Step 4 of 5

Classification ratings and in-game spending

Two questions belong together, because both are much easier to settle before you start than after. What is in this game, and what is the most I am prepared to spend on it?

Who classifies games in Australia

Computer games made available in Australia are classified under the national classification scheme. The Australian Classification Board is the body that administers it, and its website is the authoritative place to look up the classification and the consumer advice attached to a particular title.

That is deliberately the only thing this page states about the scheme. The categories, the criteria and the rules about who may be sold what are set out by the Board itself, they change from time to time, and a general workbook is a poor substitute for the current text. Where this course would otherwise summarise a rule, it points you at the Board instead.

What the course can usefully say is how to use the information once you have it. A classification is a statement about content, not about quality, cost or how much of your week the game will take. It answers one question well and others not at all.

Ratings, descriptors, and what they do not tell you

Alongside the classification itself, a game usually carries consumer advice: short phrases describing the elements that led to the rating. Those phrases are often more useful than the category, because they name the specific thing rather than a general level.

Two limits are worth holding in mind. The first is that classification addresses content, not the commercial design of a game. A rating tells you nothing about how heavily a game pushes purchases.

The second is that an online multiplayer game contains other people, and other people are not classified. What appears in voice and text chat is not covered by the rating on the box. Step 5 deals with the settings that give you some control over that.

Checking a classification yourself

Checking the register rather than a storefront badge is worth the extra two minutes, because a storefront shows what it has been given, while the register shows what was decided.

In-game currency, and why it is not priced in dollars

Most free-to-play games sell a token currency rather than selling items for dollars directly. You buy a bundle of the token, and items are priced in the token.

Two things follow from that, and both are design choices rather than accidents. Bundle sizes rarely match item prices, so a balance is usually left over, which creates a small reason to buy again. And a price expressed in tokens is harder to feel than a price expressed in dollars, because the conversion is not in front of you while you shop.

The counter-move is easy. Work out the dollar value once, write it down, and do your thinking in dollars from then on. If a bundle costs a known amount in AUD and contains a known number of tokens, the arithmetic takes a minute and it does not need repeating.

Randomised paid items

Some games sell a chance at an item rather than the item: a crate, case or pack whose contents vary. You know what you paid; you do not know what you will receive.

This is the category that deserves the most thought, for a straightforward reason. The uncertainty is the product. A purchase with a variable outcome engages differently from a purchase with a fixed one, and a run of disappointing results can prompt another purchase in a way that a fixed-price item does not.

None of that means such items should not exist or that buying one is a mistake. It means the decision should be made in advance and in dollars: either "I am not buying these", or "I will spend up to this amount on these and then stop", decided while nothing is on the screen.

Where a person under 18 is playing, randomised paid items should not be treated as an ordinary part of the experience for them. That is a judgement for the adults in the household to make deliberately, and it is a separate decision from whether the game's classification suits that person.

Setting a limit before you need one

A spending limit set in advance is worth more than any amount of resolve applied in the moment, because it is a decision made with no pressure and nothing attractive on the screen.

Make it specific. "I will not spend much" is not a limit. "Forty dollars over the next three months, and nothing on randomised items" is a limit, because you can tell at any point whether you have kept it.

Then make it checkable. Note the figure next to the six hardware figures from Step 2, and look at the game's own purchase history — most online games keep one — at the end of the first month. Comparing what you actually spent against what you planned is the only part of this that produces information.

Cards, refunds and consumer rights

Three habits reduce the chance of an unwelcome surprise. Do not save a card in a game account that other people in the house can reach. Turn on your bank's transaction notifications, so purchases appear on your phone rather than at the end of the month. And keep the receipts the vendor emails you.

Consumer guarantees under the Australian Consumer Law apply to goods and services supplied to Australian consumers, including digital products, and they operate in addition to whatever refund policy a vendor publishes. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission explains what those guarantees cover and when a remedy is available. If something was described misleadingly or does not work as described, that is the place to start.

If a charge you did not recognise or authorise appears, contact your bank or card issuer as well as the vendor. Unauthorised transactions have their own process, separate from a dispute about whether a product was as described.

If someone under 18 plays on the same computer

Two separate questions arise. The first is whether the game's content is appropriate, which is what the classification and the consumer advice are for. The second is whether and how that person can spend money, which classification does not address at all.

Practical measures: a separate account rather than a shared one, no stored card, and an agreed rule about who approves a purchase. Those are household arrangements, not technical ones, and they work better when they are agreed before the first time somebody wants something.

The eSafety Commissioner publishes guidance for families on online safety, including gaming, and operates reporting schemes for serious online abuse and image-based abuse. It is the national body for this area and a better source than general advice.

The worked example, continued

Applying this step to the game used as the running example shows what it looks like when a source is silent. The vendor describes it as free-to-play, and describes the content as vehicle construction and combat in a post-apocalyptic setting, with modification covering shape, armour, armament, support systems and accessories.

On what can be bought inside it, what that costs in AUD, and whether any purchase has randomised contents, the vendor description this course works from does not state these things. So this course does not state them either. The way to find out is the one set out above: read the vendor's own purchase information on its site, and look the title up on the classification register for the rating and consumer advice.

Visit the Crossout website

Paid affiliate link. ISWORK s.r.o. may be paid a commission if you register an account after following it. Commission is paid for a registration, not for anything you spend, and this step would read the same without the link.

The share house, at Step 4

Before you move on

Step 4 checklist

All five checklists sit together, ready to print, on the All checklists page.