Slashdot Mirror
Ultima Online Patch Introduces Economy-Wrecking Bug?
Thanks to PlayMoney for its weblog post revealing a recent Ultima Online patch designed to shore up the economy may have introduced new problems, as "the very same game patch... also [seems] to have introduced a gold-gusher of a bug, allowing some people to conjure themselves up a few hundred million gold pieces in the space of a week." The author references a thread on UO Stratics which includes allegations about "one guy that claimed to have made over 700mil to date on [a particular game server] with this bug", a total of $9947 under current dollar exchange rates if successfully auctioned. Although the other new economic rules "seem otherwise to be working out fine", and this exploit was "fixed last Friday [5th]", the author is concerned that "by the time the new money gets fully circulated, gold will be selling for $7 per million", half of the current $14-per-million auction price.
Just out of curiosity (never played UO, probably never will) does anyone know what the exploit looked like, what you had to do?
I remember Star Control 2, being able to sell more shuttles than you had, so your amount of cash 'wrapped around' to a large positive rather than negative value....frankly, I was just as happy to avoid all the semi-tedious mineral collecting and just go to work on the main story. (Which I used a walkthrough for...sigh, I'm such a wuss gamer. Still, I loved that game.)
SO YOU'RE GOING TO DIE: The Comic for Dealing with Death
Wait a sec... Are you sure that the bug was in Ultima Online and not recently introduced as a new fiscal policy by the government in the real world?
or some event or activity that the users would be willing to sink large amounts of money into, be over with quickly and then want to do again.
hmmm... i'd implement prostitutes.