The Avatar's new clothes: Understanding why players purchase non-functional items in free-to-play games

Abstract

Free-to-play online games create significant revenues through sales of virtual items. The argument that the sale of items that provide a competitive advantage (functional items) fuels a pay-to-win culture has attracted developers to business models that are solely based on the sale of non-functional items (items that provide no objective competitive advantage). However, the motivations for purchasing non-functional items remain under-examined. The present study therefore provides an exploration of hedonic, social, and utilitarian motivations underpinning purchase of virtual items within the top-grossing free-to-play game League of Legends. From interviews with 32 players, a number of motivations are identified and presented. In addition, a novel finding is that motivation for purchase may not stem from the value in the item but lie in the act of purchasing itself as a means of transferring money to the developer.

How People Reflect On The Usage Of Cosmetic Virtual Goods: A Structural Topic Modeling Analysis Of R/Dota2 Discussions

“…The vast prevalence of such topics supports the previous theoretical and empirical findings (Lehdonvirta 2009;Marder et al 2019), who found that visual representation plays an important role in a player's decision to purchase non-functional items. Not only does the analysis conducted in this work demonstrate that aesthetic value plays a vital role in the evaluation of non-functional items (the range and number of topics associated with aesthetics), but also it shows how the discussion of visual effects reflects increases in the value of the assets.…”

“…Recent work on this topic (Marder et al 2019) supports the findings of Lehdonvirta's work and extends the analysis of emotional and social value in virtual consumption. Analyzing interviews of League of Legends players, the authors extracted nine key themes and found that emotional (hedonic) motivation has five aspects important for players: novelty, aesthetics, reciprocity, self-gratification, and character dedication.…”

“…This focus of discussions on expensive items is reflected in the results of topic modeling which captures a particular discourse of discussing these goods (e.g., Expensive rare items and Store sales) and is connected with the status dimension of social value or emotional dimension of hedonic value (Lehdonvirta 2009;Marder et al 2019).…”

“…The theme of the status dimension is supported by studies that identified scarcity as a primary factor of price formation (Yamamoto and McArthur 2015;Lehdonvirta 2009;Marder et al 2019). Scarcity, in this sense, is discussed mostly as a tool to highlight the status of the owner (Lehdonvirta 2009;Marder et al 2019).…”

“…The second group of studies is led by human-computer interaction and electronic commerce research and is focused on the experiences virtual items create and the practices which make players interested in using the items (Toups et al 2016;Musabirov et al 2019;Musabirov et al 2017;Bowser et al 2015). The last group is based on an understanding of the social nature of virtual consumption (Lehdonvirta 2009;Lehdonvirta, Wilska, and Johnson 2009;Marder et al 2019). In particular, the research is focused on the virtual goods attributes which drive players to purchase items.…”