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Legitimizing Real Money Trading In Games

Posted by Soulskill on from the ni-hao dept.

MMOGamer interviewed Andy Schneider, co-founder of Live Gamer, a company working with several major game publishers (including Acclaim, Funcom, and SOE) to legitimize the real money trading (RMT) industry in online games. Schneider expects this method of customer service to grow much more popular in the West over the next few years, especially after the success it's had in Asia. "It started in the very earliest MMOs, if not back in the MUD days in a very grassroots sort of way, but then obviously got into a more opportunistic and nefarious industry. When I talk about legitimate RMT, it's about a publisher supporting the notion that people want to buy and sell virtual items for real money, and they have decided to proactively support that notion and give their player-base a way to do that. ... It takes the manual process out of the equation that most players are engaged in with the black market, and reduces the fraud considerably, which is good for players. ... The reason there are gold farmers out there, the reason why there is nearly a two billion dollar secondary market for virtual items, is because of consumer demand."

8 of 158 comments (clear)

  1. Earning cash for virtual gold will be fine until.. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The Taxman cometh.

  2. Re:Be wary... by artor3 · · Score: 4, Insightful

    See, this would be good, except that say I start a virtual business that somehow generates millions in real income, having to pay taxes on this would be insane

    Why? All companies pay taxes. You're not making a virtual business - you're making a real business that just so happens to deal in virtual goods. You should (and will) pay taxes like any other company. In fact, it would probably be in your best interest to incorporate, just like any other company.

    A company is a company. You are selling a good or service in exchange for money. The fact that the good or service exists as data in a computer shouldn't matter.

  3. Do they wish their own death? by RuBLed · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Are they trying to dig their own graves? The reason why the gold farmers and item traders are thriving is because it is not legal under the TOS of many MMO games out there. If it suddenly become legal, what made them think that they can profit from it? I'm pretty sure that gold farmers would cease to exist if the gaming company themselves sells gold for real $$$ at a lower rate.

    I'm against real money trading for gold and items because it would definitely create a crazy and lazy in-game economy. It would also remove the sense of common-ground in the game. I would hate it if by any chance Bill Gates decided to play an MMO and would have better items and gear than me instantly. (something along those lines)

  4. Can't see the point of playing a game open RMT by jmorris42 · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I can see why losers would want to buy things they couldn't earn. I can see why the companies running the games would want to take the losers money instead of spending resources fighting gold farming. What I fail to understand is why anyone worth a damn would keep playing a game that openly allows buying their way to the top. And a game filled only with pathetic losers isn't likely to stay fun for even the losers for long.

    --
    Democrat delenda est
    1. Re:Can't see the point of playing a game open RMT by SanityInAnarchy · · Score: 4, Interesting

      Personally, I find real games boring for precisely this reason.

      Even so, all the sports you mentioned require a certain amount of skill. In a game, to a certain extent, you can buy skill.

      A company has a decent plan to try and level the playing field and get farmers out of games

      I fail to see how this "levels" anything. In fact, it creates exactly the same problem for "fairness" -- it ruins the in-game economy for attempting to sell things to other players (since other players can simply buy those items outright from the in-game store), and it creates the same problem of newbies buying their way to the top, while a legit player struggles.

      In fact, it brings the whole class system in the real world into the game, which just sucks. What makes the game fun in the first place is that it's not the real world.

      I have seen this happen, in a few limited ways. I play Nexus TK, which has only recently begun to follow the Korean business model of giving the game away (or at least, of keeping it at the same $9.95/mo), and selling other things. Most of these other things, I have no problem with, as they're purely decorative. A few are actually useful.

      They do try, however, to prevent these from affecting the in-game economy. They cannot be dropped or traded in any way.

      Even so, the very existence of that shop has impacted the economy in a few ways. The most obvious are the Equipment Restoration items. Some players can repair items, and they charge an arbitrary fee. This fee halved when people could simply pay a few pennies (of real money) to repair their items -- the demand had simply dried up overnight.

      I've greatly simplified the above for the purposes of this comment, but the result is the same.

      --
      Don't thank God, thank a doctor!
  5. No 3rd party needed. by ubungy · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I've been playing this MMO for about 3.5 years (Entropia Universe, shamelessly) which was based on Real Cash trading/economy. There has always been a fixed exchange rate between U.S. Dollars and ingame currency (PED). Therefore everything you own in game has a real dollar value and can be sold in game. Real life funds can be transferred into the game, and withdrawn back to real life funds. This MMO has been around ~7 years with no 3rd party, nothing new here to me. In fact the parent company Mindark has just been granted a Swedish banking license. Yes maybe soon you can pay your real life bills in ingame currency. We aren't talking peanuts here either, we're talking real cash related to everything you do, so the best items in game fetch a pretty penny. The best healing tool in the game today you can fetch about 40,000 U.S. dollars for. You can buy plots of land in game for about the same that you can tax for real cash. Point is there are games that are based on real cash, and those who aren't. Those who arent it doesn't matter which way you go, private sales, E-Bay, Live Gamer, it's still all 'Black Market'. I'll stick with secure, non 3rd party solutions.

  6. It works for Second LIfe by Animats · · Score: 5, Interesting

    It works for Second Life. Almost too well. In 2007, Ginko Financial, an in-game bank, went bust. Then Midas Bank went bust. This drew the attention of The Wall Street Journal. In 2008, Linden Labs introduced bank regulation. Most of the Second Life banks were actually Ponzi schemes, with huge interest rates. It's still possible for a real-world bank to open branches in Second Life, but nobody has bothered.

  7. On Bribing the DM by Enderreil · · Score: 4, Funny

    >It would be like bribing your DM to let your third level character find a +5 sword. Who would continue to play in a gaming group if such a disgusting thing were to occur?

    This happens every week. It is only right to bribe the DM for all his hard work.

    Rule #1: The DM need never pay his share of the pizza for he has an infinite number of Tarrasques and magical swords. ^_-

    That said though, trust me when I say, "You CAN'T afford a +5 Sword!"