Well Fuck, SoE finally Did it...who will follow suit?

[Elgonn]

I hate the buying and selling as a player.

As a company? I unfortunately would have to agree with SOE. *shudder*

[Samus Aran]

Originally posted by Zhakrin
That being said, please, please,please don't make my server (Faydark) and ebay-server

While they don't mention it, I'm sure they'll let people transfer OFF a server if they decide to make it transfer-enabled

[FooBar]

Oh please, it's not like SOE didn't just recently ban a couple hundred accounts for farming/botting. You should have seen IGE's EQ2 website after that... not a damn thing for sale.

Read this again, then read the press release. Things happen for a reason.

[Duppin]

Look.

Say all you want about "omg they should be shutting IGE down", but the fact is, that as long as there is a demand for ingame items/currency, someone will find a way to turn that demand into RL money.

All that you can ever HOPE to do is slow it down, and really, none of the mainstream games out there have shown any sign of even being able to slow this down much, much less eliminate it.

So the best thing to do at this point is to acknowledge both of these things and cut out the middleman.

There's no way that IGE or whoever can compete with a service that SOE or whoever offers directly, not in price or in the security of the transactions.

With all this being said; yeah, it's sad that this is the reality of how MMOGs are, that some people would rather shell out some $$$ instead of camping items or whatever; but since that /is/ the reality, I don't really see the downside of companies offering this service directly.

Not to mention that maybe this'd cut down on some of the impromptu online KKK meetings that happen whenever the subject of "farmers" comes up.

[foddon]

It will be very interesting to see how this plays out. This should significantly drive down prices, creating even more of a market than there currently is.

[Jait]

Anyone see that Daily Show recently where they discussed the size of Bush's balls?


SOE had HUUUUUUGE ones to finally sink to Yantis level. And for those of you like "Rune" who feel millions of dollars spent on lawyers is a good thing, eat a dick. We the consumers would have to pay for that, and frankly it's a monumental waste of time. And while it's pedantic to the intelligent, and incomprehensible to the daft, expect to see many other companies now follow suit in the months to come.


Buh Bye Yantis. You finally got competition, and guess what that means? No more charging fiddy dollahs for a dimebag of oregano when you can get it much cheaper from the source.

[GuardianX]

Uggh,

People aren't reading the release all the way though.

1. Servers that exist now WILL NOT be ebay servers in the future.

2. SOE is creating NEW servers and will label them "Ebay servers" where people can buy and sell items.

Personaly I think this is a great idea and will put a decent hurt on IGE. Hopefuly more games will addopt this idea and make "Ebay" servers along side regular servers.

[Zhakrin]

The thing you have to remeber also is that there is nothing banning IGE/Yantis from using this service.

They'll not make as much money, but sell more due to the increased security that the system offers. People who never concidered buying something my be tempted now.

"Its the change bank, you bring in a dime we give you two nickles, how do we make money? VOLUME"

[Sampo]

Originally posted by Zhakrin
This is just a way for Sony to cut into the profits of IGE/Yantis.

1. it allows casual players to sell too, increasing the supply (therefore REDUCING the price, and profit of items)

2. Cuts the profit center of Playerauctions out of the IGE/Yantis balance sheet for EQ2. They charge a pretty-penny for listing fees and such on PA.

That being said, please, please,please don't make my server (Faydark) and ebay-server

Yantis worked for SoE before . Anyone remember the 24 hour 1-65 character creation

[Sorran]

I dislike people involving real money in these games (beyond the subscription fee), but that doesn't change the fact that there are a vast, vast number of people who have no problem with it. I *gaurantee* you SOE will have done an extraordinary amount of research into the secondary market (because they *know* it has to be worth the huge amount of pain they are going to suffer for it) and I am very inclined to believe their 200 million dollar figure. For a market that size, the number of people engaging in it is massive.

There can no longer be any avoiding the fact that players (in the generic sense) *want* the secondary market, and those of us who don't like it are simply a minority, albeit a very vocal one . If the companies running these games finds a way to truly effectively police and stop players from doing it in their game, they will simply police themselves out of exsistence. There is simply too much choice available in the MMOG market today for companies to drive such massive numbers of players away.

Given that, I find no real argument why the service shouldn't be offered by the games themselves. If this business has to exist, I would much rather it exists "in the light", so to speak, and in such a way that eliminates fraud, lightens the CS burden that is required to deal with it, and so on.

Now that one of the market's main players have introduced such a service, don't be surprised to see a lot of the others rushing to follow suit. Certainly any future developed games (out beyond Vanguard) will almost certainly include it as a standard. I strongly suspect Microsoft is going to be watching SOE's experiment with this very, *very* closely. And if you think Vivendi isn't watching like a hawk as well, you are deluding yourself. A 200 million dollar market is simply too big too ignore anymore.

In all honesty, I think this issue has become one where the developers themselves are simply out of touch with the majority of their playerbase. There is no question that there are many of us who don't like it, but there is no longer any doubt in my mind that we are vastly outnumbered by the people who do want it.

And in a sort of silver lining - today may well the beginning of the end for Yantis and IGE. If the players of EQ2 end up either supporting it or not caring either way, it will give the other companies carte blanche to offer similar schemes and IGE will vanish. No one will do business with a 3rd party when they can get gauranteed security and delivery from the game company itself.

It may be a sad day for some us, but in my mind, a completely inevitable one.

Cheers,

Sorran.

[Ronne]

I just have a hard time playing a game when the company comes with out says the almighty dollar will now be determining your success. I get enough of that in real life.

[Clowns]

It's quite clear now that SOE consists of a bunch of suits who have morales until they get in the way. These fucks have basically sold out eveything Everquest stood for and, in the 'everquest' for the almighty dolla (also in light of WoW kick the living shit out their asses), they have become the monster which they so desperately persued.

IMO, this my friends marks the end of SOE as a competitive MMORPG gaming company. They sorely fucked up on this one.

[Malse]

If you want SoE to fight the good fight and take a stand against Yantis, this is how. They can make it completely unprofitable for him to run a business via their games, at will.

No money, no farmers. Eventually, no IGE period if other games follow suit. Then you can argue over whether or not they should restrict the service.

[Andric d'Regor]

sad in a way but not suprising. Farmers are a problem and are affecting just about all online games negatively. This could have a lot of diferent efects - not least making it a lot cheaper for those whom want to buy stuff and also seriously cut into the professional gangs that run riot atm in some servers/zones as their profits will be diminished. I fervently hope that it will mean that SOE/whoever follows suit will police the non-ebay servers rigorously as they should have less to police & have a financial stake in it I think they may well do so.

If my server becomes an ebay server I will transfer - they have already said they will give free server moves away if a server is converted to an ebay server.

[Elgonn]

Originally posted by BobTheMoron
I just have a hard time playing a game when the company comes with out says the almighty dollar will now be determining your success. I get enough of that in real life.

Time has always been and will stay the most important currency.

I would be interested in seeing how a server would operate with some sort of per character/account /played limit. Lots of old online games did this. I haven't seen it in many years.