There have been a number of egregious examples of gambling mechanics in games in recent years. Games that encourage you to spend real money on randomized rewards, loot boxes, and slot-machine-like mechanics that try to tickle your dopamine receptors to get you to spend more on the game. Developers and publishers as wide as Valve, EA, Ubisoft, and Rockstar have all been at it with games like CS:GO, Star Wars: Battlefront 2, and any of the EA sports games and their Ultimate Team mode.
But the worst one of them all may be just around the corner. NBA 2K20 is Take Two's swan song to loot boxes and in-game gambling dressed up as an actual game. The game's MyTeam mode will once again bring back player card packs, but this time introduces Pokémon-like evolutions, and literal slot machine and roulette wheels to get new players. It's a casino in a basketball game.
This is 100 percent gambling and it's in a game that's rated E for everyone, with no age restrictions. Yes, Ultimate Team is an optional mode, but it's a major portion of the game and competing with friends and people around the world is why some people buy games like this. Only being able to do so in this pay to win system is not only unfair to the majority of gamers, but a disgusting exploitation of international law to encourage gambling for monetary gain.
It was always clear that Take Two were big fans of microtransactions and gambling mechanics, but this could be the worst instance yet.