Familiar IPs Are My Gacha Gaming Kryptonite

I'm well aware that gacha games, mostly on mobile platforms, are potentially pretty dangerous to people with little willpower. After all, one of the core mechanics of the genre is to lure people in with small freebies and starter packs of characters, then hit 'em over the head with the option to pay to shortcut, skip, or otherwise deal with gaming's version of FOMO with regards to new characters or benefits.

I've been largely immune to the gacha gaming gambling lifestyle, in part because I went through my irresponsible gamer spending phase when I was younger, and also in part because I've been on both sides of the gaming industry fence, and know precisely some of the wild (and sometimes insidiously subtle) things companies do to get players to spend more money on a game. I've also managed to somehow limit my gacha gaming intake to only 2 or 3 entries at a time. As someone who essentially refuses to spend money except in very few instances, time is of the essence for me in the gacha world.

The problem is that I have a weakness, and that weakness is intellectual properties I'm already familiar with. The rational part of my brain seems to shut off when it sees the serotonin associated with seeing an IP that I've squeezed every bit of life out of in a main game, only to see a gacha offering that holds out a bit more for me to consume.

100+ hours in Persona 5 Royal means I was a sucker for Persona 5: The Phantom X when it dropped in globall this summer.

A similar amount of time spent enjoying the hell out of the old-school-look-yet-modern Octopath Traveler meant I was a sucker when I made a late discovery of Octopath Traveler: Champions of the Continent.

Hell, the game doesn't even have to be good to lure me in for a few hours of seemingly well-known mechanics, characters, and gameplay. It took me maybe 20 hours of Fire Emblem: Heroes to realize the story was as flat as the soda I left out for too long the other day. I had to get through maybe 30 hours of Langrisser Mobile before I realized I would sooner get a boulder up onto a hill than be able to level my units to the point of being able to do the next chapter. None of these things matter, because in those first few hours, I'm back where I was however long ago that I beat the original game, getting into things like putting on a pair of old, comfortable jeans.

It's not like a new IP can't turn my head. After all, even though I spent years avoiding the Hoyoverse vortex, Honkai Star Rail finally turned my head with its very compelling Penacony story. I've also spent a decent amount of time in Wuthering Waves, Another Eden, and Sword of Convallaria. But there's a reason why I've stuck with Fate: Grand Order for years - it's one of the best-known IPs in anime, and the developers have still somehow given it its own identity. Frankly, I'm just impressed it's found a way to milk the "Saber Face" design into tons of differing variations - but I digress.

The point is, despite this little weakness of mine when it comes to my small-ish gacha gaming habit, the game still needs to be compelling and keep my attention, have a decent design, and maybe loosen up the hold on the more fun characters out there so I can get them without spending money - all the hallmarks of a solid title, gambling or not. I'll always probably be an easy mark when you wave an IP in front of me that I know pretty well, but getting me to stay and not uninstall because I hit a difficulty or time gate behind a paywall? That's a harder sell for frugal gamers like me, and I hope it is for many of you as well. A pretty and familiar coat of paint, after all, can only get you so far.