LogFAQs > #926305104

-Cards have enough resale value that you can usually recover most - if not all - of your investment if you buy a significant number of packs and sell the ones you don't want
-Cards are paid for using real money, not an intermediate currency designed to obscure how much is being paid
-In the case of non-cosmetic stuff, game companies have much more ability to manipulate demand for loot boxes (e.g. through increasing grindiness or engineering social pressure, the latter of which also applies to cosmetics)
-Cards make up the entire game in the case of TCG's, as opposed to being a mechanic that has been tacked on to a different game (which, again, makes it easier to manipulate demand)

Despite these differences, though, this whole loot box thing has indeed been cause to take a look at TCG's and blind box figures and anything else that uses "surprise mechanics" to make a product more appealing. Looking closer, a good many of them do seem to be predatory and manipulative in exactly the same way as loot boxes are, which could justify also placing regulations on them like those that are placed on gambling. The long-term consequence of pushing to have loot boxes regulated will likely to be to also regulate some of those, due to the logical similarities, and I'm actually okay with that.

Quite simply, if a product is going to profit off of the same psychological manipulations that make gambling profitable, it should be subject to the same regulations that limit gambling's ability to harm people.
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