[Column] Maple Story fines and balance

It was 2003. When I started my Maple World adventure in Maple Story. The pocket money I worked hard to save, 1,000 won and 5,000 won, went straight to the Maple Story Cash Shop (a place where paid items are sold in the game). 20 years later, Christmas 2023, I still shopped at Cash Shop. I purchased the probability item ‘Cube’ in Maple Story. I almost lost my December salary in one sitting (how can beautiful things disappear so easily?). A month later, news came that sales of cube items with a 13-year history would be discontinued. This was the aftermath of the Fair Trade Commission imposing a correction order and a fine worth 11.6 billion won on Nexon on January 3, 2024.

According to the Fair Trade Commission, Nexon violated the Electronic Commerce Act in selling Cube items. Article 21, Paragraph 1, Subparagraph 1 of the Electronic Commerce Act prohibits e-commerce business operators from informing consumers of false or exaggerated facts or using deceptive methods to lure consumers. For probability items, the type, performance, and effects of the item are determined by chance factors, and the Fair Trade Commission considered that changing the probability of a probability item is a matter that can have a significant impact on consumers' purchase choices.

From 2010 to 2016, Nexon changed Cube's probability structure to be unfavorable to buyers, but did not notify them of this fact, thereby enticing Cube buyers in a deceptive manner, thereby violating the Electronic Commerce Act.

Specific violations include (1) the act of lowering the probability of the appearance of popular options of the cube and the black cube (a type of cube) (hereinafter referred to as 'probability lowering act') and (2) the act of changing the probability of duplicate appearance of popular options (so-called 'bobobo', etc.) to 0% (hereinafter referred to as 'act of limiting appearance').

Accordingly, Nexon claimed the unfairness of the Fair Trade Commission's judgment, saying that the odds were adjusted for the purpose of improving game balance and that the Fair Trade Commission judged the matter to be a violation at a time when there was no legal obligation to disclose the odds. The Fair Trade Commission rebutted that it was taking issue with the fact that the probability was lowered to the consumer's disadvantage but was not notified, and that it had nothing to do with whether there was a legal obligation to disclose the probability itself. Nexon and the Fair Trade Commission are expected to continue their battle for the time being.

There appears to be no excuse for the act of restricting appearance, but there is room for doubt in the Fair Trade Commission's judgment for the act of reducing probability. Although there was no legal obligation or related authoritative interpretation to disclose the probability of random items until 2016, it is necessary to examine whether the probability or its change at that time was naturally recognized as information subject to disclosure under the Electronic Commerce Act without any room for interpretation.

Until the early 2000s, many online games were operated on a flat-rate basis, but in 2001, Nexon created a successful profit model by attempting a partial fee system that allowed games to be played for free but sold paid items within the game. In 2004, when a probability item called ‘Gachapo Ticket’ gained sensational popularity in Japan’s Maple Story, it was later officially introduced in Korea’s Maple Story. In 2010, the cube, a random item, appeared and took up the highest percentage of Maple Story sales.

In this situation, at the time, the probability of random items was considered an essential part of the fun of the game and a trade secret that required significant investment in research while considering game 'balance'.

Balance improvement work (or ‘balance patch’) is a key element for the long run of MMORPG games such as Maple Story. Balance refers to the balance between elements that appear in the game, such as character occupation, equipment, and difficulty level. As Maple Story is an MMORPG, users form a kind of small-scale society within the game and compete with each other for character specifications, creating a gap between the rich and the poor within the game.

When the balance is broken (or collapsed), the gap between the rich and the poor and the imbalance in game difficulty occur, which causes users to lose motivation and leads to existing users stopping using the game and reducing the inflow of new users, which directly affects the profits of game companies.

It is no exaggeration to say that the rise and fall of a game depends on balance patches. MapleStory has been working on balance improvements on a regular basis. In particular, since a large-scale update (the so-called 'Big Bang Patch') was carried out in July 2010 with improvements to character occupations, training structure, difficulty, etc., new occupations have been created several times and content has been expanded, and balance improvement work has been intensively continued as a follow-up work. In this context, changing the cube's probability was part of a balance patch.

Starting around 2017, discussions about the speculative nature of probability items began to surface. In 2017, the Chinese government legally mandated the disclosure of detailed information on probability items.

In 2015, the Korea Game Industry Association also proposed the method of disclosing probability by section as a self-regulation guideline for random items (e.g., dividing probabilities into very low, low, and medium), but changed the guidelines to disclosing specific probabilities in 2017. It was not until 2018 that the Fair Trade Commission determined that the non-disclosure of certain random items in the 'Sudden Attack' game operated by Nexon was a violation of the Electronic Commerce Act.

Considering the circumstances of the time, the probability of random items was interpreted as a trade secret, and the change was seen as part of a balance patch. It may be a hasty conclusion to view failure to notify changes in probability items as a direct violation of the Electronic Commerce Act.

Of course, Nexon changing the cube probability without notice may cause moral outrage among users. The Fair Trade Commission may have taken action against Nexon in consideration of the recently diminishing trust relationship between game companies, including Nexon, and users. Nevertheless, caution must be exercised in retroactive dispositions and regulations. Extensive regulations beyond the predictable range undermine legal stability and cause a contraction of the gaming industry market. We look forward to a three-dimensional discussion on sanctions for probability-lowering activities in the future.

Meanwhile, the act of restricting appearance appears to be a violation of the Electronic Commerce Act, even considering the timing of the action and game balance. As a Cube buyer, you can naturally expect that there will be the appearance of certain option combinations, including the duplicate appearance of popular options in various cases, and the duplicate appearance of popular options is significantly one of the important cube purchase incentives for Cube buyers as ordinary consumers with average trading experience and attention. Therefore, since this change in probability structure is information that has an important impact on purchase choice, it is inevitable that Nexon should have notified buyers of this.

As a MapleStory user before being a corporate lawyer, I welcome the fact that the Fair Trade Commission has taken up the sword to protect the rights and interests of users. The contraction of the gaming industry market is not welcome. Perhaps the Fair Trade Commission's regulations also need a balance patch. In any case, we hope that this incident can be used as an opportunity to re-establish a relationship of trust between MapleStory users and Nexon.

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