What the ERLC and Video Games Have in Common

Why Consumers Should Stop Funding a Bad Product

Want to show you guys something. I promise this is relevant. So don't turn off the video if you don't like the topic but Show you something here this represents hundreds of wasted dollars this is Every copy of Madden that I still currently own they release a new one every year and basically let's show you this.

I've got two copies of Madden. Oh eight one for the PSP one for the PlayStation Madden oh nine. This one was this is the year that Brett Favre was on the Jets. So if that was an interesting one got mad in 10 here.

Got mad in 11 and 12 Madden 13 this one looks kind of fancy. I don't know if you can see and then of course the PlayStation 4 Madden 25, which is really Madden 2014 and What happens is they release this game every year you update things slightly.

It's basically just a roster update you get the new rosters and they charge you 60 bucks each time. And what's happened after after Madden 2014? This is the last one that I that I that I got. I don't think I even purchased this one.

This one was given to me. But what happens is that I stopped buying it because I figured this is a scam. This is the same game every year that like they don't really update almost anything about it. Sometimes they'll take a feature out.

Sometimes they'll add an old feature back in and it's just a scam. They continue to charge the same thing over and over and over again. So I stopped I said no more. I'm not doing this anymore. Now if you continue to buy Madden, I'm not saying that you're a fool.

Because you know some people really like football. I I just grew to I grew to not like football as much I still watch it on occasion, but I stopped liking it so much. I said it said I don't need the updated rosters because I don't care if I want to play I'll play this one again.

You know anyway. But what they've done lately is they've they've added these things called micro transactions. So if you don't know what a micro transaction is. It basically is you know. You buy the game for 60 bucks and then if you want to get all of the items in the game you want to get all the cool New Jersey's the different Features of the game you have to pay more smaller transactions like a dollar apiece or maybe more.

And and it's a very manipulative because what it does is it locks certain things Behind what's known as a paywall so if you want like the best you know sneakers, or you want the coolest looking haircut.

I mean, I'm not joking. This is seriously what they sell. You know you want to make your own pet player with a cool tattoo. You want to have the right you want to get an old-school player like Dominique Wilkins or something like that.

That's that's basketball you have to you have to you have to buy that extra in addition to the $60 you paid for this game. But it's actually even worse than that because you can't just buy it directly like let's say you want to get a really cool.

You know I don't know like an arm bracelet or something or like a new like an alternate Jersey or something like that or a cool Haircut or cool sneakers you what you have to do is you have to pay extra.

But it's actually what's known as a loot box so you buy a mystery pack. And it comes with three items. But you don't know which items they are and of course. The highly sought-after items the coolest sneakers the coolest people the coolest jerseys the coolest tattoos.

They are very rare. It's almost like buying Magic the Gathering cards if you didn't know that Magic the Gathering card packs are random. So you get mostly common cards. But you might get a rare card every now and then.

And so you know you have to buy a lot of packs in order to get the rare cards that you want. That's the whole idea and a lot of people have called this gambling right a lot of people call this gambling and in many ways.

It is because they don't tell you what the odds are and they they make it so cool. Kind of like a casino if you ever been in a casino some people might think it's simple to go to a casino. I've been to many casinos.

Quite a lot before I was a Christian and even some after I was a Christian the casinos. There's flashing lights and loud sounds and and just like just just since you you know the sensory overload in a casino, right?

And they do the same thing in these games when you open these loot boxes. Just Just awesome everything looks amazing and so a lot of people say it's predatory to kids because you know for kids. They don't understand the value of money.

And you've seen stories probably in the news of people Anthony emptying their parents account to get the best player in in Madden or the best player in an NBA or even in soccer as this happens all the time you really want messy.

So you had to open a million loot boxes, and you don't know if you're ever gonna get them and things like that. And it's actually even worse because these game companies will pay people on YouTube that are big have big followings.

They'll pay them to open loot boxes. And it came out recently they'll tweak the odds because it's all digital so they can tweak the odds whenever they want so what they'll do is they'll pay a youtuber to open a bunch of loot boxes and Then they'll tweak the odds to make it more likely that they'll get something good.

And then people have these reaction videos when they open up a loot box like oh Oh, I got LeBron. I got LeBron, and it's just like it's just like oh, man. It sells the fantasy. That's the thing and so it's predatory to kids because they see the fantasy on YouTube.

And they're like well I gotta I gotta I gotta get LeBron to and they End up spending all their parents money on these stupid loot boxes, and so this is it's gotten way worse. It's gotten way worse than the scam of releasing the same game over and over again every year and charging $60 each time.

It's gotten way worse than that and so lots of people these days are just like guys. Stop buying the game if you stop buying the game. They're gonna stop this shady dirty scummy tactics, and you know I agree.

This is how capitalism works if you don't like this stuff stop buying the game don't buy it for your kids. Your kids are gonna be disappointed. But don't buy it if you don't want them preyed upon by people having loot boxes in the games literally literal gambling in many people's eyes in fact.

The games industry says well, it's not gambling. It's just a surprise mechanic. It's a surprise mechanics. They're calling it. But in the latest NBA 2k game. It's literally simulated gambling and when you open the loot box.

You're pulling a What's it called a slot machine in the game? It shows on the screen a slot machine, and then it goes and you either win or you lose. There's a roulette wheel there, so there's a pachinko machine and all that stuff.

It's literal gambling. It's all in your face, so here's the solution guys if you don't like this in your video games. And it's not just sports games. This is in almost every game now these microtransactions if you don't like it stop buying it.

Okay, that's the solution now. I promise this would be relevant and it is relevant. It's the same solution in the ERLC in the SBC if you don't like what Russell Moore is doing. Which a lot of you don't I know that for a fact.

Stop buying it. Don't send them any more money no more money to the ERLC. Starve the beast no more just stop doing it stop participating in it. You don't need the ERLC. Why do you need it? You don't need it.

There's nothing in the Bible that says you need to submit to Russell Moore. There's nothing in the Bible that says you need to give money to Russell Moore nothing. Nothing. So stop doing it. Stop doing it and starve the beast now a lot of you say well.

It wouldn't starve the beast because they'd get their money from elsewhere. Yeah. They probably would they probably get their money from their shady sources even more and it'll force that in to even worse Compromises, and I say let them do it let them sell out completely let them sell out completely or Let them change let them change to become more biblical so just like with Madden.

You don't like it. Stop buying it. The RLC stop paying for it. I hope this is helpful. God bless.