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Sony Online To Sell Virtual Property
OMG! writes "In an open letter to the community John Smedley, the president of Sony Online Entertainment, announced their new service 'the Station Exchange' which will allow players of Everquest II to trade their items for real live money.
Sony Online is the first major player in the MMORPG genre to embrace commercial trading of in-game items." Commentary available from all the usual suspects, including Wired, the Players, Terra Nova, F13, and Grimwell. This would seem to be a total reversal of the policies of certain other MMOGs.
I jumped out of my chair when I saw this. My inital thoughts:
- This is going to legitimize the activities of companies like IGE.
- I hope it's a unprecendented failure, even though I fear it won't be.
- What's next? SOE selling in-game currency?
At least they have the good sense to do this on new, seperate servers. This is going to have far-reaching consequences, they've essentially broken the "fourth wall" of MMORPGs. First-sign-of-the-apocalypse dept, indeed!
Auto-reply to ACs: "Truly, you have a dizzying intellect."
The makers of Second Life have taken a very unique approach to player rights with in the game.
.This is totally against the grain of most online games where the company owns it all.
In Second life, the content player create, is owned by the player and not the company
Additionally, they have started tying in real currency to the in game currency. I know this not unique, as Project Entropia does the same thing.
I personally hope this is the way games will go--giving ownership of virtual property to the players and allowing them to use it, sell it, convert for real $$$. I find these environments more enjoyable and rewarding that environments like Everquest, where Sony pretty much owns you.
First they don't want us to buy/sell EQ merch over ebay. Now they want the exclusive contract. TOTAL CARP. Haven't they read Clue Train? By now it's a standard or at least it has to be...
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
"How much for your woman?"
Actually if you think about it, this is even better than software fees. Need money for the yearly employee bonus? Just make some pretend stuff out of thin air and sell as needed! Who said magic isn't real?
I Am My Own Worst Enemy
The things that go through SOE's collective heads... You know, murder is illegal, and people are still doing it all over. It's clogging up our court systems. How about we just make a state where you can murder whomever you want? We will just charge a special tax so we can make a profit off of it. If it just so happens to be your state that we decide to make murder legal in, it's ok, you can always move. You don't need your friends and family anyways.
Interested in open source engine management for your Subaru?
"That's a mighty sword, but my meek level 2 arms can barely lift the thing."
*shrug* So this is shameless guesswork. I havent played the game.
It's only worth 25 cents.
Way to open the door to abuse Sony, using ebay was bad enough.
...
Although:
1) Enslave kids and the elderly and for them to play.
2)
3) Profit!
The buyer will then need to make payment via the credit card on file with the Station Exchange service. Once the Exchange server has completed the transaction with the seller's PayPal account (minus a percentage of the transaction price), the item or character will be transferred to the buyer's game account.
Frankly, I'm surprised more MMO games haven't done something like this already, it seems like a no-brainer to me.
Sony's going to open a can of worms with this idea... rotten decaying worms.
Games are meant to be fun, don't get the money involved; it'll be more commerce than fun.
Charles Keating brought in to advise.
but what happens when there is a server crash and I lose some rare object I was going to sell for 50 bucks?
- Preventing people from hacking/gaming the system.
- Making sure it's all skill and not chance.
I'll wager that this is a fiasco. Oops, I mean I suspect it will be. No gambling allowed on Slashdot...Actually, I was trying to be Insightful, not Funny.
people who play everquest for a living can actually play everquest for a living.
Live money?
Is that five pound note moving?
Argh! Get it off me! I can't breathe!
Remax signs an exclusive deal with Sony; they become the authorized agent to sell more crap, this time it is virtual.
Basically what they are saying is half their time is spent resolving issues from failed transactions so there are support cost savings in putting in an effective forsale/trade system. They won't be selling items themselves, only help facilitate the trade.
Personally I have no trouble with players selling virtual items but I would not support the company doing it. Players should have equal opportunity to get the same items with their monthly fee. But hey, I may be in the minority of people who only want to pay a monthly fee.
"Thanks to the remote control I have the attention span of a gerbil."
"Who said magic isn't real?"
Indeed--"Something out of nothing." Sounds like magic to me.
So, basically, Sony is able to create their own economy by creating, manipulating, or removing (virtual) commodities at a whim, and then get/give real money for them?
Is it just me, or is this INSANE?
~D
This sig has been enciphered with a one-time pad. It could say almost anything.
And all of the uber loot that the players have spent real money purchasing is going to be going bye bye? I'd be worried about folks suing.
By allowing (condoning, actually) this sort of activity, Sony is ensuring that this game dies a slow and lingering death. Gone are the days when all you needed to excel at Everquest was a good internet connection and a complete lack of a life...now you need the cash, too. People with money will be better equipped than people with no money...those with no money will quit in disgust, and those with money will lose interest after they run up against enough other players with enough money to equip themselves well. Fortunately, those who don't want to participate in this mercenary practice will have the option to play on non-Station Exchange servers...that is, until a majority of the players on that server want the server to be a Station Exchange server...in which case you'll have to find another server...sorry.
It seems that Sony is turning on their major client base...risking alienation and mass defection...so why would Sony embraace such a controversial move?
From The Players:
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
Think twice if you think this only affects the flagged "Exchange Servers." The big time farmers will continue to operate on the non Exchange Servers in violation of the TOS like they always have, possibly with less competition now.
If you were disappointed in EQII, check out this new game in development by the co-creator of EQ. It's shaping up to be everything EQII should have been. The FAQ (http://www.vanguardsoh.com/faq.php) is an interesting read and the forums are always frequented by the dev team, including Aradune! http://www.vanguardsoh.com/
"What kind of music do pirates listen to?" -Paul Maud'dib
"Yeeeaaarrrrr n' Bee!!" -Stilgar, Leader of Sietch Tabr
to make money on evercrack
Enjoy Every Sandwich
I can just see it, the Evercrack Mafia trying to take the system for a ride across the lake.
...Poor players will have to work for their virtual items, while some punk kid will spend his paycheck on a +1,000 sword of n00bPower.
It makes sense to me to limit or ban this kind of trading/buying. What's the point of earning money and stats, if you can simply buy them?
My roommate was addicted ("No, I just like it a lot! I swear!") to a MMORPG a few years ago and learned that you could sell your character on eBay. He worked some numbers and figured out that if he kept leveling up at his current rate, then within XX weeks he could get to an attractively high level and acquire enough good items to sell at $XX, and he would effectively get $1 an hour for failing grades, failing relationships, failing sleep patterns, and failing personal hygiene.
Amazingly, he decided not to bother.
Pure Genius on the part of the vendors
Unlike the real world, they CAN make new real estate. Should be interesting to see how stupid the market gets for this stuff. And it will get stupid.
It will also be interesting to see how far this goes. Anyone have a problem owning NPC slaves? Maybe sex slaves? Maybe NPC sex slaves that look like kids? kids that could be virtually beaten to death? I have no doubt it will happen in some game somewhere.
Anyone who has played on-line know there are some realy disturbed people out there.
I could have bought the Brooklyn Bridge from the comfort of my home rather than having to make several trips to Nigeria.
Do not try to read the dupe, thats impossible. Instead, only try to realize the truth
What truth?
There is no dupe
Maybe we can see more instances like the Shanghai Stabbing that went down nearly a month ago.
You steal men's souls.. and make them your slaves...
On one hand I scream no don't do this, don't force me to play in an economy that will be all fubared by the influence of an outside currency. On the other hand I can see Sony's desire to cash in on this market, I have seen estimates of up to 800 million with 20% of those sales being from Sony products. Kinda makes me want to try and become a professional farmer myself. I would finally have a reason for playing all those hours that my wife would find acceptable.
So the rich get to stay on top even in games?
oh what fun that will be, my character can be a penniless student just like in real life.
Be you Admins? nay, we are but lusers!
I didn't RTFA but I'm guessing Sony gets a percentage cut of all items traded on the Station. And even if they don't, it's generating traffic and thus ad revenue.
I mean, WHOA! RIAA! Look at this! Somebody had customers doing illegal things with their property in violation of their license agreement and found a way to make a profit off it instead of sueing their own customers! What a novel friggen concept.
"I have never won a debate with an ignorant person." -Ali ibn Abi Talib
Can 1099 forms and Income Tax be far behind?
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
However, I am already buying enough tangible shit from Sony like Michael Jackson & Jessica Simpson CDs without needing to spend any more with you.
At least with the tangible shit, I have something to throw at the cat or at the TV screen when I realise you guys have ripped me off again.
Regards
Blah blah blah
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
I wonder how people in the Sudan and Afghanistan would feel about this.... People trading imaginary commodities for enough cash to feed themseves for a more than year. This is very sad and an imbarrasment for the entire species when human life is literally worth less than someone's entertainment . Especailly when that entertainment is derived from a piss poor simulation of realty.
No matter where you go , there you are.
If people want to give real money to buy imaginary items, they should be able to do so. I wouldn't do it, because I don't see what value I would be getting, but if others feel differently, more power to them.
I am surprised that Sony is doing this, though, because they have a tendency to shoot themselves in the foot with propriatery standards and a sometimes control-freakish mentality which makes some of their hardware less desireable than it would otherwise be.
It's almost like someone with a different (non-Sony) mindset approved this decision.
erm... /. seems to be losing it's touch each and every day!
Each time i see the words "the first" i lmao
http://www.project-entropia.com
and more importantly relating to virtual real estate -
http://www.project-entropia.com/StdContent.ajp?Id= 1675
and
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4104731.stm
Also media buzz -
http://press.arrivenet.com/tec/article.php/618316. html
There are two issues with Sony actually doing something like this:
1) They are accepting responsibility for the value of in-game items. This might not seem like a big deal, but god forbid a server rollback takes a big-ticket item out of your inventory. Or worse, balance adjustments devalue rare/valuable items. How many lawsuits can you imagine will come from people who want to be reimbursed for their "virtual" property's market value? To be sure, the items in question are really just bits on a computer. But really, how different is that from most banking done today? Would you like to be told by your bank that your last direct deposit doesn't exist anymore because they needed to rollback their database?
2) Officially putting a value to in-game items gives new incentive to all those gold and item harvesting shops to work extra hard, not only to eat up as much of those resources as possible, but to hoard and control market fluxuations. If you think spawn camping is bad now, imagine when you're competing with people who are doing it for a living! Yes, it's already happening now, but this will just take it to levels untold of before.
Will there be an SEC to make sure collusion doesn't take place between harvesters and GMs who spawn an extra rare or two for a few bucks?
Give's a whole new meaning to the phrase Earn Big-Bucks working at home.
"It's the height of ridiculousness to say for those 9 lines you get hundreds of millions."
Any mention of how sellers get paid? Are we talking paypal, or is SOE just going to credit your monthly account? There's no mention of transaction fees either.
I had no idea of just how much work they had to do because of dishonest players.
my star, and my plot on the moon.
i'm currently playing wow and because of blizzards major problems to keep their servers up and running i was thinking about trying eq2. but a news message like this will certainly stop immediately because that's definitely not what i like.
This is pretty fascinating development we're witnessing in vitual worlds. Purchasing "virtual" goods isn't particularly new (think of domain names and banner ads, even our bank accounts can appear pretty virtual sometimes). However, what appears to be happening is that the quality of your virtual experience is now starting to be based on your real world wealth.
Putting in the time on these games to hack and slash your way to fame and power is no longer the only way to exceed. Now, if you have the real life money, you can simply buy power and fame. In fact, this will probably become the preferred way to gain items. The old slow way of working your way to the top will be a hoped-for avenue for those too poor to afford to buy their way up.
Sound familiar? The net is turning into the real world. Yes, I realize this is just a silly game, and different than what most people use the net for regularly, but these trends are going to spread (and already are: gmail accounts as status symbols?) to other areas of net usage.
And notice how IGE is already targetting many of their fansites for buyout. Amusing write up at n3rfed.
ancarett, historian and zombie gamer
There's no difference between trading virtual items and trading any tangible non-essential item. It's a basic economic process: you trade your hours (in the form of money) for someone else's hours (in the form of game goods).
There's a very good reason why realistic online games evolve this kind of trading. Never heard of people selling low-number Slashdot IDs? It's the same thing... people place a value on the virtual goods because they represent an investment in time that they cannot afford.
The obvious rules for virtual goods apply if these are to be traded usefully: a realistic supply (i.e. you can't resell the same item more than once), recourse against fraud, and a semi-official currency that allows abstract exchange.
No difference selling game goods than trading Dollars on forex.
Sig for sale or rent. One previous user. Inquire within.
I need to unload a few hot properties...
This should be interesting to see how it develops, but I don't think the "OMG They'll get sued if they ever close the servers!" sentiment echoed at some of the links Zonk posted is going to happen...yet.
While SOE is facilitating the trade of virtual chattels for real-world dollars, and apparently taking a transaction fee (like IGE and other online sellers), as things stand right now, the EULA/TOS is what will presumably control these issues. Ever since Blizzard won its case against the bnetd project, and in many, many previous cases about clickwrap agreements, shrinkwrap agreements, etc. these kinds of cases are going to be controlled by the rights agreed to under the EULA/TOS.
This isn't to say that U.S. courts may find future EULAs to be fully or partially unenforceable, but I don't have a crystal ball. Additionally, while some judges like Judge Posner have recognized that the law needs to address virtual worlds and consider where we're going in regards to the rights of avatars and virtual chattels, keep in mind that Posner in particular comes from an economic view of law. To that extent, I find it hard to believe that any changes in how we regard virtual chattels will come out in favor of massive liability for game companies if they close the server.
It's great for theoretical wanking (could players individually, or as a class, petition a bankruptcy court to appoint someone to administer the game servers to protect their property) but quite honestly, without de-throning the EULA, or without specific EULAs being found unenforceable, this won't be a problem on the legal end as things are right now.
"I do not regret the things I have done, but those that I did not do."
You'd think they'd run into inflationary pressures if they essentially printed money.
Poor people at a disadvantage to those with high disposable incomes! I can only hope that life doesn't imitate art or we could end up living in a world where the wealthy have access to the best homes, food, clothing, transport, education and health care! What a nightmarish vision!
Hello and may all the Gods of Everguest Bless Yuo!
I am writing because I know that yuo are a sincer and honest person who will hep out a preson in need.
My Everquest cahacter MINOLLY WEATHERALL was sadly kilt in a server crash leaving behind an account of $70,000,000 SEVENTY MILLION AMERICN DOLLARS with no claimant accessible.
If you wil assist me with your Everquest cahracter to recover this money I wil give you 15% plus expenses
This is a sincer offer and I know I can trust you with this verry sensitiv informations!
--- Attorneys Assisting Citizen-Soldiers & Families -
They have to do SOMETHING to keep customers. Now they're whoring out their own IP. Fantastic. They can only get people to play if it's economically advantageous for them to do so, rather than making the game FUN TO PLAY. They have just shot the horse.
-Randy
You have got your signals crossed. Sony is not making any new games of chance. This article is about the new servers which Sony will put into place to regulate a practice which has been going on behind the scenes for many years. That is the sale if virtual items i.e. swords, rings, gold coins, within the game of Everquest II.
So, if virtual swords are worth real money, and if I steal your virtual sword, can I get arrested in the real world? What if I p-kill you? I need a blue pill...
One man's Funny is another man's Offtopic.
I think the future is obvious with this plan. SOE will eventually create items which can only be purchased by real money. (It would not be a drop off any creatures for example). These items would have some significant power and 'wow' factor coolness via animated / high quality graphics. They would most likely make these items no-trade so people couldn't sell / give them away in game (forcing players to buy the item for each of their characters. Imagine being able to buy a Pegasus flying mount which can't be obtained any other way? Or some neat looking undead / skeletal horse mounts)? Eventually, you'll be able to buy NPC's who follow you and assist you in battle. Perhaps buy a castle and an army to support you?
SOE has taken the first steps in this direction and I am sure we'll see unique items for sale in the next 12 months. You can bet that if I thought of this potential cash cow, that people at SOE have thought of it and are counting on it as a source of revenue.
Most of the comments I've seen on this issue aren't really based in reality; there are a few things one should know about this policy before insulting it.
1- The servers that allow real world purchasing of items are all going to be *new* servers, no pre-existing server is affected and loot transactions will still be illegal on preiexisting servers.
2- Characters can choose to move to one of the new servers so they won't have to start over.
3- SOE will not be selling items; They won't be conjuring up a few magic sword to sell to "pay the employee bonus'"
Really guys, I'm not saying this policy is good or bad yet, but at least slam the actual policy and not some straw-man you conjured up.
There's a secondary market in Second Life currency. Gaming Open Market used to do this for other games, including Everquest, but they encounted publisher opposition.
hmm
t m
http://www.project-entropia.com
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/4104731.s
This is frighteningly similar to SL Exchange, a service I created for Second Life. Their use of many of the same terms to describe the service makes me wonder...
there was just too much money being left on the table for Sony not to get involved with the virtual sale/resale market at some point. It had to happen.
I'm sure that they've spent countless hours with their legal team trying to figure out all of the liability issues. For example, what if EQII suddenly goes bust and Sony shuts down the servers? Everything you just paid real dollars for is now non-existent.
golden tee live (a new version of a popular bar-video-golf game) just recently added some new features including paying-for-virtual-property, such as different club-sets or even boxes of golfballs which you DO lose as you hit them into the water.
I feel the same way everytime I see a Hummer H2 rocket by at 80 mph. Some many of us pour our lives down the drain on foolish wastes; in about 50 years they'll wonder why they worked so hard to end up with so little.
But that's their free choice. At least virtual reality doesn't pollute much.
--- Attorneys Assisting Citizen-Soldiers & Families -
At last I can avoid all those sticky nosey colluding people and all that sickly social interaction and STILL EARN A LIVING! ...
Thank you so much Sony!
No, I'm not joking, I really mean it.
Thank you Sony; I owe you my new life
All this shows me is how much ass WoW is kicking. For Sony to have to resort to this means that they are really going out on a limb for more people to play their crappy game.
For those of you that hope this will fail, I don't think you have to worry. The fact that they are even doing this is proof enough that EQ2 is on it's way out.
This message was brought to you by the death of 30 brain cells.
My first response to this was, like many, "What the fuck?" Almost every game out there has big glaring clauses in their EULAs that specifically state the buying and selling of in-game items is forbidden. But effectively what they're trying to do here is "legalize" it, probably hoping it will become less and less of a black/grey market.
Will it completely put a stop to selling on eBay? Probably not. But for the casual player who can't powergame to get an awesome piece of loot, maybe spending 10 bucks on the Sony Exchange intead of spending 15 bucks worth of online time trying to get it is a good deal.
I also think that if I could pick a single developer out there to try this, especially if it ends up failing miserably at the cost of developer $$$ and reputation (such as it is), I would rather Sony be the ones to give it a go.
"I'm a leaf on the wind. Watch how I soar."
-Hoban Washburn
with they're supposed "combat upgrade and rebalance" so why not kill off every game they own/manage? Bleed them dry as fast as possible, cash out, walk away from the virtual table. Come out with new, supposedly hot MMORPG, rinse, repeat. Personally, I hope SOE shrivels up like a prune and blows away and a company with some morals (ok, yeah, I'm hoping for a lot here) OR at least decent damn customer service springs up to take their place.
Dream as if you'll live forever.
Live as if you'll die tomorrow.
~Anonymous~
And just like that IGE's business model is shattered. What value could this company provide if other people are better at what they do? IGE can still sell virtual items for other games but what if other companies follow in Sony's footsteps? Surely IGE should worry.
One of the great things about online games has always been that if you are black, white, poor, or rich, you all start the game with equal footing and have equal chance at success.
Not any more. Once again, the old money will reign and trod on the up-and-coming, or the hobbyist player.
Hey, wait a minute. That means eventually the vast majority of people playing will be those who have been economically filtered to the top; those who have, and are willing to pay, lots of money for games. And Sony will have their names, addresses, and the ability to advertise directly to them.
Wow. Sony is fucking brilliant.
---
Students, children, those in countries of economic hardship, don't whine. Your computer COMES with solitaire. For free!
Millionaire just played games to get rich!
Flat Screen TV for F
Smed says that 40% of their customer service calls are related to fraudulent in-game transactions. Sony could make this disappear instantly by creating an escrow system in-game. You have a sword to sell, you take it to the EQ Escrow storefront and drop it off. The buyer picks up the sword and the credits are automatically deducted from his account. No chance for fraud.
This isn't going to legitimize IGE, this is going to put them out of business, once Sony gets rolling with this.
Huh, so money must really grow on trees afterall.
Trolls lurk everywhere. Mod them down.
Race: TOTAL CARP
Class: Ethereal Ninja
S: 12
I: 4
W: 2
D: 11
C: 17
CHR: 2
AC: 10 -1 (wants to be caught)
HP: 340
HD: 18+15
#ATT: 0 (defenseless)
Special: Spreads Influence into Corporate Culture
The dangers of knowledge trigger emotional distress in human beings.
Think of it this way:
Players pay Sony X amount of real money for the right to play the game. During the course of playing the game, there is a Y% chance of getting a particular item. That item can then be sold back to Sony for Z amount of real money.
How is that different from:
Players pay a casino X amount of real money for some tokens that allow them to play a slot machine. During the course of playing the game, there is a Y% chance of hitting a particular jackpot. That jackpot can then be cashed in at the casino for Z amount of real money.
Sony is treading dangerously close to running a gambling operation by acknowledging that in-game items have real-world value an actually redeeming that value themselves. As long as they're just offering a service for a monthly fee they're okay, but when they start offering the chance to win real money based on random events, that's dangerous territory.
Do you mean that my job title can go from "Junior Software Developer" to "Senior Everquest Item Farmer"?
"Computer science is no more about computers than astronomy is about telescopes." E. W. Dijkstra
MMORPG are based of chance. When you swing your weapon, there's a certain chance it will hit, certain chance it will crit, and then the damage is random as well. When I fight someone, i could easily have my weapon crit 4 times in row killing the other guy. Or i could have my weapon miss 4 times. Whats the skill involved with that?
Have you ever been to a turkish prison?
now the uber guilds will have a real world monopoly too.
In gunbound you can buy "gold" for $$$.
And yeah, whats so bad about it? You can invest either lots of time or money for the same result.
And yeah, some people would rather spend 20$ than 5hours of grinding...
HI O WISE PRINCE. WHT TOOK U SO DAM LONG?
Sounds very similar to that thing Microsoft was hinting at for Xbox 2, with mini-transactions or some idea like that. Personally, bad idea. The reason people play video games is so they can pretend they are not in their everyday lives. They are in worlds where you can make it yourself. So this will effect this. A lot. Why bring your monetary class into a game? I mean, a spoiled little 9 year old could buy ubar weapons and stuff, while somebody who has more skill is behind him.
A wise man once said, "wtf h4x."
To those objecting to exchanging virtual goods for real money, please explain how money is any more "real" than the objects in this game. Money is just a concept; those pieces of paper don't have any intrinsic worth. Hell, even an amount of gold isn't instrinsically "worth" anything, except the price put on it by those who might wish to acquire it.
As for the objections that Sony can create new virtual goods from thin air - isn't this what Microsoft does every time they release a new software package? How is Office "real"?
Regarding the complaint that this system will favour the rich, isn't this already the case in that rich people can afford better PCs - ie: the advantage conferred in FPSs by higher frame rates.
And finally, to those worried about cheating or viruses, or crashes or whatever; since the vast majority of "real" money only exists electronically these days, the exact same issues are faced by banks, and they seem to do OK. It can be done right.
It's going to be interesting to see how this turns out. I wonder if they're going to have to make use of the same tools as in the "real" economy, such as controls of the interest rate and so forth.
In real life you can't buy a cup of coffee +1... oh wait... Hang on, in real life, you don't own a big sword and randomly kill small defencless (i.e. anything smaller than you) creatures for fun. Do you?
Programming is an Art. I am an Artist. Does that mean I get to wear a daft hat?
Also, it greatly depends on game design.. I haven't played EQ2 but in EQ this system would definately be a problem. For WoW on the other hand it probably wouldn't have that great of an impact because of the way drops, quests and special binds are designed.
"Thanks to the remote control I have the attention span of a gerbil."
What I don't understand is the (visceral) reaction against this.
Currently, I can't think of an MMOG that doesn't 'bless' players that have more time to spend than their peers.
Either
1) these players have wealth enough to waste time playing a game at no risk to their lifestyle (IMO a vanishingly tiny percentage)
2) these players have so little lifestyle to risk, that playing a game all day doesn't significantly impact them.
How is either of these positions fundamentally different from a game allowing people who have money in real life inherently get another advantage? How is a bounty of money intrinsically different than a bounty of time?
As I see it, it's the Category 2 people that are crying because they lose the one thing they had 'up' on people who, in the real world, are financially better off than them. Yeah, so? I have neither excess money, nor excess time, so either group pwns me if I feel the need to 'compete' with them in some manhood-comparing MMOG way.
-Styopa
Wouldn't that make it online gambling then? I'd say they're walking a pretty fine line, there...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Hmm IANAL ...
And that's the key to the whole issue in Second Life.
Lawyers are given the middle finger. (Well actually, just ignored.)
And that's why it works marvellously.
I swear, the typical Slashdot reader goes by the Fox News esq over dramatization given by /. and don't even read the article.
If nothing else, this might expand the market. Other MMORPG's have been based 100% on real life cash. Sony is offering players the option of playing on servers where items can be bought and sold for cash. I would think that this, in combination with PVP (that Sony is planning to introduce soon), could totally change the market. Think of clan warfare when (potentially) money is on the line?
Personally, I will continue to play on a server that does not allow this because I like to work for my gear. What next, though? Gamblers getting addicted to EQ?
Wise men say, "Forgiveness is divine, but never pay full price for late pizza."
How long before real life taxes are put on the purchase of in game items and currency?
With online gaming, XBOXLive, Micropayments and the plethora of subscription-based massive-multiplayer-online games comming out now, games are no longer a product that you buy and pay once for, but a service which a company provides for you, and - if you want to spend more, you get better service (easier items, higher levels) without having to put the legwork in for you.
Sure, you could go to a bar, be a slub and walk up to the bar, deal with getting the bar-tenders attention and yell your order and hope it gets heard right.
Or, you could walk into the VIP lounge, pay extra for bottle service, and not need to deal with the hassles of trying to get the attention of the waitress at the bar.
The more you pay, the better service you get, and this is simply an extension of that. It'll be interesting to see how this plays out in the long run and if other MMORPGs will follow suit.
There is another MMORPG out there (forget which), where using real-life currency for in-game items is the norm, its built into the game. I recall an island being sold in game for a few thousand dollars (by the developers, not some IGE-yantis ass), and the guy gets to develop it however he wants, or even rent out parts of his island to other people for real money.
OSI has been doing a very 'mini' version of this in allowing players to buy characters that start off with their skills in the 80s (they still need to do the legwork to get them into the 100+ range), but having a 'master' character from the get-go for an extra few bucks is a good deal.
UO I think, is one of the few MMORPGs which actually allows and encourages account transfer, and provides a service which allows accounts to change hands in a secure manner to help reduce fraud.
Selling items in game has huge potential to be a cash-cow, Sony has realized this for ages, and their main reason for banning people before for it, is because someone else was making profit and not them.
Personnaly, I dont care if items/stats or characters can be bought - aslong as they are NOT exlusive to 'buying them'.
If you can buy a sword-of-ass-kicking with +555 damage, there best be a way to get the exact item in-game.
I. I think it's funny that in the past there has been great opposition to this. And only now after Microsoft announced that it would be a major offering throughout many Xbox 2 Live! games does SONY seem to alter their position on this.
II. I am just waiting for some "virtual nation" to have their GNP exceed that of real nations. "In the news today, the virtual nation of "Eschboxia Livia" has exceeded the GNP of Poland. Much question has arose since their recent purchase of an entire island in the Bahamas as to whether Eschboxia can in deed be called a virtual nation any longer.
it is no longer a game - games are ment to be fun!
All that is going to happen is someone is going to figure out the code, and start coding things for people. Neo, this is going to sting a bit, but you're going to learn karate, and have the ability to blast a vapor cloud that covers the shy and blows up a server, and all for the low price of, your time.
We all dance, we all sing.
-The Streets
How long until bots appear that wander the game, collecting items for sale on the auction? As a result, we may see VERY strong novel AI algorithms.
Project Entropia has been dealing with real life cash currency for years.
So Sony has decided to tag along????
Big Whoop!
And too bad for all you EQers out there. Now you'll get to play with some monetary risk involved..
Bwahahahaha
So what's new? Not much other than this time it's the game owner setting up the exchange.
Buying/selling game accounts, currency, items and housing has been going on for a long time.
the whole buying and selling on everquest isn't much different from buying and selling cards. Magic cards can get extremly expensive and people gladly toss over huge amounts of money to get a good deck.
Fast Federal Court and I.T.C. updates
Sony: "Want to play a great game? The objective is to give us as much money as you can afford. The player who buys the most 'virtual property' from us has a greater chance of winning."
I wonder how many idiots they'll find who are willing to trade real money for a virtual "you won our MMORPG (but lost in life)" certificate from Sony.
Between 10 and 20 years ago I was into "pen and dice" role playing games big time. As the pre-cursor to MMORPGs, it was great fun escaping from the real life of mortgages & work to go have a few beers with some friends and pretending to be an elf for a while - I even miss RPGs occasionally today.
They were pleasant hours because of pure escapism and entertainment, nothing more. Yes, it was great going up a level as a character, killing a huge beast or solving a big mystery but part of the fun was also dying occasionally or making some huge mistake that made you and your character look like an idiot.
However, one thing that would have ruined it would have been to have a games master who was open to bribery - e.g. "Here's a ten pound note, make sure I get that +5 Vorpal Blade, okay?" It didn't happen and had it happened, the fun element would have dissipated quickly purely because the real world of money and bribery would have begun to influence that fantasy world in our heads.
One reason I never play MMORPGs is because while I believe most people play them for fun, just like our pen and dice games, a small rogue element in every game takes it far too seriously. These are people who need attention and power before escapism and fun, perhaps mirroring what they are like in real life. Thus real life (again!) creeps into a fantasy universe.
Now, Sony is proposing that yet more of "real life" creeps in because, all of a sudden, how much disposable income you have in real life influences how well you will do in EQ. Suddenly, escapism is not so much of an escape...
The real problem here is that it will ruin the escape for the people who do enjoy the fun of it (again, the majority). It's sad, but those people who have to seek attention and power now have a mechanism to buy that.
In my day, we called it "cheating" and all it does is start to destroy the fun of those players who genuinely play purely for to escape from the real world.
This will destroy Everquest, no question about it, because the people that make that universe fun will feel cheated and robbed and will no doubt find another MMORPG to go and play instead.
But quite frankly, if the cheats can make Sony richer in the short term, what do Sony really care?
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
This will highly increase the value of rare items and people who have addictive personalities will play games where there is a chance of getting that rare item that now not only makes your toon more uber, it is worth a bunch of real life coin. Smart idea imo.
Every time a comment like the parent is posted, somehow it gets modded up as insightful and gathers a bunch of flames before smarter people mod it down properly. Can we track down the users who mod these comments up and make sure they never get mod points again? This is getting ridiculous!
"We've done a fair amount of homework on this subject, and we believe this is a $200 million dollar market worldwide, and there are a huge number of our players taking part in the buying and selling of virtual goods."
Or to rephrase we want our cut of it and this will cut out the ebaying, ige etc.. Our saps errr customers aren't paying us enough so we've found another revenue stream.
pay for water.("huh?") pay for clothes.("huh?") pay
for pr0n.("huh?") pay for electricity("huh?") and
-now- pay for virtual property ("outch!").
NEEEEAAATTT, i'm not mad after all!
They need so expand this to Drug Wars!
Which raises a question: if I'm selling fake drugs for real money, is this considered "drug money?"
Partial Credit: The Engineer's Best friend
"Well, the bridge didn't fall all the way down!"
You guys are talking about how people will now be able to buy their way to the top. On the flip side, all those kids that spend 10 million mind-numbing hours playing these games, can finally make a living and make money from home. Sure they live sad-pathetic lives, but now they can make money to pay for that next month of isolation.(It keeps kids off the streets)
If the items have a value based on real money and I assume there is some redeeming process to receive money from your sales, these transactions would be taxable. They would be subject to Sales tax on your purchase for your state AND income tax on your profit. I wonder how Sony plans to handle that!
The first time my kid makes more than I do in annual salary from sales of his +6 Cutlass of Mages, I'll never kick him off the computer and make him do his homework again.
BEST SLASHDOT POST EVER
There is absolutely no way for Sony to stop people from selling items outside of their game universes. They can say it's prohibited, but people will still do it. So setting up a safe, professional trade system will not only keep players happy but also cut down on fraud and make Sony more money at the same time.
:)
It's a little dream of mine to make a living selling online RPG items. I could then justify the monthly costs of the games.
"But quite frankly, if the cheats can make Sony richer in the short term, what do Sony really care?" Exactly. They need to make the money back that they spent developing this game. It clearly isn't doing that, AND they're losing customers to the competition. Sony has written this game off. It's no longer a long-term venture for them. It's the MMO maker equivalent of "selling off".
-Randy
But who gets to tax this new economy? Sony(the host provider), Japan(shelters sony), USA(has the nukes), New York City(because they want to)??
There is not nearly enough love in the world, but there is far too much trust.
This is an interesting move considering they were the first company to get people banned from ebay for selling their "copyrighted material" in Everquest.
Trading in game currencies is my main source of income at the moment, and while I don't mess with EQ2, I'd like to send a big F*** you out to Verant and Sony.
I see all these comments about how this is going to cause everyone to quit EQ II and how the rich will have the best equipment and blah, blah, blah... I used to buy and sell EQ gear for real money all the time and if you actually play the game you learn that the best gear in game can not be bought. They make the truly awesome gear that you get from raiding uber mobs NO DROP. This means that it cannot be traded, sold and etc... The key to getting great gear in a game like this is getting into a good guild and taking on the big mobs in the big zones. Of course spending time getting your character up in levels and experience is important too, but I don't think Sony will allow that on their sales site because you wouldn't be selling an item. They will probably disallow the powerleveling services that charge X amount to play your character for you and get levels. In any case unless EQ II has changed their item drops drastically I would have to say that this won't hurt the game at all. (It will hurt the kids who burn their paychecks on some goofy piece of virtual kit though. Sigh there goes that college fund.)
News Reporters Make Tasty Polar Bear Treats!
This isn't going to legitimize IGE, this is going to put them out of business, once Sony gets rolling with this.
Quite true. Obviously, no 3rd-party seller of in-game resources can survive being undercut by the system administrators, who can accomplish the equivalent of MONTHS of gil-farming with a single command-line.
However, although the short-term effect may seem beneficial, I've always thought that the legitimized (or merely widespread) sale of in-game items would hasten the collapse of any typical MMORPG. This seems to be a desparation move by SOE, whose EQ2 project has been eclipsed by WoW anyhow.
My thesis is that MMORPGs provide a substantial amount of their entertainment in the same way casino gambling does: the players' victories and rewards are quite arbitrarily handed out by the operators, but the cold-blooded arithmetic is hidden behind a screen of glamour and fun. Expose the honest real-dollars cost of an activity to the player, and they'll flee to a more fantastical game.
If a slot machine has a sign on it that each 10 minutes of play loses an average of $2.85, few people will enjoy pulling the lever.
If level 60 epic flame-armor has a "Buy Now" hyperlink which costs $14.31, few people will find it fun to camp a dragon every 3 hours hoping he drops one more of the pieces.
Basic psychological principles: addiction can best be sustained if the game gives out rewards unpredictably. Game items are valued more because it was hard to know when they'd appear. Putting a blatant dollar-sign on the items is the ultimate form of predictabilty. The virtual Skinner box falls apart. When the mystique is gone, the players will be too.
PS. The Economist magazine agrees with my prediction, although the article isn't posted for nonsubscriber online reading.
Any online game or experience is ultimately what you, the player, makes of the game. The impact of third parties (other players) upon you is limited by how wide you define your boundaries.
/. predict. As the article mentions, exchange servers will not be the default, but merely an option for those who wish to step over into something new.
If you play the game for your own enjoyment, with your friends or otherwise, and come across a player who is playing the game for some financial motivation, why not just take satisfaction in knowing that you are enjoying yourself, and he is likely forcing himself into his predicament.
However, in the long term, this won't impact the overall experience as much as the doomsayers of
I myself play World of Warcraft, and have been playing online games for a decade in the form of MUD's and MMORPG's but I am excited about a new legitamite dynamic to an already popular game.
Give it a chance before dooming it to mediocrity.
looks like the internet is a turning machine, the internet manages to mimic real life and emulate it.
i have some thoughts on this, but i will be writing them in a book. which you dudes can buy sometime.
Check journal for info on Anti-TextBook, an idea by me.
Sony isn't selling items. You buy items from other characters.
Most players play for fun.
With those two in mind, it makes sense that buying/selling would not be too central to the game. You can still use EQ $$ to buy other in game stuff, and most players don't have the real cash to buy themselves to victory. Buying/selling w/ USD (or the Euro, or whatever.) won't necessarily dominate most players lives.
BUT:
There are going to be people who go NUTS over this. You all know the type, it's the player who is convinced that his success in the game is the justification of his otherwise completely unjustifiable high opinion of himself. That guy is going to center his life around getting real money out of EQ, and he stands a pretty good chance of ruining this for everyone.
put more coherently:
Since you have to buy from other players, there shouldn't be an overabundance of high end items for sale. (if you get something cool, you want to use it.) BUT some people are just asses, and this will only give them one more excuse and one more outlet. They will ruin it, not by buying their way to victory, but by (insert unfair way that jerks can acquire high end items) in order to sell them for real $$.
If I play a card game with you and you got up to go to the bathroom, you could lay your entire hand down face up on the table and I'd never look. The whole game is an artifical structure with artificial value and balance and it only "works" if you adhere to the rules. Cheating defeats the whole purpose. However, I have some little cousins of various ages that are the exact opposite. The game is about the win or the top and the ends justify the means. The first thing they do with ANY new game is google for cheat codes.
I simply can't explain it. It makes me personally ill to witness. But I wouldn't be surprised if you and I are severly outnumbered by kids more than willing to run up mom and dad's credit card for a level 50 uber warrior. Then again, you can no longer use red pens to mark up errors on tests in school because it stresses out the kids, so I'm not sure I understand or agree with anything relating to the pussy children we're raising anymore.
Now where's my cane and Metamucil?
I'm Rick James with mod points biatch!
Basically Wizards of the Coast allows you to buy event tickets for like $1. And then people trade tickets for cards. Tickets are used to play in premium events. So this is not so new, you can only trade the tickets and cards in the game. And every transaction is logged. And yes every thing people have complained about here is/was happening when I played. People with cash would buy the best cards and build "uber" decks and beat up on the "newbies". It creates a hostile environment between the haves and have nots. Despite the fact that there are these tickets for trade, there is still quite a bit of fraud occuring. For example, someone uses a stolen credit card buys a bunch of tickets. Uses those tickets to play in an event and wins some cards. And then trades those cards for more tickets. In the end someone gets screwed and Wizards would send a threatening email to the person who recieved the cards. Too many occurences like this and they may end up freezing your account. I stopped playing a while ago so I don't know the state of things now but I am sure this is what Everquest has to look forward to.
Thanks for putting on the feedbag. Thanks for going all out. Thanks for showing me your Swiss Army knife.
Once again sony tries to take credit for where they fail.
WHAT ABOUT PROJECT ENTROPIA (.com) My roommate and i were going to make money off that game, then we got busy. and other games where you can put money IN?
I've often said that I'd be willing to spend some money to level up in EQ or EQ2. Look at it from a practical point of view... It takes a few kills to get used to your new skills, spells or whatever at a new level. From that point on, you're pressing the same sequence of buttons over and over again for hours to get a new level. If they'd cut that short, and allow you to hit a magic button that levels up your character for $10 after you've gotten 10 percent through the level...
Hardcore players have to face the fact that EQ2 takes no skill. A person can xp up through all the levels without a brain rattling around in their skull. It happened in EQ1 (even without power leveling) and it happens in EQ2. Being able to perform with large groups of people (i.e. raids) is another story, but it always has been. The best group player in the world may make bad choices until they've raided a few times.
On the other hand, it does seem odd to think that I'd happily pay to cut down on the amount of time I have to play the game to achieve certain goals. Speaks to the fun-factor of the game, huh?
"It is a miracle that curiosity survives formal education." -Albert Einstein
I can see it now: sweat shops set up in third world countries designed to powerlevel characters and sell them on ebay.
"No you can't go to the bathroom yet, you haven't reached level thirty!"
But hey, it probably beats being payed 39 cents for sewing Mickey Mouse on a sweater.
This means I can now trade in my farm items for free pizza? Sweet.
I'm game. If Sony is going to sell virtual property, I'm more than willing to pay in virtual money. The only question is what denomination do they take? Centauri Ducats, Federation Credits, Quatloos, Altairian Dollars, or Triganic Pu's?
"You'll get nothing, and you'll like it!"
If they do it right, Sony could exercise control over the system that would counteract the hyperinflation that various cashmaking exploits have created in EQ.
Unfortunately, the only way I can think of to do that would be for Sony to "buy back" ingame items with real-world money and have those items simply be removed from ingame circulation. This would cost Sony money.
Unfortunately, hyperinflation and/or economy crashes from market overflooding are difficult to avoid in MMOGs.
An example was EVE Online - The game had an amazing concept and an incredibly complex economic system. Unfortunately, they made some mistakes in aspects of the economic system that utterly destroyed profit margins on manufactured items within a short amount of time. Basically everything in the economy became available at cost or even below cost because people were undercutting each other.
The same is going for Dark Age of Camelot right now - The market for crafted items has all but disappeared, with the result being that crafters can't even sell their wares at material cost or even close to it. (99 quality items sell at material cost for one creation of such an item or sometimes even less. Since there's a 1 in 5 chance of getting an item with that quality, this represents a pretty hefty loss.)
retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
Between 10 and 20 years ago I was into "pen and dice" role playing games big time. As the pre-cursor to MMORPGs, it was great fun escaping from the real life of mortgages & work to go have a few beers with some friends and pretending to be an elf for a while - I even miss RPGs occasionally today.
Your analogy immediately starts out flawed. You had small games with a few friends, not massive worlds full of complete strangers. To be parity, you would've had to allow anybody to play, you would've had to have had a cover charge, and you would've had to have played the rules fairly with all participants.
However, one thing that would have ruined it would have been to have a games master who was open to bribery - e.g. "Here's a ten pound note, make sure I get that +5 Vorpal Blade, okay?" It didn't happen and had it happened, the fun element would have dissipated quickly purely because the real world of money and bribery would have begun to influence that fantasy world in our heads.
An economy is not bribery. If there is a fair way to get a VB+5, the fact that there is a market for it in a foreign currency in no way impacts the game. By all accounts this is not Sony devaluing game items by flipping a few critical bits. Instead, the game is generating the same resources it always did, allowing the same trading as it always did, and the only difference is that in addition to all the hundreds of other reasons you have to make a trade, they've introduced another currency that some people value more, but apparently some people value less, than online resources.
This will destroy Everquest, no question about it, because the people that make that universe fun will feel cheated and robbed and will no doubt find another MMORPG to go and play instead.
That makes zero sense, because the game isn't changing. If people are leaving, it just means they game was never any fun, and they should have left a long time ago if that were true. To me, such a move makes the game more interesting because it makes it more complex. If I were a player, I'd look forward to taking items from newbie players with more money than sense, and it's just icing on the cake that I might again be able to sell it back to them, too!
>> This isn't going to legitimize IGE, this is going to put them out of business, once Sony gets rolling with this.
/or farming/.
/legitimate/.
/keep up/, when you can be on a server where few people buy and you can do so the /get ahead/? /Only/ if Sony were to start manufacturing items at the point of sale would this put IGE out of business. However, this would put EverQuest out of business at the exact same time. Very few people want to play a game where those who work to earn items and develop skill have to compete with those with no skill but a bigger checkbook. And yet most groups and raids would see the person with better gear and take them.
Absolutely untrue. Sony is not selling new copies of items that they create for the sale. They are facilitating sales of items that players have acquired through normal adventuring
That last bit is important. Who has more items to sell? Someone who plays the game normally, and might sell off one or two random things now and then, or a company that employs a large workforce in low wage countries to play hours on end, hording spawns (preventing others from getting the content) and collecting massive amounts of currency and items to sell. This makes IGE's activities
And this won't be limited to the new servers. Even if it is still disallowed on other servers, Sony will be less likely to fight it there. And its not like people who buy things will all move to the new servers. Why move to a new server where you have to buy stuff just to
Bad bad bad Sony! I'm very glad I swore off all SoE games after how they screwed us in EQ1.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
From the article:
To be clear, all we are doing is facilitating these transactions. We are NOT in the business of selling virtual goods ourselves.
End-quote.
Sony are providing an exchange, exactly like Ebay.
Sig for sale or rent. One previous user. Inquire within.
"The real problem here is that it will ruin the escape for the people who do enjoy the fun of it (again, the majority). It's sad, but those people who have to seek attention and power now have a mechanism to buy that."
It was my understanding that they're only doing this on certain new servers set up specifically for the type of people who want this. The other servers will remain unchanged (except perhaps that the people who want to "cheat" will move to the new servers which allow it.)
It may just end up improving the game for the people who dont want to "cheat" for that reason.
That being said, I sure wouldnt have any interest in playing on a server, or game that condoned buying & selling virtual goods with RL money. Like you, I think it would completely suck the fun out of the game while also encouraging the dickheads who take it too seriously to take it even MORE seriously.
I do cheat at single-player video games tho (usually just to get past bits i think are annoying & not much fun) but i would NEVER cheat at any game where my opponent was human.
>> Since you have to buy from other players, there shouldn't be an overabundance of high end items for sale. (if you get something cool, you want to use it.)
You are assuming that, well, all players play the game to play it.
IGE employs a workforce in low wage countries specifically to farm items. Those people never keep any of the items, they maximize the availability of the items by camping the spawns, and they block real players from using the content, through simple hording or through PvP or training mobs.
Without the assumption that all players play to have fun, your argument doesn't work.
It doesn't hurt to be nice.
As someone who has played EverQuest and EverQuest II, I can assure you that this practice has already thrived for a long time through unofficial "underground" means. I believe that by offering an official means through which players can do this, and limiting this service to specific servers, should result in the players who deal in this arena and want to deal in this arena moving to these servers, and removing the behaviour from the other servers, ultimately reducing the impact of it on those of us who don't want it done. I am glad that Sony is doing this as in the long run I think this is the only true way to be successful in stopping the underground item/currency sale black market.
Me like you ! You want #1 Good Time ? Me have sister in your area, you call this number have many many good time bang bang ! Five Dollar ! Good time 5 dollar !!!!
Guns are for wimps... Use a crossbow.. this way you can pin them to their chair when you go postal.
Golden Goose, meet +5 Vorpal Blade
"This will destroy Everquest"
Well, not really. Both Everquest and Everquest2 are already in deep, DEEP trouble due primarily to Sony's shortsightedness and greed. This will definitely hasten the death of EQ2 a little bit, methinks, but Sony pretty much shot themselves in the foot a long time ago with their horrible "vision" of a wretchedly buggy expansion of questionable worth being pumped-out every 4 to 6 months. Or their new "vision" in EQ2 of downloadable mini-expansions being pushed out every other month or whatever they have in mind.
I played EQ back in the "old days" (before Sony bought it out and completely ruined it) when an expansion of the game's world was HUGE news -- I think it was around 12-18 months after EQ came out before the first expansion was ever released. Back then, content was limited to the point where people got to know every square inch of their world--both the obvious stuff and the subtleties--so the rare occurrances of the world being massively expanded with new territory and new adventures were extremely exciting at the time.
What's of critical importance here is that new people could still get into the game at that point (and any MMO game is dead in the water without constant infusions of fresh blood) without having to purchase $300 worth (and counting!) of useless expansions and downloading patches for 36 hours straight as is the case now. What's the incentive for Joe Newbie to walk into CompUSA or EB and pick up a copy of EQ or EQ2 and get involved in an established MMO game under those horrid circumstances?
With the way they (Sony) are carelessly churning out their content now, it takes the casual gamer completely out of the loop and they're basically strangling their own market as more and more people realize the pointlessness and futility of trying to keep up with their virtual world. Unless you're in the uber-est of uber guilds, then by the time you've progressed halfway through the last shoddy expansion, they're already busy cramming the next one down your throat. No thanks.
I skimmed TFA inadequately before posting, and made a mistake about how Sony is actually conducting this. Although that's mainly because their approach to the problem is so wrong-headed, I didn't believe anyone would actually try this.
.
Gold-farmers and other people who profit by the exchange of in-game resources have been an irritation in MMORPGs for a while, because the presence of people who are treating something as a job makes it less enjoyable to those who want it to be a fun escape. Rampant professionalism robs the "game" of spontaneity and makes it a regimented bore.
Naturally, the game publishers must combat this effect, and they have two obvious ways to do so:
1) forbid the practice, and aggressively ban anyone who is caught selling items, as Blizzard does in Warcraft, or
2) usurp the practice, and sell items themselves, using their inifinitely superior production speeds to undercut whatever prices for-profit gold-farmers ask.
Each of those options has its downsides, but they both can be basically effective. But Sony is bizzarely following a different approach: facilitate the predictable transfer of money for items, which will only increase the
That is such a bad idea, I'm still having trouble believing they're stupid enough to try it. Maybe they're faking it, and have an alternate secret plan in mind:
3) by legitimizing item trading, they can monitor and control it, and throttle-down the rate of sales so no professional players can profit.
4) they will secretly enter the item-selling business themselves: their Game Master players, who have the ability to instantly summon an item of any rarity, will enter into auctions themselves, always undercutting by 15% whatever prices real players can charge for an item. This is just a more secretive version of (2), above, and may be designed to slow down player dissatisfaction at a hyper-commercialized game.
Sony should add a system of Royalties to the game, wherein a player pays his duties to whichever crown his Half-elf, nuetral-good character is allied with.
Not correctly filling out the Royalty form and filing late causes the character to lose 10% APR/compounded to Luck/Karma.
Sony could really give an insentive to early adopters of the game who are already clerics, and they would receive game world gold for helping other players pay their Roayalties.
Now, how fun is that for excapism? Weee!
>>"ad space available -- low rates!!!"
Now where's my cane and Metamucil?
I sold them. I'm going to use the money to buy a red pen. Then I'm going to use the red pen in a hold-up at a local elementary school for kids' lunch money. I need to save the stolen lunch money to buy plat.
Am I the only one who thinks that people who pay real money for "virtual property" are idiots?
From the comments I've read it looks like /. has alot fewer gamers than I had thought. Ok, now forget about all the tear shedding and whining about cheaters with deep pockets. Many of the comments made here have been valid although...
Sony would be the first company that would regulate and allow such transactions along with their fee. This is no big deal being that UO, Diablo II, Lineage and almost all of the other MMO's already sell on ebay. This goes on but not all people want the hastle of ebay or the potential of fraud type issues. Sony making this Legit will now give fair access to all the players. The issue now will come down to who can control the best hunting grounds where the good items drop. In Lineage huge amounts of premium territory is controlled by Chineese farmers. With greeting like "Rang Rang (Meaning: go away) PK PK YOU GO!!". I don't want my gaming experience ruined because of a greedy band of farmers. These players will be the worst of the in game issues the EQ2 players will face.
Mod the parent up. This is the point that most people seem to be missing. SOE is not going to /create 1000000 platinum pieces
and basically destroy its economy by flooding the market with instantly manufactured money and items.
SOE is going to be a mediator for players to buy and sell from other players, that's it.
Quite true. Obviously, no 3rd-party seller of in-game resources can survive being undercut by the system administrators, who can accomplish the equivalent of MONTHS of gil-farming with a single command-line.
If I understand it correctly, Sony isn't actually selling the items or gold directly. Nothing is created in the transaction. They are just giving people a way to safely do their business.
In other words, IGE should still be able to make money from farming. Now they just have to compete with (or just use) Sony's marketplace, which may effect their profits.
I disagree. Both traditional RPGs and MMORPGs in an ideal world provide complete escapism and entertainment. In theory, an AD&D game could host a huge number of players, it's the rules and mechanics that simply restrict a GM for only "running" a game practically for a handful of people.
It could be argued that a computer performs precisely the same task in an MMORPG that a GM does in an RPG - i.e. define the game universe & ensure the players live within that universe's rules. It's just capable of doing that for a lot more players :-)
To be parity, you would've had to allow anybody to play, you would've had to have had a cover charge, and you would've had to have played the rules fairly with all participants.
Any players - We frequently did allow anyone to play with the realms of a gaming club with over 40 people in it.
Cover charge - just about every player I ever met invested money in one or more rulebooks that at least allowed character generation. This might equate to a cover charge that demonstrates some commitment to wanting to play.
Fair rules - Surely an unfair GM would soon find his/her games less popular if bias was shown towards particular players. Sure, I've seen it happen but as an ex-GM also, bias does detract from your fun as the moderator also.
An economy is not bribery. If there is a fair way to get a VB+5, the fact that there is a market for it in a foreign currency in no way impacts the game.
Of course it impacts! Imagine as a player in a fantasy world I have amassed enough wealth to own, say, a castle because I happen to be an experienced player? It doesn't mean that in real life I might not have a job, a good credit rating or even anywhere permanent to live.
Real-life wealth will allow new players to skip the system of the fantasy world that experienced players have worked hard to live within in order to make their characters successful.
What happens to the players' perception of the game world if, all of a sudden, the rules are changed on them in a way it couldn't possibly happen? The answer is, it shatters the illusion and the game ends.
they've introduced another currency that some people value more, but apparently some people value less, than online resources.
They've introduced a "currency" that makes your abilities as a player in the game universe completely meaningless - if you have more real-life disposable income, you can progress as a character within the game without having any game-playing skills.
If I was an experienced player who invested time and effort in creating a character through good gameplay only to find some upstart with a big bank balance has progressed quicker than me, I would be most angry! In just the same way as when I find out a player in Quake on the Internet is using a game cheat - no difference!
If people are leaving, it just means they game was never any fun, and they should have left a long time ago if that were true.
Rubbish! Many years ago, a friend of mine wrote and ran games within an AD&D world he created. We played in it for over a year, on and off, until we suddenly realised how linear his game and GM-ing had been. In other words, we, as players, had little influence over what was happening in his game world no matter what we did. The whole game died there and then.
Yes, we'd thoroughly enjoyed it for a year until we got to that realisation of linearity - it shattered the game world for us just like this will do to EQ now.
To me, such a move makes the game more interesting because it makes it more complex.
Then you've lost the point - the players and their interractions with each other determine the complexity of the game, not the rules.
No GM or MMORPG designer can create rules and scenarios fo
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
It was my understanding that the high corn syrup content of soda is a remenant of WWII when sugar was a rationed item, but corn (and thus corn syrup) was not. People came to prefer the taste of corn syrup soda, also it is less prone to crystalizing than sugar based soda. Also corn syrup does not have a goverment mandatd minimum price like sugar.
It just sort of makes sense to use one over the other.
For what it is worth I perfer the taste of european coke to american coke.
I used to have a cool sig, back when I cared
In my younger days with computer games, I used to put in "pokes" and "peeks" for infinite lives in games occasionally. However, whilst it was interesting for an hour or so to see other parts of the game I wasn't able to use skill to get to, it destroyed the game completely and I invariably never played it again after that.
I think it's a sad reflection on society as a whole. We live in a world where everyone is measured on a graph around some threshold value - you hit or exceed the value, you're a "winner" but if you don't then you're a loser.
I myself work in a support environment where my own work is summed up in about 5 statistical values based on how many faults I've rectified, how long I took to resolve each fault, etc. etc. Nothing measures the quality of my responses or the care I took in getting a resolution. Nobody in higher management comprehends the fact that some problems, like a patch or fimware update, takes minutes to resolve while investigating a network issue can take days.
The point I'm trying to make is that nobody focuses on "the experience" any more, its just whether you win or lose at the end. Even the design of most computer games is about "winning" to open up more racing tracks or levels, there's no real measure of what you did along the way...
This is the type of world we're bringing kids into and it's not surprising they see cheating as purely the path to winning, not as something that destroys the quality of the experience along the way...
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Quite true. Obviously, no 3rd-party seller of in-game resources can survive being undercut by the system administrators, who can accomplish the equivalent of MONTHS of gil-farming with a single command-line.
Except, what it clearly says in the article is that they will allow players to sell things to each other, not that they will sell things.
Basic psychological principles: addiction can best be sustained if the game gives out rewards unpredictably. Game items are valued more because it was hard to know when they'd appear. Putting a blatant dollar-sign on the items is the ultimate form of predictabilty. The virtual Skinner box falls apart. When the mystique is gone, the players will be too.
I don't buy that. Something has value because it has value, not because it happened along by chance.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
* Gold can be made into thread and used in embroidery.
* Gold performs critical functions in computers, communications equipment, spacecraft, jet aircraft engines, and a host of other products.
* The high electrical conductivity and resistance to oxidation of gold has led to its widespread use as thin layers electroplated on the surface of electrical connectors to ensure a good, low-resistance connection.
* Gold is used in restorative dentistry especially in tooth restorations such as crowns and bridges.
* Colloidal gold (a gold nanoparticle) is an intensely colored solution that is currently studied in many labs for medical, biological and other applications. It is also the form used as gold paint on ceramics prior to firing.
* Chlorauric acid is used in photography for toning the silver image.
* Disodium aurothiomalate is a treatment for rheumatoid arthritis (administered intramuscularly).
* The gold isotope Au-198, (half-life: 2.7 days) is used in some cancer treatments and for treating other diseases.
* Gold is used as a coating enabling biological material to be viewed under a scanning electron microscope.
* Many competitions and honors, such as the Olympics and the Nobel Prize, award a gold medal to the winner (with silver to the second-place finisher, and bronze to the third.)
* Since it is a good reflector of both infrared and visible light, it is used for the protective coatings on many artificial satellites.
* Gold flake is used on and in some gourmet sweets and drinks. Having no reactivity it adds no taste but is taken as a delicacy.
* White gold (an alloy of gold with platinum, palladium, nickel, and/or zinc) serves as a substitute for platinum.
* Green gold (a gold/silver alloy) is used in specialized jewelry while gold alloys with copper (reddish color) are more widely used for that purpose.
--wikipedia
Spoon not. Fork, or fork not. There is no spoon.
Sega did this the right way with Phantasy Star Online: money abounds, item storage is limited, rare items are not that much better than good non-rare ones, and you can't kill another player.
What does it mean? A good player soon has more money than he can spend and lots of weapons for which he has little use. So veterans usually give away their old stuff to newbies, and everyone went together to do what's actually fun: help each other and kill monsters.
Best of all, Phantasy Star Online was an action-RPG - it took skill, rather than just levels and clicking. Hands down, THE BEST ONLINE GAME EVER.
Circumcision is child abuse.
Basic psychological principles: addiction can best be sustained if the game gives out rewards unpredictably. Game items are valued more because it was hard to know when they'd appear. Putting a blatant dollar-sign on the items is the ultimate form of predictabilty. The virtual Skinner box falls apart. When the mystique is gone, the players will be too.
Clearly, then, the obvious way to make money off players is for the MMOG operator to sell them opportunities to win rare items... for example, selling them a "sword shaped item wrapped in brown paper."
This is the primary reason card games like Magic the Gathering, Pokemon, etc. are so profitable. The more packs you buy, the more likely you are to assemble a powerful deck to play with. You put your finger on it-- people get addicted to unpredictable rewards (gambling) or rewards given at random times (fishing). I don't think it's going to ruin MMOGs outright unless executed poorly. It doesn't bother me that some rich guy who buys a $150 putter might be marginally improving his golf game because a player's skill is more important than equipment. As long as game designers make MMOGs that follow this philosophy, they'll be able to make real dollars selling equipment & currency.
I don't buy that. Something has value because it has value, not because it happened along by chance.
Not always. Look at the diamond industry. There are piles and piles of diamonds that have been mined and held by the De Beers Group, more than the market could ever buy. So they just don't flood the market. They release only so many stones of a certain sizes and qualities each year to the jewelery makers. So if you want to buy a diamond of a certain size and color and quality, there are only a certain number out there. This drives up the prices. Of course, De Beers creates the demand with their advertising ("A diamond is forever").
Oh wait a minute. You said value. People will buy things that have no value, however.
My other first post is car post.
Just a quick point, SOE have already announced that to start with the Exchange will only be active on NEW servers, and that they will offer transfers to these servers. They will also poll the residents of existing servers to see if they would like to be changed over. It will need a significant majority to get a server changed, and they will give transfers OFF that server if requested.
I play EQ2, I won't spend my (real) money on items in the game. I will stay off servers where this happens. A few people on my friends list may leave, or I may swap to another server in the unlikely event that my server becomes "enabled". I fail to see how other "worlds" buying and selling items effects my game experience. From a quick scan of the posts here I would be surprised if all the normal servers vanished due to popular demand. (Of course that's taking Slashdot as a representative cross-section of people, risky in the extreme)
Yeah, but if they don't create items to put up for sale, it is the exact same thing as having an auction house system. It will still be super hard for player x to get the best items because they will be the most expensive to pay for with real money. It's already happening with IGE. This just cuts them out of the picture. No fear of being banned and no fear of getting ripped off. Unpredictability is the same.
And PS, The Economist may have a similar point of view, but I doubt they cite you as a source for their ideas:P
Support a great indie game: http://www.abaddon360.com
While Sony may be allowing formal $ for Plat exchanging now, It has always been going on. Cool, some noob bought a wurmslayer for $50, and a mount for $100. Unless you are a shopping freak, and have to buy everything, you still have to play the game for fun, whether you twink or not twink. The quests, the mobs, they all will still offer the same entertainment value, but if you refuse to play the game the way it was designed. Dont flame the other gamers when whacking kobolds is boring, but you dont have the skill to 'really adventure' because you were a loot whore of one kind or another.
Like the parent post says, some people get uberloot from raids. Some people have so much fun raiding they join a raiding guild with strict appointments and attendance policies. Some people have a blast meeting once a week for a LDoN. Some guilds set up treasure hunts, naked gnome races, buffing lower level toons in newbie zones. $ to Plats will only ruin your game experience if you focus on it and let it ruin your game for you.
Some peeps go for getting screen shots of exotic mobs, ie the South Karana Ancient Cyclops.
The most fun I have had with EQ I (my choice) is when I can hook up in my guild and go help someone play for an important piece of a quest. Skill, logic, background research, mystery, and teamwork. These will still be in game, even if some twink increases the EQ money supply with his own plats.
1. Players are selling items to each other. This is no differet than selling things at an AH for in game money. I suppose it removes a little bit of the escapism of it, but it really won't make a large difference on the economy.
2. People are already doing this. It's not a few people. Thousands of people in every MMORPG are buying/selling gil, items, and characters. Sony is just making it so there is no middle man. Now they can guarantee a transaction rather than some guy on eBay ripping you off.
3. While your reasons are off, I do agree that this will cause a lot of bad thing to happen in EQ2. Now that this is legitimized, people will flock to this game to earn real money. The numbers who already do this are bad enough. These people use very agressive tactics to get the best items. They often do things that ruin the experience for other people. For example, in FFXI, they will lure a bunch of monsters to where you are waiting for some powerful monster to appear. They will do something (die, warp out) so that these creatures will attack you causing you to flee or die allowing them or their friends to get the kill and the loot. I have had this argument a lot with a friend on if this will be a good idea or bad idea. I would totally be for it, if not for the reason I just stated.
Support a great indie game: http://www.abaddon360.com
Both traditional RPGs and MMORPGs in an ideal world provide complete escapism and entertainment. In theory, an AD&D game could host a huge number of players, it's the rules and mechanics that simply restrict a GM for only "running" a game practically for a handful of people.
You make no points here by requiring an ideal world. It's simply not a parity analogy, and if you can acknowledge that then maybe there is something worth discussing.
It could be argued that a computer performs precisely the same task in an MMORPG that a GM does in an RPG - i.e. define the game universe & ensure the players live within that universe's rules. It's just capable of doing that for a lot more players :-)
Making that point favors me. I'm sure you realize that only the computer version treats people the same. A human GM will gladly hand-wave the kind of rat-killing tedium that online players must endlessly suffer through. The human GM is far more corruptible by all manner of "currency" than any lifeless server is. So how is it any more fair to have a GM arbitrarily decide a task is trivial compared to having a MMORPG with clear rules that state things like "Killing a rat is worth 5 silver. The current exchange rate for 1 gold is $0.1234"
Real-life wealth will allow new players to skip the system of the fantasy world that experienced players have worked hard to live within in order to make their characters successful.
Bullocks. That's like saying rich kids are cheaters in real life because they're using "soul wealth" (or however you'd like to explain an inequality of birth) and skipping the hardships of being poor. The truth remains that the in game experience does not change because of it. They're simply acquiring something that you yourself have acquired, but using a different means to the end. An unfair favoritism is not cheating.
They've introduced a "currency" that makes your abilities as a player in the game universe completely meaningless - if you have more real-life disposable income, you can progress as a character within the game without having any game-playing skills.
And the problem is . . . ? Are you really tying some fundamental sense of worth to the progress of a game character? Isn't the value supposed to be in the journey, not the destination? Isn't the fool supposed to part with his money? Is it really so bad that a person acquires a castle with no experience and thus no means to keep it when confronted by a die-hard player? Me, I say "Free castle!"
If I was an experienced player who invested time and effort in creating a character through good gameplay only to find some upstart with a big bank balance has progressed quicker than me, I would be most angry! In just the same way as when I find out a player in Quake on the Internet is using a game cheat - no difference!
Big difference. Again, an economy is not a cheat. In the MMORPG, nothing is taken from you. You still have your castle and you still have the adventures that went into it. For an FPS, the entirety of the gameplay is the kill and a cheat does steal that. If you don't get the difference, think about this: if I join your castle game today, I don't have a castle and so I can't play the "castle management" game and instead can only kill rats. If rat hunting is not my thing, I bail and that's one less person who you can possibly play against. Is that any more "fair" than me being able to hop on and actually play against you at your level in the "castle management" game? In a very real way, it actually levels the field in a manner that makes the game more playable for all parties involved. How can you not see that?
Rubbish! Many years ago, a friend of mine wrote and ran games within an AD&D world he created. We played in it for over a year, on and off, until we suddenly realised how linear his game and GM-ing had been. In other words, we,
"Part of the charm of these games is that in the game world, what I can achieve is determined by my character's behavior in that world, rather than by my real-life situation."
Bullshit. If you are a millionaire in real life then you can afford to play 24/7 while Joe Shmoe can't, so your real life *DOES* affect your in game situation.
Your real life situation affects online game play in every concecivable way from hackers who use their 'real-life situation' to create bots to play for them to students who can also powergame.
To think otherwise is a delusion, now this policy just formally acknowledges this reality that people seem to pretend didn't exist.
It's good people know economic terms but real life and virtual reality differ in that in real life it is rare for people to burn piles of their own money while in a game every time you sell to NPC vendor it effectively removes the currency from the game.
:P.
What Sony needs then is a lot of so called money sinks to remove the exceess cash.
If these virtual realities and their economies get complex enough even more economists will be interested in studying them, perhaps even being hired regulate them
The real problem here is that it will ruin the escape for the people who do enjoy the fun of it (again, the majority).
No it won't. It *may* ruin it for people who only get enjoyment out of comparing themselves to others. And there does seem to be a lot of people who only get enjoyment out of what others do.
But not all of us. Some of people get enjoyment from what they do. Perhaps you ought to try that.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
And if anybody here remembers 10six, this news seems just a little expected.
Surprisingly, nobody remembers that game anymore. It was the game that started it all, the first MMORPG. Wait! It was also the first MMOFPS. Planetside? Pales in comparison, both in gameplay and story. The community was the best I've seen yet, people were genuinely out to just have fun and the sky was the limit as far expansion and teamwork. As a matter of fact, the "MDF" system was probably the most dynamic and involving clan system....ever.
It was a project by Heat.Net that eventually seperated and became a seperate entity after heat went tits up. It lasted a quite healthy 24 months and was closed down to the chagrine of a quite large community. It played perfectly fine on a dialup connection, not too laggy to poorly affect your melee/skirmish capability.
The idea was original, both the story and the market system were quite innovative. Being a "3R" Real-Time strategy game and an intense FPS rolled into one, the opportunities for practical markets were ENORMOUS. Buildings, including: Factories, Mines, Wells, Defensive Towers. Vehicles, armor, weapons, buffs for all. There was no tradeskills, everything was traded in what was called "Jitters" ; your weapons, armor, buildings vehicles and buffs were substantial only when built in a particular location. This location could include the world map, or in a factory to be transferred to a warehouse for storage or to be deployed on the map.
These jitters? Bought. It was standard practice to buy rare jitters from the company making the game. Choice plots and ranks (required for transporting a greater amount of vehicles) were also purchased for undisclosed sums of money under the table by those who knew the programmers or knew who to ask.
Of all the Universal Constants, here's one I know: Nice guys finish last
Yeah, I'm not talking about supply and demand. But the OP seemed to believe that something could only have value if it was hard to get or you get it randomly - and I disagreeed with that.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
For a long time gamer of multiple MMORPG from the dawn of NexusTK to WOW What Sony tried to implement just plain crazy Why stop at offering gold and stuff at cheap price ?? why dont offer a high level character for grab with all the godly-epic-artifact-high-level items ? All sony want to do is suck up all the $$$ from an already quite expensive MMORPG game and the one who gonna buy stuff online with REAL money are the freak and thick wallet rich kids
I don't think it's going to ruin MMOGs outright unless executed poorly.
I see you're unfamiliar with Sony...
That, and there's a lot less use for ingenuity in MMORPGS than in tabletop games, which translates to a lot more goal-oriented hack-n-slashing.
I've heard a lot of people say "There goes Sony again!", or "Anything to make a buck!", or "I'm glad I moved on to Wow, Sony SUXXORS!" and etc...
But the truth is that people will love it! People are going to absolutely love this and think it is the best thing to happen to gaming. It wil legitimize this and that and etc... Not everyone will love it, but enough people will that we'll start to see new games and old games follow this model after they learn lessons from the SOE model.
If you are reading this, then you are one of those people whom I just can't take seriously.
Argh. You're doing it too. Everyone is doing it. Nobody seems to understand the difference between PvP and PvE!
Everquest is a Player-versus-environment game, where players slay virtual goblins and dragons in order to gain levels. They do not directly compete with one-another. Basketball or Chess are very PvP (player versus player) activities, and giving one player an advantage "over" another is unfair. However in a PvE game, if I'm a level one newbies with a flaming sword of uberness and I slay goblins with one fell swoop, how am I inconveniencing the other players, except by reducing the supply of available stuff to kill?
Tilting the playing field in EQ in "your favor" doesn't directly impact the other players, because you aren't playing AGAINST them, you're playing WITH them.
Reinvent the wheel only at either a lower cost, greater effectiveness, or your own personal enrichment and satisfaction.
Heck, if I was Sony, I'd sell version of things that had a life span of 2 days or so. Sell them on IGE with whatever logins they need. Or don't even do that. Sell/buy legit items on IGE, and then "follow" the sold item around. Whomever takes posession -- wipe their account.
Please note, I'm not advocating these things, it's just what I think Sony will do to drive all the external business to their market.
Nothing great was ever achieved without enthusiasm
Is that the type of money that eats, roots and leaves!
I had some pet monies once but had to trade them in for some RAM.
Waves vs. Particles
--- Attorneys Assisting Citizen-Soldiers & Families -
This is so wrong, A game should be something were everyone plays on the same level. No one should get an advantage because they are rich in real life.
I am saying that it is perfectly valid to compare traditional RPGs and MMORPGs. Both of them provide a cohesive universe in which players can act out & develop characters, both of them provide a level and "experience" system & both of them are designed to provide players with pure escapism & entertainment. As far as I'm concerned, those are the only relevant points I need to make the comparison valid.
You say they are different because of two core issues; firstly, the number of players & secondly, lack of bias in a computer-governed (as opposed to human GM-governed) universe. I say you are wrong on both counts.
Firstly, as a human GM I can populate my world with thousands of people in exactly the same way a n MMORPG does - however, in my case I create NPCs (non-player characters) who only become relevant when they interact with my characters. In other words, if my characters are in, say, a medieval city, I don't need to worry about creating the tavern owner in an inn across the other side of the city until the players need to encounter that person. As long as I create that person in a cohesive fashion that follows the laws of my universe that the players are already accustomed to, then the game flows and the players are happy.
However, if the last time we played that inn was by, say, the city gates but the next time we played it I positioned it near the docks, then I lose cohesion, the players no longer understand the rules of my game and the game fails.
That's point one - it doesn't matter whether we are talking about an RPG or MMORPG here, if you give players rules about your universe and they create characters within that universe that they grow accustomed to then suddenly change those rules, you lose cohesion and destroy the fantasy; exactly what Sony is doing here.
Point two is about bias. I am saying that a good GM can perfectly happily run a game without bias and, in fact, the game is not good until he learns the skills how to do that. Sure, you may send the players off to go retreive a magical sword that the fighter in the group wants but you better make sure that in the near future, you give the wizard in the group the chance to use the party to retrieve that magical wand he wants. A good GM understands this and can tweak his game real-time to keep all the players in the party interested - in other words, if the fighters are up the front wading into a group of orcs and the wizard is sat at the back clicking his fingers, then how about we throw in an orc or two then and there that surprises him from behind...
That's point two - an experienced GM can keep a game balanced and unbiased. Sony's action creates bias towards those who can afford to buy their status in the universe.
Those two points are enough to kill the game for experienced, long-term players. End of story.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
In an AD&D game, for example, all the weapons, classes and monsters are well-defined within rule books - I fail to see the difference.
Also, progression and quests is purely about how good the GM is at putting the characters into interesting situations and confrontations.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
Please read my original post again. I am stating exactly that point - that it's the playing experience that's important, not the end goals.
But I argue that if you've earned every level and item for your character through hours of careful play, you will not be happy with some upstart buying in minutes what took you days or weeks to earn.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
But I will remain in Project Entropia, a free MMOG where I have have the ability to earn real money while having a blast. The claims that Sony imitates Second Life is laughable. Project Entropia is three times as big as Second Life, and in Entropia you also can remove funds you earn into real life cash. So people that claim that Second Life was first need to take a MMOG history class. Project Entropia has no subscription fees, so you should try it out your self - it is free to download from their site; www.project-entropia.com
Sony is doing this because people have been selling items "illegally" for a decade. Sony will do it through their online store so they can have a stronger defense against ebayers. And of course they're going to skim some money off the top, DUH. Now you will not only pay your monthly subscription, but you will pay a tax on everything.
In other words, Sony is turning into Canada. It sucks to be me.
-Billco, Fnarg.com
Yeah but EBay can't control the generation of items in the game world... Great for people who pay $12.95 a month to be Sony's virtual hamster
You say they are different because of two core issues; firstly, the number of players & secondly, lack of bias in a computer-governed (as opposed to human GM-governed) universe. I say you are wrong on both counts.
You are so misguided it is laughably sad. OK, one last opportunity for you to turn your brain on or I'm done with you.
Firstly, as a human GM I can populate my world with thousands of people in exactly the same way a n MMORPG does - however, in my case I create NPCs (non-player characters) who only become relevant when they interact with my characters.
Another non-parity example. An NPC is simply not another person. Hell, it is unlikely to even be another adventurer. That is, in an MMORPG, it is highly likely someone else in the world has explored the dungeon (or gone of the quest, or whatever the task is) and gotten whatever treasure was the point of the exercise. That creates an economy that any one-off campaign you run at home does not. When you tell the players they need to get a dragon scale from the caves of Qualdar, do you also supply an NPC that will just give them such a scale in exchange for something else? If not, stop pretending the two situations are even close to similar.
That's point one - it doesn't matter whether we are talking about an RPG or MMORPG here, if you give players rules about your universe and they create characters within that universe that they grow accustomed to then suddenly change those rules, you lose cohesion and destroy the fantasy; exactly what Sony is doing here.
But that's just it; the rules of the game are not changing! Players can already exchange items. It doesn't matter one bit the reason of the exchange. Maybe they're doing a vanilla sale in game for gold. Maybe they're part of the same clan or friends or have some other reason to share the item. Yes, maybe it's because they're getting cash money. Regardless, the game is unchanged. You're trying to claim a difference where none exists. I'd respect you more if you simply said you didn't like the idea rather than trying to make up an excuse through some unreasonable mental gymnastics.
A good GM understands this and can tweak his game real-time to keep all the players in the party interested - in other words, if the fighters are up the front wading into a group of orcs and the wizard is sat at the back clicking his fingers, then how about we throw in an orc or two then and there that surprises him from behind...
Uh, that is the very model of bias! What a shitty GM you are. The wizard is playing perfectly fair, and if the fighter doesn't like it he's free to turn on the bastard. If you as a GM are making a judgement on that, you're an asshat. That is precisely what Sony didn't do. The game still plays as it always did, and people will sell items like they always have. The only difference is that there will be fewer fraud complaints tying up their customer service lines.
That's point two - an experienced GM can keep a game balanced and unbiased. Sony's action creates bias towards those who can afford to buy their status in the universe.
Bwahahahahaha! Everyone buys their status in EQ! The game is not free to play. That creates a base for exchange, and "time is money" does the rest. It doesn't matter that you don't like it; that's just the way things are. As I have also noted, a bought status is easier to take than an earned status, so the bias is definitely against those with fat wallets. Your inability to see all these things makes your opinion on the matter essentially worthless.
Please read my original post again. I am stating exactly that point - that it's the playing experience that's important, not the end goals
Oops, sorry about that.
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
Well, if you cannot hold an intelligent argument without turning to personal insults then I see no point continuing with this.
I thought we were having an interesting argument here but obviously not.
Gentoo Linux - another day, another USE flag.
This so much looks like the movie Avalon.