Don't Take the Bait

In the 2016 presentation ‘Let’s Go Whaling,’ a mobile game executive openly discusses designing free-to-play systems aimed at ‘whales’, the small percentage of players who spend exorbitant amounts—employing psychological manipulation while deferring any moral inquiry until after the presentation. The use of gambling language, targeting of vulnerable groups including children and addicts, and deliberate opacity about spending raise serious ethical concerns that consumer advocates must confront.

How it works

Whaling is an industry term, borrowed from the world of casino gambling, used to describe the practice of extracting large sums of money from a small subset of players, often referred to as whales. In the Let’s Go Whaling video (2016), a mobile game executive lays out a clear blueprint for identifying and monetizing these players using a set of psychological tools designed for maximum profit.

Core Tactics:

• Behavioral Profiling – Tracking in-game activity, spending patterns, and engagement time to pinpoint potential high-spenders.
• Scarcity & FOMO (Fear of Missing Out) – Leveraging limited-time offers, daily login rewards, and countdown timers to create urgency.
• Gacha & Random Rewards – Using loot boxes, randomized draws, and “spin-to-win” mechanics to keep players chasing rare rewards, mimicking slot machine behavior.
• Social Pressure – Encouraging spending through leaderboards, cooperative rewards, and gifting systems so players feel compelled to “keep up” or avoid letting teammates down.
• Gradual On-Ramping – Introducing players to the game for free, then easing them into small purchases that normalize spending before escalating to high-priced offers.

The presentation notably postpones any discussion of ethics until the very end, framing these practices not as moral questions but as business optimizations.

Terminology with Consequences:

By borrowing the word “whale” from gambling culture, the industry reinforces a mindset where players are reduced to revenue sources. This language not only normalizes aggressive monetization but also masks the human and ethical costs behind the term.

Who Is Affected:

While whales can include affluent players willing to spend, these tactics also disproportionately affect vulnerable groups:

• Minors, who lack a mature understanding of money and probability.
• Compulsive spenders and gambling addicts, who are especially susceptible to randomized reward systems.
• Financially insecure individuals, who may spend beyond their means in search of in-game status or rewards.

These strategies create a finely tuned monetization engine, one that maximizes revenue while sidestepping the broader conversation about fairness, transparency, and consumer protection.

Why it is a problem

Although the gaming industry often frames whaling as a harmless and even innovative business model, the underlying mechanics raise serious consumer rights and ethical concerns. The Let’s Go Whaling presentation makes clear that these systems are deliberately engineered to maximize profit—often at the expense of vulnerable players.

1. Psychological Manipulation

These mechanics draw directly from behavioral conditioning and casino playbooks:

• Randomized rewards mirror slot machines.
• Scarcity tactics and limited-time offers generate artificial urgency.
• Social features create peer pressure to spend in order to maintain status or support a team.

3. Lack of Informed Consent

Players are rarely provided with:

• Transparent spending summaries
• Upfront disclosures about odds and probabilities
• Warnings about the potential for significant cumulative costs

Without these safeguards, informed decision-making is undermined.

Ethics as an Afterthought

In the Let’s Go Whaling talk, moral considerations are explicitly deferred until the end, framing them as an optional discussion rather than a central responsibility. This communicates a troubling industry norm: profit maximization first, ethics second. When ethics are treated as an afterthought, it signals that consumer well-being is a secondary concern rather than a guiding principle in design.

Regulatory Blind Spots

Many countries do not classify loot boxes, gacha pulls, or similar mechanics as gambling because they trade in virtual items rather than direct cash payouts. This loophole leaves a wide regulatory gap, allowing minimal oversight of overly aggressive mechanics. Without age verification requirements in most markets, minors can access and spend on these systems unchecked. The absence of strong consumer protections means vulnerable users, such as problem gamblers and financially insecure individuals, remain exposed to psychologically persuasive designs.

Calls to Action

To protect consumers, especially those most at risk, regulatory and industry measures must be strengthened. Developers should be required to provide full transparency on spending history and in-game odds so players can make informed choices. Default spending limits and robust parental control tools should be standard across all platforms. Most importantly, independent oversight is needed, with laws that treat gambling-like mechanics as gambling whenever they meet key risk criteria. Such reforms would help shift the industry toward a model that values fair play and informed choice over aggressive profit extraction.

Examples

Examples of Games Using This Model

Many of the world’s most profitable free-to-play games rely heavily on whaling mechanics, integrating psychological triggers and monetization systems designed to target a small subset of high-spending players. Fate/Grand Order, for example, is a gacha game notorious for players spending thousands of dollars in pursuit of rare characters. Genshin Impact uses a similar gacha model, combining limited-time character banners with extremely low drop rates to create spending frenzies whenever new content is released.

In the strategy genre, Clash of Clans and Clash Royale employ time-gates and competitive pressure to nudge players toward purchasing premium currency to accelerate progress. Casual games like Candy Crush Saga utilize endless microtransactions, lives systems, and time-limited boosters to keep players paying for “just one more turn.” Meanwhile, Star Wars: Galaxy of Heroes aggressively promotes pay-to-win character unlocks through randomized packs, and Raid: Shadow Legends floods players with constant pop-up offers and bundle deals, targeting those who have already shown a willingness to spend.

Conclusion

These examples make clear that whaling mechanics are not limited to one genre or platform, they permeate everything from mobile puzzle games to blockbuster role-playing titles. By exposing these systems and understanding how they operate, consumers and advocates can push for greater transparency, stronger protections, and ethical reforms in game design. Awareness is the first step toward change; the more players understand the tactics being used against them, the harder it becomes for the industry to justify practices that prioritize profit over player well-being.

References

Primary Sources

• Luton, W. (2016). Let’s Go Whaling: Tricks for Monetising Mobile Game Players with Free-to-Play. PocketGamer Connects Helsinki 2016. Video link

Academic / Industry Reports

• Zendle, D., & Cairns, P. (2018). Video Game Loot Boxes Are Linked to Problem Gambling: Results of a Large-Scale Survey. PLOS ONE, 13(11), e0206767. Link
• Drummond, A., & Sauer, J. D. (2018). Video Game Loot Boxes Are Psychologically Akin to Gambling. Nature Human Behaviour, 2, 530–532. Link
• King, D. L., & Delfabbro, P. H. (2019). Predatory Monetization Schemes in Video Games (e.g., ‘Loot Boxes’) and Internet Gaming Disorder. Addiction, 114(10), 1967–1975. Link
• Australian Senate Environment and Communications References Committee. (2020). Gaming Microtransactions for Chance-Based Items. Report PDF

News & Analysis

• Australian Institute of Family Studies. (2022). Gambling-like features in online games: Literature review. Classification Board PDF.
• Ashcraft, B. (2022, May 3). Some Genshin Impact players are spending thousands on characters. Kotaku.
• Norton Rose Fulbright. (2023). Regulation of loot boxes: A global perspective.
• Derrington, S., Star, S., & Kelly, S. J. (2022). Loot boxes and microtransactions: Towards a unified classification framework. Canadian Development Studies Press. PDF.