Developers speak out on in-app purchases investigation

Industry professionals discuss what devs can do to regulate and improve the business model

Self-regulation and educating parents are key to the future of in-app purchases in games, a number of developers have told Develop.
The Office of Fair Trading recently launched an investigation into the use of IAPs in children’s games after concern that some games had been using unfair practices to encourage users to spend money.

Speaking to Develop, Assyria MD Adam Green said that any controversy surrounding in-app purchases and free-to-play was less about games, and more about up-front parental controls and warnings.
He said that burying such crucial information in a menu was not enough, and that enabling or disabling parental controls should be a key part of the registration and login process.
“Additionally the 'would you like to pay $x for Y' should form part of the login box as kids will have clicked 'ok-buy' and got to the login page before they request a password off their parents, by which point there's no way for a parent to see what the child is actually trying to do.,” said Green

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