It's done for fun, certainly - I've (effectively) traded real money for isks in the past, and considered it money well spent, for the entertainment value (It's not something that you can 'cash out' without breaking the EULA). But... the point of quoting the 'RL money' angle, is to give non players some kind of context of the effort involved - building a Titan may be something that's done for fun, or as a hobby - and you see the same thing with people restoring steam engines, or that kind of thing. But that doesn't change that it's taken many hours of 'work' to accomplish, and that's what makes it interesting - especially if it goes up in a puff of smoke.
Well, sort of. But the bigger point is not so much 'money was lost' as a 'basis for comparison'. Lets face it, only a WOW player knows what 1 gold is worth, and only an EVE player knows what 1 ISK is worth. But to compare it to 'real money' is something everyone can understand - whether that's done 'legitimately' or not, the point remains you can buy in game currency on e.g. ebay, and that's about the only real baseline for comparison.
My girlfriend doesn't 'get' what 60 billion isks means, but if you look at the exchange rate (which last I checked was about 300 mil for 20$?) quoting $4000 is something that... makes more sense. (even if that does make us EVE players barking mad).
There's two kinds of 'fast'. The kind where it runs games, and the kind where it 'does internet'. Netbooks do the latter, and as such don't need to be particularly meaty.
Home computers on the other hand? Well, I want to be able to play Supreme Commander (which is a monster for resource consumption) and play my favourite MMO. Ideally with a couple of active clients, and a web browser, maybe iPlayer in the background, that kind of thing.
Very different utilisation, and thus resource demand. Netbooks are acceptable 'portable devices' because they're good enough for spodding, and cheap as well.
Oh and I sort of missed the point - the point is those 'classes' are transferrable - today I fly a tackler, tomorrow I fly a ganker. I swap what I do, depending on what the rest of the fleet can do, and we optimize accordingly. Not 'need mage, otherwise we're not going'. Although, I did do a D&D game once that was basically all fighter types. It actually worked pretty well, you just need to factor that in to how the campaign evolves - no 'on tap' healing, and 'funky magic assistance' makes certain challenges way harder.
Say what you like about EVE, one thing you cannot accuse it of is pidgeonholing a player character. There's no class or race restrictions. The tradeoffs you make in character advancement are purely a question of what you want to first. You do sort of still have the 'classes' in the sense of you've got 'healer', 'DPS', 'tackler', 'ewar'. But you don't get 'tank' in the same way - but you do get management of positional advantage.
Cheque is something I write, and you've only my word that its a) valid, b) got funds to cover it c) it's actually my cheque book, and that's actually my signature. d) I won't just ring up to cancel it in half an hour's time
Bankers draft is... very similar to a cheque, but what happens is the bank transfers the money out of my account, into theirs, and writes a cheque for that sum. It's therefore easier to validate (can be done over the phone, and the bank can confirm they've issued a draft for that sum to that person) and is 'guaranteed' by the bank, and probably some FSA regulations as well - if you take my bankers draft, you can be pretty certain that you will get that money.
What do you think happens when you present a cheque? Guess what. Pretty much the same thing as would have happened if you'd done it electronically, except with the added nuisance of a bit of paper in the middle.
When I send a transfer to another account, it's on my assertion that it's 'OK' - and so the bank just does it. It'll show up in your account immediately. Or at least, near enough. And if there is a problem or dispute with it, the bank can rollback the transaction, or put it on hold. If you show up at the bank with the IOU I wrote you, then your bank sends it to my bank, who then agree that that is a valid IOU, and... then does exactly the same kind of electronic funds transfer.
In the event of economic collapses, serious power failures, solar storms, then your cheque becomes just as worthless as the numbers in your bankaccount just did. Well, maybe slightly less, since you can at least use your chequebook as a firelighter.
What's more likely to be the source of accidental error? The one that involves two computers transferring data to each other, or the one that involves writing out a piece of paper, handing it over to someone else to be validated, moved around the country a few times - before performing pretty much exactly the same electronic transfer.
If you don't trust your bank not to screw you... WHY ARE YOU GIVING THEM YOUR MONEY?
As opposed to... what amounts to an IOU, that takes days to clear? Hmm, yeah. Totally can see why cheques would be faster than electronic funds transfer.
Outside of franchise America - AND the rest of the modern world. Because you don't have that problem in Europe - EFT is well supported and widely available, and it's actively trivial to pay by card.
Bank to bank transfers are also widely available and free of charge.
If you think about it, you'll see why this makes sense - cheques require manual validation, direct transfers don't. Cheques require physical items moving around, direct transfers don't.
I'm afraid it really is only backwaters that hasn't kept up with the times. This might include a lot of the US though I guess...
As of the latest stunt, I've stopped playing MW. The problem for me, is that... well, you have the CEO bragging about how nefarious they've been. That raised alarm bells. But... mostly I just detest the quantity of noise they seem intent on generating. I mean, for a facebook integrated game, I know full well that most of my friends list already know I play mafia wars. They either already play themselves, or they don't give a toss about what the spam is. If they play themselves, then... one notification a day is really all that's necessary. OK, maybe two. But... certainly they don't need a 'feed' page filled with mafia wars spam.
And that's why I've stopped, removed the account, and blocked everything. Simply because I no longer believe that Zynga have any ethics to them whatsoever. 'Secret Stash' was the final straw - previous 'spams' have been 'giving free stuff' and as such optional. I did spam a couple a day, but no more. When they've changed a gameplay mechanic to stop working _unless_ you spam a friend, and they click on the link you send... too much.
But that was enough to make me realise that the game is actually not all that interesting anyway - it has very little depth, and is just about 'acquisition of more stuff'. And frankly, Progress Quest is better at it.
No, but there's not _that_ many variants of key components. Processor, graphics card, etc.
What my server space stuff end up doing is qualified configurations - specific combinations of hardware and software that are considered 'qualified' because they've been tested and definitely work.
Now, I'd assume that home companies do the same - they test their game on at least one platform.
So... how hard would it be to publish the 'qualified configuration' list, and that they be _required_ to accept responsibility for their stuff not working IF it's on said qualified configuration.
Anything else, you get best efforts support.
AT the very least, 'tested on xyz system, xyz spec' IMO should be something that the game publisher offers. OF course, they don't, because there's a lot of people who will still buy on the 'it might not work' basis.
Moot point. Game has bug. It doesn't matter what's 'at fault' it just doesn't work. I return it, you give money back, and everyone's happy. Perhaps more so, as your customers have peace of mind.
If your game is not shoddy shonky crap, then you don't get many returns, and it's mostly a moot point. If you it is, and you do, you deserved it. Everyone's happy. Well, except you, if you're the guy that makes shoddy shonky crap.
If software doesn't work, and the company couldn't reliably make it do so on my platform, I should be able to return it without prejudice.
If their software is good, this will happen infrequently enough that it'll be a moot point.
It's reliable enough and credible enough for the average netizen. Sure, you won't get browny points citing it in academia, but when I want to know something about something, I check Wikipedia first.
As well... how long have various players of EVE been around?
Well, I'm a month or two short of 5 years. (My accounts have been active the whole time, even if I have got sidetracked for a few weeks at a time to play other games)
Or y'know, you could just have a game that doesn't have such a gap - you can keep people 'together' by making it easy to catch up, or you can keep people together by making everyone have 'value' in their own right. When a level 1 can take the field, and... if not win going toe to toe, at least be contributing to the oucome of the fight... against a level 80, then you don't need to 'help them catch up'.
Sort of. EVE has mission and exploration mechanics, which are 'on the fly' created, but I believe they're based out of a library of such things, and have a locational distribution system (e.g. you get a particular kind of exploration site show up in a particular region of space).
But really, the whole point of EVE is that the 'content' is the players - everything (pretty much) links into the evolving political and economic dynamics of the playerbase - you make a profit by finding sources of demand and supplying it. Or creating it in the first place.
Maybe you crash in on an alliance that's collapsing, and take advantage of it, or maybe you bolster and existing conflict to tip the power balance. Maybe you join the alliance and _create_ that power balance in the first place. But certainly, where you get combat happening, no NPC AI can ever beat another player in terms of sneakyness and deviousness.
And in other parts of the world which have health services based on the common good, not capitalism and greed, this treatment will be available as an elective free procedure, with a waiting list.
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It's done for fun, certainly - I've (effectively) traded real money for isks in the past, and considered it money well spent, for the entertainment value (It's not something that you can 'cash out' without breaking the EULA). But ... the point of quoting the 'RL money' angle, is to give non players some kind of context of the effort involved - building a Titan may be something that's done for fun, or as a hobby - and you see the same thing with people restoring steam engines, or that kind of thing. But that doesn't change that it's taken many hours of 'work' to accomplish, and that's what makes it interesting - especially if it goes up in a puff of smoke.
Well, sort of. But the bigger point is not so much 'money was lost' as a 'basis for comparison'. Lets face it, only a WOW player knows what 1 gold is worth, and only an EVE player knows what 1 ISK is worth. But to compare it to 'real money' is something everyone can understand - whether that's done 'legitimately' or not, the point remains you can buy in game currency on e.g. ebay, and that's about the only real baseline for comparison. ... makes more sense. (even if that does make us EVE players barking mad).
My girlfriend doesn't 'get' what 60 billion isks means, but if you look at the exchange rate (which last I checked was about 300 mil for 20$?) quoting $4000 is something that
There's two kinds of 'fast'. The kind where it runs games, and the kind where it 'does internet'. Netbooks do the latter, and as such don't need to be particularly meaty.
Home computers on the other hand? Well, I want to be able to play Supreme Commander (which is a monster for resource consumption) and play my favourite MMO. Ideally with a couple of active clients, and a web browser, maybe iPlayer in the background, that kind of thing.
Very different utilisation, and thus resource demand. Netbooks are acceptable 'portable devices' because they're good enough for spodding, and cheap as well.
I like having my 'portable library' in the form of my reader. However until they make it bathtub proof, hardcopy will still have a place...
Hate to break it to you, but 30mpg isn't very good.
Oh and I sort of missed the point - the point is those 'classes' are transferrable - today I fly a tackler, tomorrow I fly a ganker. I swap what I do, depending on what the rest of the fleet can do, and we optimize accordingly. Not 'need mage, otherwise we're not going'. Although, I did do a D&D game once that was basically all fighter types. It actually worked pretty well, you just need to factor that in to how the campaign evolves - no 'on tap' healing, and 'funky magic assistance' makes certain challenges way harder.
Say what you like about EVE, one thing you cannot accuse it of is pidgeonholing a player character. There's no class or race restrictions. The tradeoffs you make in character advancement are purely a question of what you want to first. You do sort of still have the 'classes' in the sense of you've got 'healer', 'DPS', 'tackler', 'ewar'. But you don't get 'tank' in the same way - but you do get management of positional advantage.
Cheque is something I write, and you've only my word that its a) valid, b) got funds to cover it c) it's actually my cheque book, and that's actually my signature. d) I won't just ring up to cancel it in half an hour's time ... very similar to a cheque, but what happens is the bank transfers the money out of my account, into theirs, and writes a cheque for that sum. It's therefore easier to validate (can be done over the phone, and the bank can confirm they've issued a draft for that sum to that person) and is 'guaranteed' by the bank, and probably some FSA regulations as well - if you take my bankers draft, you can be pretty certain that you will get that money.
Bankers draft is
Yeah, or I could write you an IOU instead. It's about as reliable.
What do you think happens when you present a cheque? Guess what. Pretty much the same thing as would have happened if you'd done it electronically, except with the added nuisance of a bit of paper in the middle. ... then does exactly the same kind of electronic funds transfer.
When I send a transfer to another account, it's on my assertion that it's 'OK' - and so the bank just does it. It'll show up in your account immediately. Or at least, near enough. And if there is a problem or dispute with it, the bank can rollback the transaction, or put it on hold. If you show up at the bank with the IOU I wrote you, then your bank sends it to my bank, who then agree that that is a valid IOU, and
In the event of economic collapses, serious power failures, solar storms, then your cheque becomes just as worthless as the numbers in your bankaccount just did. Well, maybe slightly less, since you can at least use your chequebook as a firelighter.
What's more likely to be the source of accidental error? The one that involves two computers transferring data to each other, or the one that involves writing out a piece of paper, handing it over to someone else to be validated, moved around the country a few times - before performing pretty much exactly the same electronic transfer.
If you don't trust your bank not to screw you... WHY ARE YOU GIVING THEM YOUR MONEY?
As opposed to ... what amounts to an IOU, that takes days to clear? Hmm, yeah. Totally can see why cheques would be faster than electronic funds transfer.
We are talking about the US here... I mean in Europe viable alternatives exist to ... what amounts to a big IOU.
Outside of franchise America - AND the rest of the modern world. Because you don't have that problem in Europe - EFT is well supported and widely available, and it's actively trivial to pay by card.
Bank to bank transfers are also widely available and free of charge.
If you think about it, you'll see why this makes sense - cheques require manual validation, direct transfers don't. Cheques require physical items moving around, direct transfers don't.
I'm afraid it really is only backwaters that hasn't kept up with the times. This might include a lot of the US though I guess...
As of the latest stunt, I've stopped playing MW. The problem for me, is that ... well, you have the CEO bragging about how nefarious they've been. That raised alarm bells. But ... mostly I just detest the quantity of noise they seem intent on generating. I mean, for a facebook integrated game, I know full well that most of my friends list already know I play mafia wars. They either already play themselves, or they don't give a toss about what the spam is. If they play themselves, then ... one notification a day is really all that's necessary. OK, maybe two. But ... certainly they don't need a 'feed' page filled with mafia wars spam.
And that's why I've stopped, removed the account, and blocked everything. Simply because I no longer believe that Zynga have any ethics to them whatsoever. 'Secret Stash' was the final straw - previous 'spams' have been 'giving free stuff' and as such optional. I did spam a couple a day, but no more. When they've changed a gameplay mechanic to stop working _unless_ you spam a friend, and they click on the link you send... too much.
But that was enough to make me realise that the game is actually not all that interesting anyway - it has very little depth, and is just about 'acquisition of more stuff'. And frankly, Progress Quest is better at it.
No, but there's not _that_ many variants of key components. Processor, graphics card, etc.
What my server space stuff end up doing is qualified configurations - specific combinations of hardware and software that are considered 'qualified' because they've been tested and definitely work.
Now, I'd assume that home companies do the same - they test their game on at least one platform.
So... how hard would it be to publish the 'qualified configuration' list, and that they be _required_ to accept responsibility for their stuff not working IF it's on said qualified configuration.
Anything else, you get best efforts support.
AT the very least, 'tested on xyz system, xyz spec' IMO should be something that the game publisher offers. OF course, they don't, because there's a lot of people who will still buy on the 'it might not work' basis.
Moot point. Game has bug. It doesn't matter what's 'at fault' it just doesn't work. I return it, you give money back, and everyone's happy. Perhaps more so, as your customers have peace of mind.
If your game is not shoddy shonky crap, then you don't get many returns, and it's mostly a moot point. If you it is, and you do, you deserved it. Everyone's happy. Well, except you, if you're the guy that makes shoddy shonky crap.
If software doesn't work, and the company couldn't reliably make it do so on my platform, I should be able to return it without prejudice.
If their software is good, this will happen infrequently enough that it'll be a moot point.
It's reliable enough and credible enough for the average netizen. Sure, you won't get browny points citing it in academia, but when I want to know something about something, I check Wikipedia first.
I live in a country that has a national health service.
It works very well, thank you.
1/ yeah, fair point 2/ so what? A search is a search 3/ No. 4/ No.
Well, I'm a month or two short of 5 years. (My accounts have been active the whole time, even if I have got sidetracked for a few weeks at a time to play other games)
Or y'know, you could just have a game that doesn't have such a gap - you can keep people 'together' by making it easy to catch up, or you can keep people together by making everyone have 'value' in their own right. When a level 1 can take the field, and ... if not win going toe to toe, at least be contributing to the oucome of the fight ... against a level 80, then you don't need to 'help them catch up'.
Sort of. EVE has mission and exploration mechanics, which are 'on the fly' created, but I believe they're based out of a library of such things, and have a locational distribution system (e.g. you get a particular kind of exploration site show up in a particular region of space).
But really, the whole point of EVE is that the 'content' is the players - everything (pretty much) links into the evolving political and economic dynamics of the playerbase - you make a profit by finding sources of demand and supplying it. Or creating it in the first place.
Maybe you crash in on an alliance that's collapsing, and take advantage of it, or maybe you bolster and existing conflict to tip the power balance. Maybe you join the alliance and _create_ that power balance in the first place. But certainly, where you get combat happening, no NPC AI can ever beat another player in terms of sneakyness and deviousness.
And in other parts of the world which have health services based on the common good, not capitalism and greed, this treatment will be available as an elective free procedure, with a waiting list.