Collect all

Collect-them-all pressure

The set is never quite complete, and finishing it costs more.

Watch · Fine if you understand it

Sets are built so completing them needs more purchases, trades or luck than one copy provides.

What it does to the fun

An empty slot on a collection screen nags more than a full one pleases. The last few pieces are the hardest to get, so the part that should feel like a victory lap becomes the longest and most expensive stretch. Like a sticker album where the final few stickers are printed in tiny numbers, finishing becomes the goal instead of enjoying the set. With no built-in gaps, you'd collect what you like and stop when you're happy.

What you're actually buying

The missing pieces: a second copy, a trade, more pulls or more packs. You are paying to close a gap the game left open on purpose.

How it works

In Pokémon Red and Green (1996), some creatures appeared in only one version, so completing the set meant trading with a friend who owned the other cartridge over the Link Cable. Players still paid a one-off price, and nobody felt cheated, even though the design sold extra copies. Gacha games turn the same urge into a lottery: collection sets are engineered never to quite complete, and the last items can be exponentially harder to pull. Japan banned that version (complete gacha) in 2012.

When it's fine

When completion is possible within the game you bought and trading with friends is an extra, not the only route.

Where it came from

Pokémon Red and Green (Japan, 27 February 1996) split monsters across two cartridges; producer Tsunekazu Ishihara built version-exclusive creatures and the Game Boy Link Cable specifically to force players to trade to complete the set. Gacha (from 2012) industrialised the idea. Japan's Consumer Affairs Agency banned kompu gacha in May 2012.

Rules and regulation

In May 2012 Japan's Consumer Affairs Agency banned 'kompu gacha' (complete gacha), where the last item in a set became exponentially harder to pull.

Historical prices and revenues are in US dollars at the time unless marked A$.

By the numbers

Pokémon Red and Green (Japan, 27 February 1996) split monsters across two cartridges; the Link Cable was built to force players to trade to complete the set.

Bulbapedia / The Gamer