The Netherlands recently found that four games were in violation of their Better Gaming Act. These games were found guilty because of the addictive and deceptive qualities found inherent in loot boxes but also because their rewards could be traded for items or money. By allowing for loot box drops to be monetized through trading, these games have been found guilty of promoting negative and addictive cultures. Unfortunately for Dota 2, trading is an integral part of every Valve game, and fixing the loot box mechanics will not be so easy.

Steam rolled out their trading system in 2011, and since then it has become synonymous with the platform. All Valve games feature collectable items that can be dropped, purchased or traded. More importantly, almost every game on Steam offers trading cards, making trading an essential and integral part of the entire Steam economy.

If Steam fixes the trading mechanism for Dota 2, they dramatically alter the economy of the game and Steam as a whole. That isn’t to say it would crumble, but core tenants within Valve point to a marketplace largely run and operated by the public. Valve has done its best to remove itself from this marketplace, interfering only when quality or questionable materials appear. However, the Netherlands is putting them in a bit of a corner.

Dota 2 is hardly Valve’s first internationally played game, and now that they’ve confirmed they are getting back into gaming, it likely won’t be their last. That means that policies that affect Dota 2 could easily bleed over into other huge titles like CS: GO. How Valve handles the Netherlands ruling will not just be an indication to the rest of the global market, but also to their fans of what the future will be for such titles.

Valve’s best bet will probably be to simply abandon or alter the loot box system, which is far less ingrained within Steam than the trading system. It would be much easier to simply not let players trade loot box drops than it would be to address the larger issue of how trading works in the Steam ecosystem.

Another option also exists, where Valve simply does nothing. This would result in a fine and whatever punishment the Netherlands chooses, but it could be the right decision. If Steam chooses to simply take the punishment, then they keep intact a larger system that affects thousands of games, and they show the larger marketplace that they aren’t willing to change.

The only certainty is that the loot box debate is not over. Unfortunately for Valve, their trading system might also place them in the worst position possible to defend it.