminate the need for the state to intervene and ban anything: the current (The administration has expressed reluctance to interfere with the gaming industry in that way in the past year.)

The full 11 points of the new principles are listed below and refer to how Asian governments such as Japan and Korea have addressed the issue, with a particular focus on transparent probability, with headlines on children's access to loot boxes and surfacing information on probability. Number one on the UKIE's list of loot box precepts is to provide "technical controls that effectively restrict persons under the age of 18 from obtaining a loot box without the consent or knowledge of a parent, caregiver, or guardian."

Meanwhile, awareness of these controls will be spread to "players, parents, caregivers, and guardians through regular communication," beginning with a public awareness campaign this month. The principles also require that if a game includes a loot box, it be made clear prior to purchase, so players and caregivers can avoid it if necessary.

If a player is purchasing such a game, the loot box should be designed "in an understandable way" and its probability should indeed be clear. Anyway, here are the principles in their entirety (and more details on the UKIE website):

The effectiveness and progress of the principles will be reviewed in another 12 months.

It is difficult not to be skeptical of such a self-regulatory system. Last year, when the British government decided not to intervene in the loot box, one expert declared that "the foxes are guarding the henhouse. It is hard to believe that a series of 'self-regulatory' guidelines, however well-intentioned, will stop certain firms from doing whatever is most profitable at the time. But perhaps I am wrong. As the industry digests these guidelines and decides whether to adopt them or take a chance with a government that seems less interested in regulation, we will know much more.