The Psychology of Steam Wallet & Microsoft Points 190
Hugh Pickens writes "Ever bought something from Xbox Live Arcade? The first time, you may have been a bit bamboozled by the process because Microsoft doesn't just let you put $15 on your credit card to buy a new game; purchases are done in 'Microsoft Points' that you deposit into a virtual wallet and you use the points to buy stuff. 'Gamers possessed of equal parts suspicion and curiosity may wonder why our gaming overlords adopted such a strange system instead of just letting us pay real money for our purchases,' writes game psychologist James Madigan. He says the real reason for Microsoft Points is that sometimes you are going to have some points left over in your account. Leaving money on the table or in your Xbox Live account makes most of us a bit uncomfortable (PDF) because it feels wasteful. 'It's similar to overeating at a buffet or doubling your paper towel use after buying the 124 roll jumbo pack,' says Madigan. 'Even though you could just let those paper towels or Nintendo Points sit there until you have a good reason to use them, spending real money on something else seems wasteful.' And Microsoft isn't the only one – Sony and Nintendo have similar systems, and Valve has even rolled out a 'Steam Wallet' for in-game microtransactions."
I disagree. (Score:5, Informative)
Lets suppose you have a website that sell Second Life avatars. You want a avatar to cost 0.30 $, but the credit card 'tax' is 0.20 $. And people buy maybe 20 in a year.
What you can do, is to make so the user buy 30 "points" paying 10 $. And make so every new avatar cost 1 point. You are still paying 0.20$ to the credit card company, but only once. With the other option you pay 0.20 * 20 = 4 $. So is paying 0.20 $ versus paying 4.00 $. Is really better to run with points.
Also, is also better for the user, so he do only one transaction, and from there, he don't have to enter his credit card details. ..that can be annoying.
Re:Why is this even legal? (Score:5, Informative)
It obviously vary by country, but I think prepaid phone systems have that policy of not wanting to return your cash. If you dump your money, they are gone.
In Italy the cell-phone companies have been forced to treat money in your prepaid account as real money a few years ago. This means that:
a) they cannot charge you extra money for recharging your account. If you pay 30 euros to get 25 euros credit, that means you end up paying your minutes more than the advertised rates. Not allowed.
b) they have to give you any leftover money back when they close the account.
c) they cannot in practice do promotions where you get free credit with restrictive conditions (as in "Get 100 euros* of credit with your new account". *only valid for calls done on february 29th and lasting between 13 and 14 minutes). Of course, they can and do use some kind of point system for that as well, but they're not allowed to mislead you by calling it money anymore.