Veteran game designer Raph Koster has a thought-provoking blog post published in response to the massive controversy over pay-to-win loot boxes in the new online game Star Wars Battlefront 2 from Electronic Arts, which retails for about $60 but requires paying much more to unlock all the game content. (Similar to the gacha controversy in other online worlds.) The problem, as Raph explains in detail, is AAA games like SWBF2 are becoming more and more expensive every year ($120-200 million+, not counting marketing), and it's becoming near impossible for game companies to make a profit just from retail sales.

But how does he think EA could have avoided the imbroglio?

"Not having a box price?" Raph tells me. In other words, go completely free-to-play with no retail box, and make loot box purchases (or whatever) a completely optional payment. "What most angers people, I think, is the perception of double-dipping."

Some MMOs and games like Team Fortress 2 have made quite a lot of money as F2P, though it'd probably be difficult to convince a hidebound company like EA to ditch retail sales completely: