f13.net

Given their major market and how their competitors already do this, I've always wondered when NC would come up with their own meta-game currency.

Well, I wonder no more (http://www.gamedaily.com/articles/news/ncsoft-introduces-nccoin/?biz=1).


Not much otherwise to say about it. Logical and a long time coming is about it for me.

All game companies would be wise to implement this.  It removes farmers and spam from farmers and provides a number of paying customers that want access to more in-game currency.  Not having in house RMT seems like lost revenue. 

I'm sure there are legal reasons why more games haven't gone this route.  Perhaps one of the lawyer types can answer that. 

Why did they call it NCcoin?

Who came up with that?

NCoin ALREADY HAS IT BUILT IN.

Damnit. My OCDness is going to make me angry every time I see it.

I saw the PR email and had to read it 5 times, and by the 5th time I was crying a little blood.

I have already bought some for Exteel, to date, i have spent 1$. They have had the system for many months now, Exteel is the only game i thank that uses them right now. There are items for the game that cost in game credits, and others that take NCcoins, with NCcoin (only) items being just a tier down from the best, that are credits only to buy.

I think a share your obsessive-compulsive disorder somewhat, Schild. That's a freaking horrible naming decision. :uhrr:

They could even call it "n¢"/"n-cents" considering they are 100 to one US dollar. Marketing.  :oh_i_see:

The question that I'm interested in answering: Is it profitable to allow players to buy the best gear in game for RL cash if you consider the effects of this mechanism on retention?  

I have to imagine that Blizzard would make a ton of cash in the short term if they allowed people to buy top tier gear with cash.  How would this effect the long-term bottom line?  It's an interesting question.  Of course, it doesn't consider the complications that are brought about by legal concerns in allowing RMT.  

You don't buy the best gear in game with NCcoin, at least, not in exteel. Like i said, it will only get you one tier down from best. The best is bought with in game credits that you earn. Also, don't compare parts and equipment in exteel with gear in game like Wow, the "Power" difference is not so gaping. In fact, its really about choosing parts that fit your playstyle, or how your mech reacts/feels rather than power. A lot of the high tier guns may have higher damage, but they overheat way faster, making it a personal choice to use them, not a must.

Micro-payments would not work in a game like Wow, where retention is 100% about the carrot (Gear). Retention in exteel is game play, and competition, and a little bit of the shiny. Every item in exteel has pros and cons, they are not simply "Better".

I'm aware.  I just thought it an interesting hypothetical.  Would there be enough of a cash influx to offset potential losses to long-term retention?  I think there exists a population of gamers that would enjoy playing at the highest levels without having to go through all of the hoops to get there.  This may be an untapped financial resource. 

Well, technically, Wow has this already. (http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/pvp/tournament/index.xml) It doesn't affect anything, because its segregated, and focused.

I love the Puzzle Pirate method.  Everything is bought with a combo of in-game cash(ie time) and token (ie real money) and let the player decide which they value more via in-game market.

NCCoin is infinitely better than NCoin. But then I say, "G U I" not "gooy".

They shoulda gone gangsta naming yo.   En City Coin.

I would love to be able to spend real money for fluff in games.  Pets, appearance, dance moves, emotes - that would affect nobody's "real game" experience yet could contribute to my own enjoyment of the game. 

It's more a question of audience. WoW attracted a bunch of new players, but was built with veteran semi-communal ideals: what you put in you get out aside from the flat fee everyone pays.

Newer MMOs a) not being built by established MMO companies; and, b) not servicing the Corp Por group mostly don't bother with flat fees, instead collecting money from microtrans. These companies also aren't spending AAA budgets and some of these games barely qualify for that label.

To date I can't think of any big budget AAA title that's gone from flat fee to microtrans, so it's hard to know what the losses and gains are. Microtrans games brag about registered users (Audition is above 130mil now, Habbo I think broke 100mil, Maplestory at 90mil, etc). Flat-fee games brag about paying subscribers (we all know those and guess at the rest). It's easier to calculate what the flat-fee games collect (though even there many get it wrong, mostly due to lack of full info). So most assume flat-fee games make a LOT more than microtrans.

At the same time though, it needs to be pointed out that microtrans games cost a LOT less to build and run. And while they might not collect fees from all players, they have an easier time selling advertising space on sheer eyeballs alone, and they get deep investments from whoever they can collect from. That could be due to proven conversion from eyeball to purchase, or just the belief that covering 300mil potential people over just three games is too good a chance not to take. Some claim that the amount of money they make on advertising far exceeds what they make on microtrans or paid-download/purchase (in those studies that cross between casual and persistent worlds). But then, there's the bubble question: is all the money being made because advertisers haven't wizened up yet?

I suspect the flat-fee games will eventually go away though. We're sorta already seeing it. How many viable "big/real" titles are coming? Compare this to the number of kiddie/IP browser-based worlds a completely separate group out there is talking about (the type that attended the Virtual Worlds Summit, and the self-styled "casual" events... not those talking about casual online games either). The latter group is like where this genre was five years ago. Nowadays though, the general belief is that WoW won and everyone else is fighting over scraps, so better to invent a blue ocean strategy or something.

I used to lean heavily one way. Then the other. Now I'm really not invested in either, so sorta ambivalent.

I'm a big believer that a hybrid model - both sub fees and microtrans - will be better for the MMO industry. Sub fees will be tiny - say $5 a month - while microtrans will also be cheap - max $2 for any item in the game.

You need a sub fee to keep the riff raff out (he says, as he adjusts his monocle). All items available for microtrans also need to be available in-game via drops as well, so the player can choose between investing time or money to get what they want. It should be built with an eye to keeping external RMTers out - your authorised microtrans channel should also offer powerlevel services (or: instant level up) to minimise any foothold an external RMTer could get.

Two things that need to be sacrificed under such a model are the idea that a MMO can have a self-regulating in-game economy or an auction house where players can sell in-game items for RL cash. If people can buy what they want using either in-game or RL cash, the in-game economy is likely to be deflated due to sales going through the RL microtrans channel.

The flat fee may prove to keep too many people out there, as for this to work in the West people would rightly wonder about the justification for double-dipping.

I think microtrans will be the future in the West. Us old farts just need to get out of the way :wink:

I'm not sure all microtransaction games are the future, but if they are a $5 sub plus microtrans would be a great transitory model for a quality game.  People would think it a bargain compared to the current $15+ games while getting used to the idea of paying for goodies from a legitimate source.

I like the cosmetic idea, I'd shell out $2-5 for a hat or parrot on my eve avatard, or a special paintjob on all of my ships that let everyone know just how awesome I am.

(http://www.vgcats.com/comics/images/051115.gif) (http://www.vgcats.com/comics/?strip_id=173)

So are they going to get around to really cool microtrans? Like letting me rename another guys' character "Gaylord" for 20 bucks?

I.... doubt it.

1. Design game with unbelievable grind
2. Sell shortcuts for more money
3. Proft


Does anyone finds this a bit odd business model? You ether offer 'unbelievable grind' as a product, or you incorporate 'shortcuts' into product and charge more subscription?

I just don't see how can you design good game where your entire goal becomes inventing new ways to frustrate the user so they micropay to skip unpleasant parts.

The trick would be to lovingly sucker the players into it, make it a bit too obvious and its ruined.

My thoughts.

Microtrans are fine for games where teens cyber in purple sparkly hats. They want to blow their lawn mowing money on stupid shit. That's fine.

Any MMOG where you can bypass content by spending 50 bucks for a level 70 loaded with purp epix (Not counting the current tournament system, which is a special case, and temporary at that) is not gonna see a dime from me. It's bad enough that content is gated by time investment, but when it's gated by money investment (Kara key requires 10,000 WoWBucks!) I'm taking my wallet and going home.

I can't wait for the lawsuits.
"I paid 10,000 Ncoin for this sword."
"You nerfed it's stats the next day."
"I want my $100 back."

hehe been saying that for years, particularly given how long this has been the case across the Pacific. Seriously, just because we don't call those games DIKUs doesn't make them not DIKUs.

This industry designed itself into xtrans years ago. And then they got all "shocked" when players starting paying? Bullshit. Heck, Garriot himself seemed to like the like of people eBaying UO stuff, and this was while other people were getting pissy that players had the gall to find a way to alt-tab to check EQatlas, or the hubris to run AIM in the background! Oh noes!

Pandora's box opened long ago and the only people not profiting are those sinking money into fighting it (though of course Blizzard can more than afford it). It's a nice image, if you can afford to keep it.

My personal philosophy wouldn't be about selling short cuts or designing the game to have unpleasant bits needing to be skipped.  The base game should be solid and offer an enjoyable game as is.

The extras are for fluff, like Xan suggested.  New emotes, new clothing styles, more decorative options, etc.  If there is item customization like EQ2's appearance slots (more games need this!), sell cool items to wear in them.

EULA.

The thing that says we can't buy gold or items or use 3rd party software?  :awesome_for_real:

The thing thats says you have no rights.

Oh. Okay. I just click "OK" without reading them anyway.  :grin:

It's in operation even before that, actually. Opening the package for many videogames is enough to bind you. Of course extra layers of protection are never a bad thing.

Yeah, but theirs is the Real NcCoyn.

OK that was admittedly horrible, sorry.

Well, this is the current MMO model in a nutshell. Adding in a step two either 1) shortens player retention because they can buy what they want, get bored and quit sooner than if they had to 'earn' it, or 2) lengthens player retention because they don't get turned off by the first X levels / mobs they have to grind through to get to the 'fun' bit.

The other thing is that fun means different things to different people. If some money means the dedicated PvPer can skip all the crappy PvE bits to get to the right place, or the dollmaker doesn't have to fight 1000 felt monsters to get a purple felt hat, then it provides the player with some choice.


I'm suggesting a time OR money gated model for most in-game things (you'll actually have to play the game, even having bought everything). If someone wants to buy a max level, fully kitted out character, that's great, but they won't have the experience to use that character correctly.

As it stands, pretty much all MMO content is time gated, so the time rich benefit the most. I'd personally like to have the option of buying things from the MMO directly so that my full-time working self can feel like they are keeping up.

I know it's not a popular idea in some circles, but it don't see MMOs having to rely on either subs or RMT; the two can be harmoniously combined and will probably do well in a market where MMO sub fees appear to be going up (well, WAR's reputed > $15 a month fee, but that could lead the charge - it's fairly obvious that MMO sub fees aren't coming down, regardless of how long a MMO has existed, unless it goes to 'free').

No it isn't.

EULA doesn't magically make your consumer rights disappear, no matter how hard MMO companies might want them to.   If you sign a contract saying 'You can't sue Honda if your engine blows up within 500 meters of the lot' and then they blow it up, do you really think you're helpless?

Then real life happens. Suit comes into office and decides that he needs Porsche upgrade, and that he overspent money on hookers... he then talks to game designers and sets goal to increase revenue by 5%. As a designer you are now forced to increase appeal of micro-payments or push expansion release that it ships before it is ready. This keeps going on in vicious cycle until micro-payments is all but mandatory due to artificial cock-blocks put into place. Worst part of it - typical mmorpgs have enough lag that while doing this might cripple it, effects won't be visible for long time making it Someone Else's Problem.

Micro-payments will bring unbelievable level of SUCK into mmorpgs. Imagine what developers that actually *trying* to be annoying can come up with.

You need to look into how both systems will work in ideal case - subscription based model ideally will keep you entertained that you stay subscribed perpetually, micropayment model ideally will get you frustrated just enough to pay maximum amount in shortest possible time. Once system entertains, other frustrates. Why do you want to pay money to be frustrated?

Have you been paying attention? MMOG's already have unbelievable levels of suck just out of the box. Micro-payments will just mean suck you get to pay extra for.

The level of suck only needs to break the barrier of common perception. That's when MMOs become vertical casinos all the way, with a whole new league of middle-management.

Most don't after having played them "Normally".


So when the next wave of people who aren't time or money rich can bitch?

I'd rather see the content limited by timers. Like the transmutes in WoW, applied to advancement. (They kinda sorta dipped their toes in with the rest xp bonus.)

They tried that with UO. It was only ok there because advancing a characters stats wasn't the only thing you were trying to do there.

And the Chinese government instituted this as policy for any games that operate there, including WoW.

Take yer pick :wink:

I find that desire to limit time is like permadeath: it works for everyone else. I personally don't want my time dictated at all. There'll be weeks I can play 20 hours. There'll be weeks I can't play at all. It's the ebb and flow of life that should be the determining factor, and then self-motivation*, not some arbitrary fascist rule.

* which works for microtrans games too. Some people are motivated to spend more cash on dress up accessories. I am not, but that's mostly because none of the microtrans games features themes and mechanics I have any interest in.

a 16 year old can't sign a contract and half their players are underage.

I know the lure of $$$ is hard for MMO developers to resist, but assigning a dollar value to virtual items is a HUGE mistake on their part. Some court somewhere will eventually equate this to gambling (if the swords worth $100 and there's a random chance it drops off a mob... etc...) The only reason it hasn't blow up in their face yet is that only the smaller MMO's are doing it. If WOW started something like this, it'd be on CNN the next day.

Yeah, only the smaller MMO's are doing it. You know, the ones with more customers than WoW that havetheir game currency cards available at mass market retailers all across North America (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MapleStory). Good thing that only happens in Asia, we still have a purely subscription dominated model here in the States.

Oh wait, we don't.

Future.

Jeepers. Everyone jump on the microtrans bandwagon. Because what works for one game obviously will work for all games. Look at what going MMO did for Sims!  :awesome_for_real: Or charging a monthly sub did for Hellgate London!  :drill:

Both those games failed for reasons outside of just becoming a MMO or just having a monthly sub fee and you know it.

Microtrans has a definite future in MMOs. The sub model will also continue to work well for some MMOs and is technically a 'safer' revenue source, but I can't see people willing to fork out more than $19.99 a month, which kind of limits how much revenue a MMO can generate off a given playerbase.

My point, which most game companies seems to miss a lot of the time, is that there are considerations beyond "How much money can we get for X?" Like how applicable is a microtransaction... or a monthly fee?

Lol, not even remotely similar and you know it. Buying appearances and fluff items from some vendor is not the same as putting a direct real world dollar value on your games currency.

What you guys are doing over on the Exchange servers is exactly what is going to get the MMO industry in trouble. What happens when some 10 year old steals their parents Credit card, logs into your game, buys $1000 worth of plat and then blows it all on that Gibbering Goblin slot machine you guys have? You're going to get slapped with a huge lawsuit, and then nailed for letting a minor gamble. It IS going to happen. Just because it hasn't yet is simply luck on your part.

The other side of the point that you are missing Ratman is that revenue model does not have to impact gameplay.

There are many free to play MMO's that drive revenue from microtransactions, advertising revenue, velvet rope subscriptions (think Runescape) and more that are KICKING WOW IN THE NUTS ON A DAILY BASIS. Sure, some of them really do things with their game design to support the notion of paying; but not all do -- and even the ones where you are only able to buy a hat make good money.

Why are game companies looking at this model more and more? Because it beats the crap out of the subscription model on a global basis, and you don't have to sacrifice game quality to be free to play. I reference WoW not because it's some 'enemy' game from another company, it's a raging success -- wildly so; and everyone wants to point to it as an example for subscriptions working. Thing is, the bulk of WoW customers don't pay traditional subs either... and it's the top dog (I have a sub too, I'm not complaining). Finding more ways to get more customers in the door and still make a profit is a good thing.

Free to play is the future. It gets more people to try the game, and that's a good way to profit.

1. We no longer have Exchange servers (it's a technicality, but now they are LiveGamer servers).
2. Just because you say it will happen does not mean it will happen.  :drill:

In the example you make, I'd imagine that the parents would call their credit card company and deny the charges, resulting in a charge back to the game company. Then they would likely punish the kid some and find better places to hide their plastic.

I don't have internal evidence to prove it, but I bet your example has happened and was resolved more how I envision it. I suppose I could ask someone, but what would that prove? :)

I' won't hide the fact that I have a personal aversion to it all. I have no interest in Maple Story or Exteel or whatever free MMOGs use the microtrans model. And I can't imagine what I'd want from microtrans in the MMOGs I do play. I can imagine game companies getting it "wrong", since that seems to be the M.O., and managing to find a way to junk what enjoyment I do get out of these games through a poorly implemented microtransaction system.

Oh, and just because it came up on another board today...

(http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2003/20030716h.gif)

Micro transactions are like PvP. The game has to be built around it FIRST, or it sucks. You won't see many games retrofitted for Micro transactions, however.

I agree!

Point taken   :-)


It most cases you're prolly right. But eventually the kid doing it will be the "right kid" (like maybe his parents are fundamentalist Christians or some other strict religion) and maybe the kid does well for a while... "Mom, I won $5k before I lost it all! It was a wize investment!" That's the story that's going to get into the news.

And I'd also like to point out that you didn't dispute the fact that your company is allowing people to gamble on your servers with what are basically poker chips. It's not "Sort of" gabling... it's a regular old slot machine, that people can buy tokens through you... then gamble away, loosing all their chips... or better yet, actually win and sell all your money back on the exchange!

My guess is the only age check you guys have is Credit card validation. So you have little to no proof that any of the people using the service aren't minors.

ALL of that is against federal law. Without question. Some of what the other MMOs are doing is pretty iffy, but that Slot machine you guys have is cut and dry. If it gets in front of a judge, you're going to be up a creek. You take a cut when they buy the money, you take a cut when they sell the money. If they win, suddenly lots of new chips are created for you to make more money off of. It's practically like printing your own cash!

It won't be the gambling aspect that screws things up for a company legally, it'd be the other thing you mentioned, the nerfing of items.

Which, of course, is why for the most part, the very-hugely-popular-but-ignored-anyway MMOs that feature xtrans do so mainly for fluff items  :grin:. They can do that because enough people want that nonsense anyway. But they also went that route because it allows them to keep the sanctity of the real game development choices in the hands of the developers, so they can buff, nerf, and add/remove content as needed.

So you don't need to design the game around xtrans. You really just need to bracket it into a very specific class of goods.

No they are not. None of those games are making nearly as much money as WoW is. In fact WoW is making ~2.5x what MapleStory is in profits.

The other reason for only selling fluff is that if you sell items and money, you will end up competing on price with the gold farmers. You don't want to be there. You'll lose and it'll rip your game apart.

Playing Grenado, you need to buy a card to upgrade your character to heroic when you hit 100. If you've hit 100, you're hardcore. You can get some potions, which make life a little bit easier, but you can buy much the same on the auction house. Other than that, it's all fluff really. I didn't notice any real difference when they went to cash shop.

Uh... no.  You CONTROL supply, ergo, price.  You can create gold from thin air.  POOF.. i just gave you a hundred billion WoW gold and every item you could want.  Now go try and farm that in the same timeframe. As the guy with access to the server and creation commands I'll beat you every time.

Now if you want to say they'll lose because items/ gold become "worthless."  Well, that's a completly different arguement alltogether.  How much are your hard-earned EQ or UO items worth nowadays?

You are correct, I didn't dispute it. I also didn't validate it. I'm choosing to not agree, or bother trying to convince you differently. It's not gambling and there aren't any poker chips. YMMV. :)

On your question about age verification, we do everything the law requires and more. You can also bet your bottom dollar that Free Realms is causing us to visit the topic quite heavliy (yup, thats obvious but worth saying).

Hmm, neither of us are right. I tried to find numbers that match, and here's what I got. In 2005 WoW and Nexon tied.
NY Times article projecting $250 million for WoW (page two) (http://www.nytimes.com/2005/02/10/technology/circuits/10warr.html?pagewanted=1&ei=5090&en=ba633bc16b682182&ex=1265691600&partner=rssuserland).
Business Week article putting Nexon at $230 million (http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/07_13/b4027047.htm?campaign_id=rss_daily)

Well, not quite a tie, but a close call that shows both games are making insane money, and that you can't discredit the model that Nexon is using. Further, it costs a lot less to make Maple Story work than WoW. Team size, technology, the whole nine yards. So I'm still quite comfortable in saying that people who ignore the free to play games are putting their heads in the sand.

Every model is viable; and quite so. Ignoring a model when you have the business ability to create a credible game for that model is foolish.

Last year WoW posted profit of over $425mil, on income over $1bn. And as you know, Nexon is more than one title :-)

In the pure statistical sense, Trippy is correct. WoW is making more actual revenue.

However, whenever I've gotten into a similar debate, it's always been about the larger investment and return ratio.

Blizzard is making money hand over fist. However, they are mostly doing so because they invested way the heck more than any other MMO company before them, since, or likely. Their operating profit percentage is about the only relevant number to most other companies looking at this space, because almost nobody else has the will nor confidence to make that much of an upfront investment to achieve anywhere near a similar actual revenue return.

But even then, 40% operating margin is approaching the impossible for everyone else when you look at WoW itself. There's a certain soft cap achieved in a game where there's only two codebases duplicated innumerable times. Each new server is not the same additional cost. It's similar to mass production ammortization. And heck, they could have actually hit the point where adding more realms requires zero additional investment resources.

Yeah, yer right. Better research, as of last fall Maple Story is making $16 million/month (http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=15425). Not as much as WoW; but more than enough to consider it staggering in my book. :)

It's an academic statement at this point, but none of the "gambling" type mini games have ever spawned on the Exchange/LG/etc servers exactly because of the cash-out potential.

I'm assuming, of course, that this hasn't changed in the months since I left. ;)

- Scott

Exactly. For a game that cost, by some estimates, a mere $8mil to make (no idea what their operating budget is). Add that to Club Penguin costing maybe $7mil and yet getting a cool $350mil+$350mil from Disney in a total buyout.

There's a LOT of money flowing out there. Some of it is going to people making much more smaller investments. They're making less ROI percentage than WoW, but able to spread that money around a lot more too. This is one of the many things that makes WoW irrelevant to the newer-age MMO developers: it's too vertical to be of much relevance to IP owners hiring out or licensing in tech from one person, design work from another, O&M from a third, and hardware/servers from a fourth, and so on.

They are making more profit too *and* have higher margins (most likely).

You keep saying that but have no facts to support your claim. In 2005 Nexon's made $75 million on $230 million revenue. That's no better than what Blizzard is making on WoW. In fact Blizzard's margins were quite a bit higher than that in 2007, though we don't know Nexon's 2007 figures since they aren't public. In 2007 Blizzard (as a whole but really it's almost all WoW) had revenues of 814 Euros and an EIBTA of 345 Euros. That's a 42% profit margin.

I think you are too used to saying "You keep saying that but have (provided)* no facts to support your claim". I am not proclaiming what I've proclaimed in the past. It was Grimwell's turn.  :grin:

What I have said here is stuff we already know:

• Blizzard has spent more money than anyone else the upfront development of an MMO. I invite you to find someone who spent more, even adjusted for inflation. Heck, I'd invite anyone to offer up any company that would ever spend more. This leads to:
  
• Nobody else has the will nor confidence to spend that much upfront on a single game like Blizzard did. I'll be the first to fall over dead of shock if anyone else ever does.
  
• 40% operating margin is likely higher than anyone else (based on guesstimates prior to WoW. It probably still is). Fine, it's 42%. You could me in my wildly inaccurate ramblings again. I added the part of as the soft cap argument because I think there's a correlation. I have no proof and did not offer it up as unarguable fact (though I suppose how I wrote it could be seen that way, this is the intertube. We all insert "imho" in front of every sentence,don't we?).

Tell me where that's wrong. That would be a nice change.

* I added "provided" to make the sentence accurate.

You are right, I misunderstood what you were saying in the second part. My 42% figure wasn't meant as a correction for your 40% one. It was a rebuttal to your constant claims that the microtrans games are cheaper to operate. Also it's very likely that NCsoft came close to what Blizzard spent on WoW in developing TR.

As someone closely familiar with psychology, gambling and mmorpgs have A LOT in common. It will be trivially easy to draw parallels in court. Trying to squeeze extra dollar slot-machine style going to blow up spectacularly... probably ending up with level of protection/legislation/taxation currently 'enjoyed' only by Casinos.

Entropia Universe (http://www.entropiauniverse.com/index.var)

Listed as a an online casino.

It is?  Interesting, wonder how they get around the ban of online casinos in the US now.

As a note only:
Entropia is run by a Swedish company, http://www.mindark.se/ (http://www.mindark.se/).
I have no idea in what way they might have been marketing their online world in the US.

Sidenote:
US ban on online gaming? How do they do that on gambling in other countries?
The Chines version, filtering internet?

They went after the banks in the US. US Banks aren't supposed to allow transactions with any online casino.  I just read about how It's still unenforceable, since folks who want to gamble just use a middleman service now.  You can't stop teh internets.

It was enough to get Second Life to ban gambling.

I don't know, but it has always been listed as an online casino, not a game. It operated out of like Sweden or some shit with 2-3 banks backing/providing service for it. I think you can even get a credit card that pull directly from your in game casino bank account.

EDIT: You know what, they changed the terms of use on me. It isn't an "online casino" anymore, at least according to them.


Link (http://www.entropiauniverse.com/en/rich/107004.html)

maybe thats how, by changing the classification.

I am looking forward to having to declare my Epics on my tax forms.

On the upside you might be able to list repair costs as expenses.

No doubt. And taken the next step:

Your computer purchase, maintenance and repairs are business expenses.
As is the legitimate % of your domicle in which conduct said business.
As does the travel mileage for going to the store for computer stuff, fedex costs, software costs, etc.

:-)

I'll need to spend more time gaming.  Good thing I can work from home, too.  That'll make computer use for business purposes 100%.

Reading this reminds me that someone payed $1000 for a 135 million year old lump of dinosaur crap.

I would think that game developers would be fairly nervous about putting monetary value on virtual items, at least in the west. Pretty sure its just a matter of time before property laws start getting applied to virtual items. Dont see how one can sell a virtual item for a set monetary price and not fall under some form of property laws/tax. EULA saying that we will be sold items that you still wont own doesn't seem particularly legal. How fucked would MMO developers be if they had to legally justify banning accounts or changing any items?

banning accounts -- happens when contract between the user and service provider is broken by the user.
changing items -- the online gameplay experience may change, standard part of said contract.

It could be set up a hire / leasing system, valid only within the realms of the game.

Like how I can go down and hire paintball equipment to run around the local paintball centre, but can't take that equipment outside since it isn't really mine.

Except if those items have a monetary value associated with them, you've deliberately lowered the value of that item after the original purchase was made.   It's like you bought a V6 and the auto company decided that was no good, and came over to your place and replaced it with a 4-cylinder. 

Games can get away with this because they are games.  You are paying to access the game world, and anything outside of that is your own damn fault.  As SOON as the company itself begins selling items they are a retailer and a whole new set of rules applies.

This has been one of the core arguments against legal RMT, the shackles it places on otherwise legitimate game development practices.

These games change all the time. They need to so we keep paying our fees and buying expansions. If the games were static, they'd peak and only ever decline thereafter.

That's why we see that even the microtrans games mostly sell decorations and buffs. Companies don't sell the equivalent of WoW Tier 6 gear. It's the main way to avoid such issues.

It isn't really avoiding the issue so much as sticking their head in the sand and pretending it isn't an issue. There are already MMOs out there with official microtrans / RMT channels in place.

Also, I don't think that legislators are going to carve out a distinction between in-game cosmetic bonnets or in-game +6 Vorpal Great-Axes if you sell either through RMT.

Yes, but you are told explicitly it can happen before you make the purchase. If knowing this you're still willing to shell out the money, you can't complain when it does actually happen, as you've made informed decision to form the contract with the seller.

If you want to use that RL analogy -- the V6 you bought won't last in pristine condition until the power that be decides to pull the plug on the universe server. It doesn't cause people to sue manufacturers over the wear and tear down the road, does it?

Err, "avoiding the issue" is "sticking their head in the sand". Maybe the better way to say it is "staying under the radar". The goal here is to prevent enough consumer complaints so that it doesn't get elevated. Not like legislators are going to start playing MMOs en masse. They way for a crescendo of complaints, usually first from people talking about it enough that the media picks it up.

Think along the aligns of a few people "losing millions of dollars because a game company changed their game". And then realize that's already happened in Second Life and legislators aren't clamoring for heads. It needs to be in a world(s) the average person has heard about and maybe experience.


If it gets to that point, I suspect they actually will, because it'll be the game companies helping them map the legislation.

Real life companies are already free to change their prices as they want.  They have constraints such as not wanting to sell below cost, taxes, and wanting to make a profit, however they can do it.

Game companies cannot afford to fluctuate the prices wildly since people want confidence in what they are buying.  It's within their rights though, so talk of legal action is a little silly if it's just about devaluing the price of an item over time.

the difference being, a cosmetic item, is just that... cosmetic. It's like selling a hat.  But any item that makes it easier to accumulate more money/items that have real world value... now you have the mmo company manipulating the market. And if the MMO developer has openly embraced the idea that its fake money/items equal real money/items... now they are manipulating real market trends and are subject to all the tangled web of laws that govern such markets.

MMO economy's are not real, not anywhere near being sophisticated enough to handle real market trends, and will fail almost instantly if they even tried. If they want their money to = real money, they have to have a real economy and lose control of the very money hat the tried to create in the first place. So, either they keep it as monopoly money, and retain control of the market... or they make it real money, and let it be a real market. It can't be both.

Most ToS reserve the right to ban you for any reason what so ever. Start placing monetary value on specific items outside of a "service" and eventually laws dictating rights and ownership of virtual property in MMO's will be established. You really think it would just be an ambiguous grey area of law in the US forever? A corporation reserves the right to devalue and destroy items you have purchased? It not being well defined up till now can be chalked up to the Western market of MMO's being tiny. But now with hundreds of millions being raked in by WoW its just a matter of time.

Id imagine this is also why a corporation like vivendi hasnt attempted to fight RMT on a large scale. Fear of forcing legislation that will fuck them.

Darniaq is correct, when the time comes that laws must be written governing virtual worlds and the goods and services that exist in them the game companies will be doing the drafting.  Actually the lobbyists that they've hired will be making suggestions and such but it boils down to the same thing.

Considering it's spelt out to potential customer, what exactly is grey about it though? It can probably be argued it has to be really dumb customer to enter a contract of this kind, but then intelligence of customer (or lack thereof) is not the concern of the corporation.

To put it in another way, they are selling products with no warranty and stress the fact that longevity of the item is undetermined. As far as law is concerned the items receive implied warranty of merchantibility and fitness, but these are promises about the condition of products at the time they're sold, and don't assure that the product will last for any specific length of time.

I can make a "ToS/EULA" stipulating any number of illegal or non-binding things. Still wont make a remote difference in it being legal or not. If you think a company can sell a product to a customer while removing all rights of ownership you are sadly mistaken. Yes i sell a product with a self destruct mechanism that i detonate whenever i wish and no laws govern my actions nor the customers rights of ownership....please.

They'll call it licensing, not selling; like they've been calling it for the last 20 years or so?

When was last time someone sued a company for providing trial software that ceases to exist after specific time, and won? If you "bought" say, 7 day xp buff for your character, would you sue the company after that time when the buff disappears? The "sale" of other items is very much the same, except in case of these the guaranteed period of functionality is zero and the practical period of use is undetermined. You know what you buy, if you don't like the product, you vote with your money and simply not buy it. The customer rights etc generally aim to protect the customer from buying the snake oil that is sold with promise it'll work, not the one that's sold with clear disclaimer "won't do shit".

edit: incidentally, that 'limited period' model would be probably about perfect to avoid most of the legal trouble. Rather than "sell" people items, "rent" them instead for short, renewable periods.

Thats alot of text that really has nothing to fucking do with anything being discussed. And is pretty irrelevant since the people that currently allow the sale/exchange of virtual property do in fact get sued over ownership of said property.

Its that MMO corporations would be selling a virtual "product" instead of a "service" as they currently spin it now. To avoid the very issue we are discussing.