What's the meaning of "氪金"? How to translate it?

Question

I know the meaning of 氪 is krypton. But I find there are many people say: 这个游戏真好玩，我要氪金.
Now they have got the game and played it, so they needn't buy the game now, even sometime they say so when play a free game. So how to understand the meaning of it?

Answer 1

氪金 means pay, charge.

氪金，原为“课金”，指支付费用，特指在网络游戏中的充值行为。

Even the players are playing a free game, they still could pay money for items in games (to become more powerful, etc).

Also see here.

Answer 2

I think it might originate in Japanese, where it is written as 課金, meaning that you pay real money to the game, to get some advantages (such as better equipment).

When the word come to Chinese, 課 (simplified: 课) has the same reading as 氪. So on the internet, it is sometimes written as 氪金. You might also see other forms.

Answer 3

I see the question has already been answered, but I want to add a method of finding the answer.

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This word is in CC-CEDICT. You can search it on: https://www.mdbg.net

氪金
kèjīn

to make an in-app purchase in a game