Gacha Accessibility Range?

Warning ☢️ Heavy Game Design podcast ahead.

Do you know the main difference between the 3 most common Gacha (lootbox) types on the market? 🤔

▪️ 𝐒𝐨𝐥𝐢𝐝 𝐓𝐨𝐤𝐞𝐧 𝐆𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐚 (𝘎𝘦𝘯𝘴𝘩𝘪𝘯, 𝘙𝘢𝘪𝘥, 𝘚𝘶𝘮𝘮𝘰𝘯𝘦𝘳’𝘴 𝘞𝘢𝘳)
This is the initial setup introduced in Japan. Monster strike already passed $8 Bill. lifetime revenue with it. Tokens can consume only few of their duplicates. The key is to upgrade all of their other progression vectors such as skill trees, equipment, skills, level, etc. Low rarity characters are used as upgrade fuel. Collection number dramatically increases through the lifecycle of the game into hundreds or thousands.
🎰 𝘈𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘣𝘪𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘺: Best characters are extremely hard to get and are dropped from timed exclusive drop pools.
💰 𝘙𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯𝘶𝘦 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘧𝘪𝘭𝘦: Characterized by spiky revenue, that jumps always with a new content release and then goes down dramatically until the next content drop.
👀 𝘝𝘪𝘴𝘶𝘢𝘭 𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘵: Usually tokens have stars ⭐ or other symbols that goes from 3-10 to indicate their rarity. Best tokens usually start from 5.

▪️ 𝐒𝐡𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐓𝐨𝐤𝐞𝐧 𝐆𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐚 (𝘊𝘭𝘢𝘴𝘩 𝘙𝘰𝘺𝘢𝘭𝘦, 𝘎𝘰𝘭𝘧 𝘊𝘭𝘢𝘴𝘩, 𝘎𝘰𝘭𝘥 & 𝘎𝘰𝘣𝘭𝘪𝘯𝘴)
This is pioneered by Clash Royale in 2016 and used in nearly all of Supercell‘s games. It is literally adjusted for the Western audience, as there is no more binary situation of you spending thousands and not getting what you want. Characters can only consume their own duplicates, which are given in large quantities. You usually need all of the characters as in a chess setup in order to be competitive in the PvP metagame. Collection goes into around hundred+.
🎰 𝘈𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘣𝘪𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘺: Very easy to unlock most if not all of the characters, but very hard to fully upgrade them.
💰 𝘙𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯𝘶𝘦 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘧𝘪𝘭𝘦: Very stable revenue, not that affected by release of new characters that much, rather live ops events.
👀 𝘝𝘪𝘴𝘶𝘢𝘭 𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘵: Under each token, you can see a “loading bar” which indicates how many shards you currently have until the next upgrade.

▪️ 𝐌𝐞𝐫𝐠𝐞 𝐓𝐨𝐤𝐞𝐧 𝐆𝐚𝐜𝐡𝐚 (𝘈𝘍𝘒 𝘈𝘳𝘦𝘯𝘢, 𝘈𝘳𝘤𝘩𝘦𝘳𝘰, 𝘚𝘶𝘳𝘷𝘪𝘷𝘰𝘳. 𝘪𝘰)
This is the middle ground between the previous 2 models pioneered by AFK Arena in 2018. Tokens can consume their duplicates, but at some rarity gates you can also use other tokens. Collection management later turns into inventory Tetris 😵. Usually PvE driven.
🎰 𝘈𝘤𝘤𝘦𝘴𝘴𝘪𝘣𝘪𝘭𝘪𝘵𝘺: Best characters are not that hard to get but again hard to upgrade.
💰 𝘙𝘦𝘷𝘦𝘯𝘶𝘦 𝘱𝘳𝘰𝘧𝘪𝘭𝘦: Stable but with spikes. The jumps aren’t that big as with Solid token.
👀 𝘝𝘪𝘴𝘶𝘢𝘭 𝘩𝘪𝘯𝘵: You can see same tokens having different levels of rarity in the inventory.