SoE new move (or not so new)

[Zhaun's_Shade]

I see a danger of MMOs getting a bad rap from this, due to people who can't control their real cash spending and keep buying dumb shit in game. It'll be some wierd offshoot of gambling addiction or somthing. It will cause in-game economies to boom and so there will be stuff to buy at all levels and in good quantity, so we'll end up with issues like "Little Mikey" charging new weapons and armor every other level to mom & dad's credit card, and "John" who spends him and his wife's vacation money on some l33t epix.

I think it will be nice for people who want to "cash out" and quit, and maybe for people who want to try to farm for a living online, but it will likely hurt the games and industry as a whole.

[Arakkis]

Jesus Christ. I have never understood paying RL money for in game items. I already pay $15 a month to play the damn game, why the hell would I want to pay more? Why the hell can't people actually go out and earn whatever it is they want? All people want now a days is instant gratification. Fucking ecrack heads.

Before someone says it, no I am not casual, I am in a BT/MH raid guild and I have earned everything I have including my epic mount.

[Miele]

You know the most funny thing?
Instead of making really good games and attracting more customers, they want to squeeze every possible cent from those they have, potentially pissing them off even more.

In light of this "epiphany" I got, I canceled my account because after all I was just waiting for a reason to do it. Thanks for giving me one I guess.

@Pinski: maybe it just won't change a shit overall, you're right. It just pisses me off and it's still good to say "fuck you SoE", same feeling as many years ago: refreshing.

[Hachima]

I don't understand why people go to the grocery store to buy their food. They should earn their food by plowing fields and watering their crops on their own!

[Bongk]

Originally Posted by Miele

It just pisses me off and it's still good to say "fuck you SoE", same feeling as many years ago: refreshing.

you do notice the other companies they list as doing this also right? One being Funcom who is doing AoC?

[Bongk]

Originally Posted by Hachima

I don't understand why people go to the grocery store to buy their food. They should earn their food by plowing fields and watering their crops on their own!

stupidest analogy I ever read...

[Hachima]

The OP did mention farming so....

[Lyrical]

Originally Posted by Arakkis

Jesus Christ. I have never understood paying RL money for in game items. I already pay $15 a month to play the damn game, why the hell would I want to pay more? Why the hell can't people actually go out and earn whatever it is they want? All people want now a days is instant gratification. Fucking ecrack heads.

When I was working 120 hours a week, I bought virtual currency. I have done this maybe 4 times since EQ1. I had plenty of money, but no time. I haven't done it regularly, and have pretty much gotten to the point where I don't need to do it anymore. I just manage my time better. I don't see any difference between spending money on a virtual game or spending money on golf. Don't some golfers spend $200-300 a month on golf? I have spent maybe $500 over ten years of playing MMO's. I can see why some people would want to do it.

However, I can't see how some people will spend their rent money on virtual items. That makes no sense.

[copernic]

You would think a bunch of Venture Capitalists would do at least a tiny bit of research before investing in stupid shit like this.

There's already a legal RMT exchange, it's called StationExchange. It's run by Sony. It's been such a tremendous success that:

1. It's still only offered on two EQII servers, years after the initial rollout. And those servers have seen no influx of RMT-seeking players... in fact, one was consolidated with a second server.

2. The absolute volume of trading is a joke. Go to StationExchange right now and search for "all characters." Wow, there's 154 AUCTIONS THAT'S AMAZING! If Sony takes a $10 cut on all of those (numbers made up) that's an extra $1500 dollars!!

3. The money taken in is kind of sad too. "Total cash collected between June 2005 and June 2006 was $1.87 million. The daily amount of cash collected, on average, was $2,588." That's before expenses.

But most importantly, StationExchange revealed that players could care less about the "It's safe! It's legal!" promise. Prices on black market and Station Exchange sites were the same. That meant that the "safety premium" = 0.

So a bunch of VC idiots thought they were going to enter a new marketplace and be hailed as saviors for oppressed poor players. In reality, most players hate RMT because it fucks up the *game* you're supposed to be playing. Actual gold sellers/buyers will stick to the established, highly competitive, very liquid grey market that already does a fabulous job of handling RMT. The only winners will be those Virtual World Libertarian-Economists that get a hardon whenever someone buys plat.

Check out http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20...per%201.19.doc for more on what a terrible idea this is.

[Dashal]

Originally Posted by copernic

You would think a bunch of Venture Capitalists would do at least a tiny bit of research before investing in stupid shit like this.

There's already a legal RMT exchange, it's called StationExchange. It's run by Sony. It's been such a tremendous success that:

1. It's still only offered on two EQII servers, years after the initial rollout. And those servers have seen no influx of RMT-seeking players... in fact, one was consolidated with a second server.

2. The absolute volume of trading is a joke. Go to StationExchange right now and search for "all characters." Wow, there's 154 AUCTIONS THAT'S AMAZING! If Sony takes a $10 cut on all of those (numbers made up) that's an extra $1500 dollars!!

3. The money taken in is kind of sad too. "Total cash collected between June 2005 and June 2006 was $1.87 million. The daily amount of cash collected, on average, was $2,588." That's before expenses.

But most importantly, StationExchange revealed that players could care less about the "It's safe! It's legal!" promise. Prices on black market and Station Exchange sites were the same. That meant that the "safety premium" = 0.

So a bunch of VC idiots thought they were going to enter a new marketplace and be hailed as saviors for oppressed poor players. In reality, most players hate RMT because it fucks up the *game* you're supposed to be playing. Actual gold sellers/buyers will stick to the established, highly competitive, very liquid grey market that already does a fabulous job of handling RMT. The only winners will be those Virtual World Libertarian-Economists that get a hardon whenever someone buys plat.

Check out http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20...per%201.19.doc for more on what a terrible idea this is.

Probably because you can get it everywhere now. No need to go to some RMT server and have everyone discount what you do because you're on said server. Same with that EQ server that you paid extra for, whatever that was called. Legends?

Anyway if there is 1.8 billion (with a b) dollars in this, you bet your sweet ass they're gonna want in on it and will figure a way to get a piece.

Full disclosure: I bought a PGT in the original EQ1 at level 14 for like 9 bucks.

[Kodylan]

Originally Posted by Miele

I think the day people will no longer accept NBG loot even among friends because "it's money lolz" is the day MMOs will die and some new shit will take their place.

Honestly I'm concerned about this. I have no problems saying that if it comes in EQ2, I'll be gone before they can say "don't unsuscribe".

Funcom is in this too, what is that they are making now? Age of Conan?

If you read the press release you quoted to start the thread, the Funcom CEO says it will be used in their upcoming casual MMO. Just because these companies are partnering with Live Gamer, it doesn't mean you'll see this service in every single MMO they offer.

[Bongk]

Originally Posted by Dashal

Anyway if there is 1.8 billion (with a b) dollars in this, you bet your sweet ass they're gonna want in on it and will figure a way to get a piece.

That is 1.8 billion for the year across every single game in existance, correct? So for sony it is probably not very much as obviously the majority is going to be more popular games.

This is going to bring gold farmers out into the open and make things far worse as they will not be breaking the rules anymore IMO. I could see them losing more than they gain in total revenue from pissed off players who are having a far worse gaming experience and at the same time sullying their name in the industry.

[Lyrical]

Originally Posted by copernic

You would think a bunch of Venture Capitalists would do at least a tiny bit of research before investing in stupid shit like this.

There's already a legal RMT exchange, it's called StationExchange. It's run by Sony. It's been such a tremendous success that:

1. It's still only offered on two EQII servers, years after the initial rollout. And those servers have seen no influx of RMT-seeking players... in fact, one was consolidated with a second server.

2. The absolute volume of trading is a joke. Go to StationExchange right now and search for "all characters." Wow, there's 154 AUCTIONS THAT'S AMAZING! If Sony takes a $10 cut on all of those (numbers made up) that's an extra $1500 dollars!!

3. The money taken in is kind of sad too. "Total cash collected between June 2005 and June 2006 was $1.87 million. The daily amount of cash collected, on average, was $2,588." That's before expenses.

But most importantly, StationExchange revealed that players could care less about the "It's safe! It's legal!" promise. Prices on black market and Station Exchange sites were the same. That meant that the "safety premium" = 0.

So a bunch of VC idiots thought they were going to enter a new marketplace and be hailed as saviors for oppressed poor players. In reality, most players hate RMT because it fucks up the *game* you're supposed to be playing. Actual gold sellers/buyers will stick to the established, highly competitive, very liquid grey market that already does a fabulous job of handling RMT. The only winners will be those Virtual World Libertarian-Economists that get a hardon whenever someone buys plat.

Check out http://www.gamasutra.com/features/20...per%201.19.doc for more on what a terrible idea this is.

/agree. It looks like the VC's are just chasing a fad (since Second Life seems to be on the cover of Businessweek every couple of months or so). The only way it would have any real implications would be if it was on every server. In this situation, given that we are dealing with large corporations here, the suits might force devs to put in more moneysinks. I somehow doubt that SOE or Funcom would be stupid enough to make the service available on every server. As a player, there would be no way to trust that the devs didn't design the game to push RMT trades. There would be no integrity.

[Agraza]

That Second Life crap was/is hilarious. My sociology professor went off on it in a positive light. She did have her shit together though, with numbers, names, places, etc. I had to distract myself because if I paid attention I'd have probably laughed in her face. Honestly, her premise wasn't of money to be made, but that she thought it was anything more than cybersex was entertaining.

That shit is ridiculous, but mad props to whomever these gigantic brand names are forking their cash over to for exposure in the "virtual world".

[Bongk]

you said integrity and SOE and Funcom in the same sentence? heh...

SOE has never had any integrity and have tried every single thing they can to milk their players of cash from rushed expanions, to lame card games with played in game that are purchased with real life cash, to RMT servers where they get a cut, to just flat out making shitty games and hoping people will buy it anyways as they don't want to take the time to do it right even though they have the capital. the list goes on and on with them. Hello LOY...

Funcom... the only company I have ever done a charge back on my credit card. After I bought AO it was so unplayable that i contacted by bank and got a chargeback on the full purchase price of the game. Ironically, funcom didn;t even dispute it and fully reimbursed me and didn;t even close my account. They know they had released a steaming pile of shit that was unplayable but tried to milk people of their cash VG style anyways.

Sorry when i think integrity, these 2 companies do not come to mind.