--- title: In-game purchases and skins: the dancing banana problem — a lesson of Mova's school · trees and pragmatics description: «In-game purchases and skins: the dancing banana problem», a lesson of the everyday course of Mova's primary school, sentence by sentence with dependency trees and pragmatics. It begins: Kai got forty pounds for his birthday and spent all of it, that same evening, on a skin that turned his Fortnite --- [Mova](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) · [this page in HTML](https://mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/) [home](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/) / [corpora](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/) / [school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/) / [Everyday](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/) / In-game purchases and skins: the danci… # In-game purchases and skins: the dancing banana problem Lesson 412 of the everyday course of Mova's primary school: 25 sentences, each with its syntax tree and pragmatics. The lessons are written for Mova, and their agreed trees are part of Mova corpus 0.4 (CC BY-SA 4.0). How Mova does on its tests: [the lesson at school](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/school-run/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/). - [0](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/0/) — Kai got forty pounds for his birthday and spent all of it, that same evening, on a skin that turned his Fortnite player into a dancing banana. - [2](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/2/) — A week later the banana was just a banana. - [3](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/3/) — Kai looked at the Lego set he had wanted, at forty pounds, in the shop window, and said a word his mum pretended not to hear. - [4](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/4/) — Priya did something cleverer before she bought her dream skin. - [5](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/5/) — Her mum paid her for hoovering, so she worked out what the skin really cost: not «just 1,500 V-bucks», but twelve hours of hoovering the stairs. - [7](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/7/) — The stairs looked at Priya. - [8](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/8/) — She saved for a bike instead. - [9](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/9/) — Ollie, asked by his mum how much he had spent on games that year, guessed «about five pounds». - [10](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/10/) — They checked the purchase history together: forty-two pounds, in little bits of 79p and £1.99 that he had never added up. - [13](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/13/) — Jayden bought a skin because his favourite YouTuber wore it, then found out the YouTuber had been paid to show it off: it was an advert dressed up as a friend's tip. - [14](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/14/) — Games use quiet tricks to make spending feel easy. - [15](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/15/) — Prices are in coins, gems or V-bucks instead of pounds, so they feel like play money. - [16](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/16/) — Ruby's battle pass gave rewards only if she played every day (when she missed a few days she got fewer rewards, and found she did not really mind), and Noah's building game made him wait hours unless he spent gems — and when the gems ran out, it offered to sell him more for real money. - [17](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/17/) — Mia's answer was a simple rule of her own: only half of any money goes on games. - [18](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/18/) — By summer the other half had paid for a day at the water park, where nobody cared what skin you had. - [19](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/19/) — A skin changes how your character looks, not how well you play. - [20](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/20/) — Game coins, gems and V-bucks are bought with real money, even though they look like play money. - [21](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/21/) — Small purchases add up: ten spends of £1.99 cost almost £20. - [22](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/22/) — Turning a price into hours of chores shows what a thing really costs you. - [24](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/24/) — Some games make you wait on purpose, so you will pay to stop waiting. - [25](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/25/) — Rewards for playing every day are made to keep you coming back, even when you do not feel like it. - [26](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/26/) — YouTubers are sometimes paid to show off items; in the UK and USA such videos should say they are adverts. - [27](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/27/) — Most consoles and app stores show a purchase history that a parent can check. - [28](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/28/) — Waiting a few days before a big spend helps you see whether you really want it. - [29](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/412-in-game-purchases-and-skins/29/) — Teasing someone for what they cannot or do not buy is unkind and says nothing about the person. - ← previous: [Account swaps and passwords: the door key of your game](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/411-account-swaps-and-passwords/) - next →: [Loot boxes and the surprise trap](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/413-loot-boxes-and-the-surprise-trap/) - ↑ back to [Everyday](https://md.mova.elamur.ai/free/en/corpora/school/everyday/)