What Is Gacha Life? -- What Parents Need To Know - Internet Matters

What is Gacha Life?

What parents need to know

Created by Lunime Inc., Gacha Life is a popular roleplaying video game for your mobile device. It’s made for kids and young people who love anime characters. Learn more below about what it is so that you can keep your child safe.

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In this guide

• What is Gacha Life?
• How it works
• Is Gacha Life safe for children?
• What is Gacha Heat?
• Ways to keep online gaming safe for children
• More resources

What is Gacha Life?

Gacha Life is a roleplaying video game that allows users to create anime-style characters on a mobile device. In Japan, people use the word ‘gacha’ to refer to small toys sold in vending machines, packaged in capsules.

Players can try a demo version on PC, while the full version is available on mobile devices. It allows children and young people to roleplay as characters, creating stories of their own imagination. It is most popular among older children and pre-teens.

How it works

Users can choose different outfits and accessories for their characters to wear and can customise parts of their appearance.

They can then choose from 8 mini-games to play or can create scenes in Studio Mode and become ‘friends’ with non-player characters (NPCs). Some users may upload their Gacha Life stories onto other platforms to share with others.

Is Gacha Life safe for children?

The Gacha Life app is rated 9+ on the Apple App Store and Everyone on the Google Play Store. Parents should be aware of the chat feature, access to in-app purchases and in-game ads. Ensure you have disabled in-app purchases to limit spending.

In some instances, people raised concerns about strangers requesting underage users to verify their age by sending inappropriate images of themselves.

So, it’s important to have conversations with your child about what they do online and who they talk to. This will help them develop their critical thinking of what is and is not acceptable. It’s important they understand when to flag something to an appropriate adult should they get such requests.

Gacha Life’s privacy policy encourages parents to be vigilant with their “children’s use of e-mail and other online communications and transactional features.” Parents may request a review and/or removal of their child’s personal information at any time. They can do this by contacting Gacha Life and providing them with the same screen name, password and email address that their child submitted.

What is Gacha Heat?

Gacha Heat is content generated by users of Gacha Life who upload the content on social media platforms like TikTok.

The content is inappropriate and offensive, and it goes beyond stories within Gacha Life gameplay. This content may include sexual violence and other sexual subject matter. It may also feature age-inappropriate relationships that normalise abusive behaviours.

It is problematic because of its use of characters and art from the Gacha Life mobile video game. Children or young people could view these videos on social media apps, thinking it’s appropriate for them when they’re not.

Make sure to check what they are watching and see how you can support them if they stumble across inappropriate content with our advice hub.

Ways to keep online gaming safe for children

• If you want to allow kids to pick apps, but with permission – Set up Family Sharing (iPhone) or Family Link (Android).
• If you want to prevent access to app stores altogether – Turn off the App Store in Screen Time (iPhone) or use an App Lock (Android).
• Talk to your kids about your expectations about what types of apps are allowable
• Have regular conversations and check-ins about what they are watching or interacting with online.

In this guide

• What is Gacha Life?
• How it works
• Is Gacha Life safe for children?
• What is Gacha Heat?
• Ways to keep online gaming safe for children
• More resources

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More resources

Online gaming advice hub Family games guide for all ages Step-by-step gaming parental controls My Family’s Digital Toolkit