f13.net

SoE San Diego has a job posting for a lead game designer:

http://careers.vurvexpress.com/jobprofile.cfm?szWID=16059&szCID=72267&szSiteID=1574&szOrderID=534351&szStart=1


EQ3? something else?

Social network game with RMT.

Sounds right...

EQ3 (another improved fantasy diku MUD) in the face of WoW, would basically just cannibalize the already depleted playerbase of EQ1 and EQ2.

We went through this before.  Subscriptions are not 0 sum.

It's the right time to start development of EQ3 in the game lifecycle.  I can't imagine they'd den the brandname. 

You could probably put forth an argument that in terms of "fantasy MMOG flagship product", there is a zero sum game.  You're either WoW, or you're trying to chisel a few hundred thousand users from the people dissatisfied with WoW.  Since most fantasy MMOGs seem to try to emulate large swaths of WoW, the players end up not being terribly enchanted with the new game either, or they realize that WoW simply has more completion, and they cancel anyway to go back to WoW.

So, what you're saying is that WoW has magical anti-competitive lock-out powers?

I mean their subscribers came from somewhere, right?  One day, the old king will die and then there will be a new king.  So it goes...

I'm saying that in order for something to dethrone WoW, it will have to be significantly better than WoW.  Not "as good".  Not "slightly different flavored game mechanics, but as good".  An incrementally better WoW will interest people, and retain them, but it won't be a significant number.

Until something comes along that is good enough to cause a critical mass of players to exit WoW together, it's pointless to aim a flagship product at the fantasy MMOG market.

Does that make more sense?

It makes sense... but not more sense.  What you are basically saying is that when someone develops something that can draw players away from WoW, then someone should develop something that can draw players away from WoW.  It is understood that you have to have a VERY good product to compete, but your only choices are to keep trying or just give them the market.

No, because it's a chicken and egg argument.  I mean, srsly, your advice is, "Don't compete with WoW, compete with it's successor"?  How will it ever have a successor if no one ever competes with it?

The only way to win is not to play?

Edit: WoW is a four year old game that looks 6 years old and plays like it's 10 years old.  Someone, somewhere can do better.

Edit 2: The market of MMO subscribers has grown every year.  No one [credible] is predicting that will end any time soon, it's just not 0-sum.  The more [quality] MMO's that get made the more room there is for them to operate in.

I agree with this thought. And EQ1 and 2 have coexisted peacefully, even to the point of cross-game chat and Station Pass users having accounts on both.

My main worry for an EQ3 would be the lack of Hartsman :)

There's two markets:

1) The market WoW has grown with its faster-dikuMUD model. It proved there are millions of people who wanted an EQ-like experience that weren't being serviced previously by the various Visions of SOE, Mythic, Cryptic, etc.
2) The new market of free/mtx/ad/light-sub browser and thin client games coming because Smartfox and Unity make banging out these things cheaper and therefore less risky for IP holders. This growth far outpaces #1.

#1 is what Soulflame is talking about. And I think he is right. You want to draw people away from WoW, you give them a game that is better  because it is different. Sci-fi diku wouldn't cut it because if anything, the market for sci-fi RPG-like games is smaller than the fantasy one. So you need an evolutionary gameplay that combines what people like of WoW with a theme that casts a wider net. And you need that because the investment spend is going to be even more, unless you can make a better game mechanic that a) isn't as expensive; and, b) doesn't require as much content.

#2 is already happening. It's a different market though. 10 years from now they won't be in WoW nor EQ1 nor UO. They'll be in something unrecognizable compared to today. And I don't mean might-as-well-be-DCUO FusionFall.

The market has grown for WoW. Not for MMOGs like EQ or WAR or LOTRO. The market for those types of MMOGs is around 500k-1m (plus or minus depending on if the game sucks or not) And I base those numbers on the sales and subscription numbers we know about.

Anyone who wants to make a MMOG that gets the subscriber numbers of WoW needs to come at it from another angle. Making a better WoW is futile if you don't understand what makes a game better than WoW.

Every product has a lifecycle, even WoW and it isn't really a requirement for something better to come along.  EQ was ready to give up the ghost at least a year before wow came out.  Players evolve faster than games do and the larger and more entrenched the wow world gets the harder it will be for them to keep up.  EQ went through this same cycle.

I've wondered about EQ1 actually. Did it die of its own accord or was it prematurely killed by SOE developing EQ2 and early beta reports emerging about WoW's uberness?

Because since then I've felt the only ways in which WoW "dies" is either:

• Blizzard kills it with WoW2 or the same game better but with a different theme. There isn't yet much a market for ex-WoW players. They leave WoW and instead go play COD5 or X360 or something. Meanwhile, you couldn't keep EQ1 players if you offered anything better.
  
• The publicly-held metric of success changes. I don't mean forum warriors, but the average developer pitching management/VC with a point of reference. Maybe down the road MTX/adsales end up producing more revenue in a game than WoW makes. Doubtful but at least plausible. But while the theory is being used to push companies with less appetite for WoW-level investments anyway, there's simply less money flowing around (lower fees, somewhere south of 10% of players seem to want to get invested at all, etc).

WoW will fade eventually. But unless #1 happens, or someone surprises us, so goes the whole AAA sub-based genre too and we contract back to what it was before the bubble came along.

Start counting operating MMO's and then tell me the market hasn't grown.  The realistic market for EACH game that's not WoW maybe around 500k + but there are a lot more them then there were 5 years ago.  We call that growth.

WoW maybe be special, but it just proves the point that if you build something good, people will find it and play it WITHOUT taking away from everyone else.

Most the people I knew including myself were just going through the motions with EQ for at least a year prior to EQ2 or WoW being released.  WoW comes out and it's all new and shiny and w/o the cockblock issues of EQ1.  Then once the griefing wounds healed over WoW evolved to include more pvp content.

I don't overly care for PvP and I was never a big fan of the majority of the gameplay being instanced and was always a big fan of fast respawns.  Also if you absolutely must instance the dungeon then at least take advantage of the opportunity to randomize it (like Diablo or EQ/LDoN).  Hopefully some day the mainstream will migrate back to non-instanced play.

Being a bit of a min/maxer another thing I have always hated in MMO's that I would have to think contributes to the subscription suicide rate is when they inevitably have to change the rules of the game.  From a ruleset standpoint I preferred the 1st year of wow and nearly every mechanic type of change they made to the game since pretty much just pissed me off.  Even TBC which I thought had some awesome content was pretty much ruined for me by the messed up warrior/tank mechanics.  This is what finally did me in I dropped shortly after hitting 70 (right about kara), I haven't/won't buy the latest expansion and there didn't need to be another mmo around to steal me away.

Planetside 2?




I know, never happen. *Sad panda*

Ok:

• GW- Incomparable. Lots of people, but there's no fee.
• VG- Bombed hard. Never was a serious "competitor" anyway.
• DDO-  :awesome_for_real:
• AoC- Started strong, tanking to probably EQ3 levels.
• WAR- Started ok, tanking to probably DAoC 2.0 levels.
• DnL- Closed.
• TR- Closed.
• LoTRO- The one they had to make up a stat for ("a million registered characters"). Plugging along nicely, but small.

And I would wager large that even AoC and WAR wouldn't start at 750k+ numbers if not for the market WoW both created and is. In a world where the king of kings was 550k, those would have started at maybe 400k at best and tapered down further, because even though they followed WoW by years, they still didn't solve any of the enduser problems WoW did.

That is not market growth. That is market dominance and other games unnaturally benefiting from it.

The only actual growth we've seen is in the web-based/IP/kid space. Which is why some people keep talking about it.

You forgot EVE, Lineage and the city of's off the top of my head.


I really don't expect anything to kill WoW. And honestly anyone making a MMO shouldn't try to aim remotely that high, as the recent flops this year have shown if your gonna come out of the gate and put WoW in your cross-hairs you have better be able to pack 4 years worth of polish into your launch or your going to be disappointed. aiming for 200k -300k subs and hoping for the best seems like a more reasonable goal. SoE seems to be in a good position to pull off something decent, they seem to have a lot of lesions learned in the past 4-5 years and won't have the whole company hinging on the release of something amazing (yet).

I figured he meant games that have launched since 2004, since we know the size of the genre and it's (shallow) growth rate from all the games that preceded EQ2, including those you mentioned plus about two dozen others.

No, they haven't shown this.  AoC and War were both unfinished games, they hadn't even gotten to the point where you could pass them off as unpolished.  In addition, it is pretty apparent to even a bystander that Warhammer is broken at the mechanics level as well.  We have proven that broken shit is unfun.

You keep trying to say that WoW is magic and shares no correlation with anyone else.  I don't believe in magic, people will play another game, as long as that game also, 'get's it right'.  It's asinine that people keep popping up in this thread with, "Don't bother to compete, you can't do it."   Yeah, if the world followed that advice, you would be right, it's self fulfilling.  But the fact is, WoW sucks to quite a few people and if someone does try and compete then someone will take the throne.

The population of people that play MMO's is in the teens and probably 20's of millions and it has just been continuously increasing ever since day 1.

You keep saying it has been increasing, but you're not backing it up by any insights. Do you not care that the majority of growth has come from non-WoW competitors? Do you not care that tweens and teenagers are playing very different games from the late-20/early-30-somethings? Do you think the growth of Gaia has any impact at all on EQ2 players, or WoW players looking for a viable alternative?

It's fine if you don't. But we can't have a discussion about where the genre is and is going without these kind of questions being asked.

The question isn't just growth. Because growth requires metrics, and not everyone's using the same one.

WoW is in its own bubble because people aren't leaving in droves to other games. And that is because of unique things about WoW that nobody else has tapped into to the same degree. We can sit back and talk about "welp, somebody will someday", but I find that about as enriching as "welp, someday someone will populate another planet".

I want to know how.

The think "magic" is a pretty apt term to apply to WoW's success. In a genre (at least in the west) where the pinnacle of success was 300-400k subscriptions WoW seems pretty mystical. It did not  steal a user base from a preexisting demographic. It CREATED the demographic. Everyone so far who has tried to compete with WoW directly has died or is in the process of dying.

For many WoW is the genre defining MMO. Most WoW players had no concept of what an MMO was previous to playing WoW. It is the alpha and omega of MMO's. WoW is also imo one of the most polished and refined MMO's to hit the market with a limitless fount of wealth to support and market it. Thus far any attempt to "compete" with WoW for its userbase has failed to various degrees of horror. Anyone who is looking to directly compete against WoW is doomed.

Create well developed niche titles of a different genre or you are going to be destroyed by a direct comparison to WoW.

When creating a burger joint the last thing on your mind should be "how do i compete against Mcdonalds". You cannot to try is stupid.

Everything SOE has done in the past couple of years has been RMT, micro transactions, mini-expansions, etc... They are trying to build a game as big as WOW in which people "Accidentally" send upwards of $60/month. What they (and everyone else who's tried this) keep failing to realize is, people see through the BS and don't like getting ripped off.

Whatever they're doing, they will probably produce more of this RMT garbage, and further relegate themselves to relics of the past that no-one cares about anymore. If they actually produce an EQ3 with none of the garbage micro transaction, nickle and diming in it, I think this would be their last chance to turn things around. They don't need to hit WOW numbers, they just need to make something that restores a little respect in the company.

Every other MMORPG is the GoBots to WoW's Transformers.  :grin:

I can't speak for SOE of course, but whether or not this was their goal, what they've actually been doing is building laterally. No single title from SOE is going to one-up WoW. But if they can get future titles like Free Realms and Agency done right, and incorporate other titles that wouldn't stand on their own (as they have with MxO, VG, PotBS, etc), then their business goals can continue to be met even if they don't use metrics forum warriors like us think are interesting :-)

They're sort of retroactively externalizing to smaller more motivated studios the whole "is it fun" portion. This gives them greater flexibility than the days when their entire divison lived or died by EQ1 alone. It's only good to have all your eggs in a single basket during the specific phase in which you are successful :wink:

Yea, but there comes a point in which the consumer pics up a title, says "ooo, neat, this looks cool! Oh... SOE? Damn." and puts it back down.

EA for example. They make a lot of games that when I see the title, I think "COOL!" then I see the EA sticker and I know if i buy it I'm just going to get ticked off as dudes that spent $99.99 on the preorder snipe me with the 'UBERLEET' sniper rifle I'll have to speand the next 3 months trying to unlock. No thanks, I just put the box back on the shelf.

Don't put out shit.  Seriously.  It's that easy.

WoW, Gaia, etc. they all contribute to the pool.  WAR and AoC launches show there's demand for a non-WoW game.  Games in other spaces will have people who leave to try something new.  They all grow the numbers interested in some kind of MMO, and the more kinds there are, the more players and play styles that can be supported.

To see continued growth we need three things:
1) Companies willing to try new things; or at least refine existing ones when the current alternatives have room for improvement
2) Fun
3) Not be utter shite

:oh_i_see:

I can see the gripe about unlocking a weapon, I think it sucks fps has gone in the mmo direction. But to bitch about the RMT part? Please provide specific examples of how RMT has affected the power differential on pvp servers of SOE games or gtfo. And really, even then you're talking a niche of a niche. And you shouldn't be playing on a pvp server of a pve game, SOE would be much better served closing those crapholes down and avoiding the balancing headaches.

On PvE, I couldn't give a shit if Johnny Uber spends money on some item. Doesn't affect my gameplay in the slightest.

I hear a whole lot of bitching about SOE's RMT, but I'm not seeing much in the way of tangible effects. Ooo, an xp potion. Big fuckin' whup.

I don't think it's worth doing an EQ3. SoE will never have a major hit game again until they are able to overcome their reputation and they are still busy digging the hole. It just doesn't make sense to try to develop a AAA title.

From old grudges over EQ1 nerfs and slights to the SWG:TNG thing, they just keep creating new customers who do not want to do business with them. I still hear people who are unwilling to try EQ2 because their class got nerfed or they hated the play nice policy in EQ1 or because they played SWG and will never forgive them.

That's not enough people to make or break a game in sheer numbers, but it's enough to make or break momentum, particularly when you're competing against WoW.

EQ2 is a fantastic game and they could have and should have used the last few years as a way to dig themselves out of that public relations hole. But while development on the game has been great, management of the financials of it haven't been. They continue to try to chisel an extra couple of bucks out of subscribers for website services that other games give away for free. They had the SOEbay servers followed by the intrusive card game followed by the RMT stuff.

Most awesome typo today.  :why_so_serious:

Prob Vangurd II  :pedobear:

By the way people talk about SWG: NGE, lesion sounds like it fits...  :grin:

If it was that easy, we wouldn't keep seeing it happen  :grin:

"How" to me is:

• Understanding the size of the pot. How many people care about your game?
• How many people are willing to pay anything for it?
• How many people are willing to keep paying for it?
  
• How are they willing to invest in the game?
• For how long?

Once you know your demographic then you start designing a game for them. Because then you can approximate how big your budget should be. "Fun" is not tied to a price point nor a development budget. Both of those equate more to quality. Money does not magically make a game more fun any more than it magically unlocks whatever thereto undiscovered talent you might (or not) have on your staff to deliver.

Instead, what we keep seeing is a bunch of people who grew up playing these games trying to retroactively design something they think they would have enjoyed 15-20 years ago, and that being a rose-colored memory itself.

All of your "hows" are important, but as we have seen with recent history, there is a severe lack of knowledge when it comes to psychology, sociology, business, and perhaps even programming.  If the people calling the shots are incapable of answering your "hows" within a 100% margin of error, how do you expect them to put out even a semi-decent game?

When they're setting WoW as their target, I can already tell you they can't.  Because they don't have realistic expectations about their project.  That means they won't see the flaws with it, so they cannot mitigate those flaws, and their product will perform accordingly.

Picking a demographic out in any kind of detail and then setting out to build a game for them doesn't sound like the recipe for how to end up with a good game, to me. It sounds more like the Hollywood movie process of "OK, now let's change this character to a woman/add a romance/whatever else it takes to hit the demographics the studio is targeting" that so often ends up with diluted crap.

Great games start with a great concept and then they find a niche based on that strength, it seems to me.

I'm guessing Darniaq is talking about the business side of things once the concept is fleshed out.  If you make a Hardcore PvP game you know your pool is small so you don't budget for half a million players when you know your demographic might be in the tens of thousands.  Is this going to attract the MMO crowd (older) or kids and what is their income level going to be?

Hopefully asked as a followup to "Our really cool idea is BLAH.  Who is going to play?"  If they're starting with those questions and building the concept from there, then see my recent posts for thoughts on where that will lead them.  Maybe they have been, and that is part of the problem.

Yes. That. And you're correct Lant: this has been the problem. Because the genre has been driven by people who are designing games for themselves against a budget they largely guessed at while concurrently hoping a lot of other people wanted to come along too (and could get past the messy parts along with them). This includes Blizzard, except they had a lot more money and entered the actual development process way south of the "hey, wouldn't it be cool if we could get this working someday..." hope and more in the land of "here's what works, here's what needs to work better, here's what we know how to build".

Because:

That's exactly what it is. This is why big companies rely on indies to do all that crazy invention stuff. Indies and indy personalities can survive the ups and downs of trial and error. Big companies have hundreds or thousands of people, including stockholders/VC, to placate along every step of the path.

It's the price of success. Your definition of "concept" goes from the neato "let's invent something no one's ever seen before" to "let's innovate against something that's been proven to work because we know more people will buy it". Just like movies. Because Slumdog Millionaire draws attention to the creative side while it's the system that spits out Titanics and Legally Blondes that keep way many more people employed.

And no, I don't think creativity should suffer. I'm just offering up why I think it does.

That's what you're going with for a first post? Learn what that icon means, newb.

I am pretty sure the process Darniaq described is exactly how Stardock designs its games.  From their dev blogs and such over the years they basically said that they did research on who played their games and what those people like.  Then they spend their time/money building those features.  They know thier Niche before they develop, not after.  And, their success is evident.  It is not Blizzard success, but it more than pays the bills.

With the changes currently in testing for EQ2, I have a hard time seeing SoE roll out an EQ3. They are making EQ2 less fun by making all 6 tank classes ultra boring.  Still, this new game is 3 years+ away, probably, so it is hard to say that anything being done today has a new game in mind.

I do agree with some previous posts that RMT will be large in the new game.

Dude, you made an "I quit" post after the last expansion because you felt you got screwed as a tank class, then after a month you posted it was the best expansion ever except for drops. Give it time, let them tweak it, and adjust playstyle.

I don't deny that at all but it just shows how much they are adjusting classes after 4 goddamn years. The last time they nerfed dps which is how tanks generated aggro. Now they are are nerfing it again but buffing taunts a lot. I very well might quit again for a month or two if these changes ever go live.

Well, its actually rather simple. There are 2 types of MMO players... 1 kind (me) plays to compete with others on the server. I want to finish Quest x before you do, or get the cool guild house... whatever. To players like me, buying items with RMT is quite literally cheating. I'm not going to play a game where its allowed. Then there are players like you that don't think of it as a competition, you probably don't mind instancing either because you just don't really care what anyone else around you is doing. To you it's no big deal. That's fine, but SOE lost my sub the day they announced the exchange server.

SOE probably made a profit despite the subs they lost due to RMT. But I think squeezing more and more money out of an every dwindling consumer base will inevitably lead to failure. SOE probably is more profitable now than they were 5 years ago, but they aren't growing subs.

While direct competition is not the sole motivation for playing MMO's i view the purchasing of any advantage to be cheating as well. Even in a game like EVE where the system is governed with strict guidelines i still feel its fucked up. EVE is the only game i can tolerate it in and only then because i don't play it all that often or get to heavily involved.

RMT feels like it's outside the "magic circle" to me. I may be able to win a game of monopoly by bribing my opponents with beer, but then I couldn't say that I played a really good game of monopoly.

Real money for cosmetic bullshit is fine...retarted but fine, but you always have to wonder if the bean counters are sizing up the street value of a level 80 character with uber gear.

Hold on. You quit because of RMT on another server??? One that has no crossover whatsoever with normal servers? I'd at least grant you a bit of ire if you're on a pvp server, even though the items are trivial and mostly fluff. But an entirely unconnected server?

 :uhrr:
How about multi-boxers? I feel that the numbnuts spending the money to run a healbot account (let alone the six boxers I see in EQ2) are part of the problem solo players have. Why balance for solo play when people will willingly buy a second sub? It was eye opening for me to get close to some popular content in EQ2, because the /majority/ of "solo" players are running at least a dual-box. Three-box is not uncommon and I did see multiple 5-6 boxers.

That almost bothered me, until I remembered it's a game, and went and did something else and when I came back later, the 6-boxer that was dominating the solo spawns to grind faction was gone and I could continue on my quest.

And for RMT for uber gear....I'd think guilds would be happy that characters could show up raid-equipped and not have to waste time gearing them up. But then, I acknowledge I know little about the raid game, because it seems so silly.

The point of raiding is to gear up though, so it would eliminate the raid game.

And I hate multiboxers. I always have.

Yes I did. Again, you don't understand because you're a different type of player than I am. A LOT of people quit because of the exchange servers.


Multiboxing is entirely different. It's a difficult thing to do. It's not a case of: I give SOE $50 and get the BoneBladed claymore you spent a week questing for. I've tried multiboxing, and it's by no means as simple as buying some equipment. I even know a lot of scripting... and it still was extreamly difficult to do anything more complex than farm a single mob over and over.

I don't understand because it doesn't make sense. You will never, ever, ever see those people. Ever. They can't transfer to other servers. I dislike pvp but I don't quit because they have pvp servers....and those servers /do/ affect me because of some dumb rules they need because it'll fuck pvp balance or whatever.

And you don't give SOE $50 for a BBC. Some other player quests for it and sells it to you for $50. It just legitimizes what was going on through 3rd party sites. I feel it's better to keep it our of the back alleys if possible, and hey, if they make a few bucks, good on them.

Sturm und drang, but where is the substance?

PVP isn't cheating.
RMT is (imo)
I don't want anything to do with it, and I wont support a company with my money that allows it.
Simple as that.

This is a 5 year old argument and I'm done with it. You stayed, I didn't, enjoy your nearly vacant servers.

When you support a certain despicable business practice it tends to validate said practice as being acceptable. You justify its douchiness by participating even if you are only participating in a passive way.

I wish to god everyone would stop supporting Micro-transactions across the board so companies would stop trying to apply them to western users. But my fundamental problem is that games are based on rules. You should not be able to circumvent game mechanics based on how much cash you are willing to invest.

It's not circumventing the game mechanics if the game mechanics allow it.  :why_so_serious:

I think I'd rather the devs put more effort into, y'know, making the game fun to play.

The evils of RMT and multi-boxers!....

 :dead_horse:  :dead_horse:  :dead_horse:

edit add:
You know, back in hoary days of EQ1's GoD (the worst ever expansion for ANY GAME!); I always thought to myself, " if only there was a game that took all the suck out of this game and did it all better - it would make millions." I was wrong, WoW made billions...  :grin:

I'm thinking something along the same line these days. Someone needs to make a game that is unashamedly RMT, do it right and make a fortune. It can be done, it can be done RIGHT, and it can be fun - it won't appeal to everyone but thats alright.  The time is ripe for this sub-genre of MMOGs in the Western markets.

People are already making fortunes in RMT.

4 steps to make money in the new mmo market.

1. Make grindy piece of shit
2. Create cash shop; IE pay to escape the grind
3. ??
4. Profit

Has been working for 5+ years.

Disclaimer works best if your a F2P game with low graphic requirements/client download.

You could have just stated "Make an AMMO (Asian MMO)"

Works in the states too. I saw maple story gift cards in rite aid... people have no problem playing asian games they just don't like paying a monthly sub for one.

The Maple story time card and Tabula Rasa CE gift bundle!

Maple Story isn't getting closed.

:oh_i_see:

I never said pvp is cheating. I said it directly affects me via the game's rulesets, some patches address balance issues that have nothing to do with the vast majority of players and the game would be better served by not trying to tack on a shitty pvp ruleset. RMT doesn't affect me in the slightest, but I don't have an epeen.
Hm. Really? Despicable? I don't see it that way. Exchange is player to player, and easily avoided by not making a character on that server. The Station Cash or whatever they call it is for cheesy shit like xp potions, and I play xp-capped, mostly. I really don't give a shit. Even if they offered tangible stuff, it wouldn't mean shit to me, because I don't give a fuck what other players have for gear.

I find the despicable practice to be the raid content and endgame drama, but as there's really no way to avoid that and still be playing an mmo, I just avoid it as best I can ingame.

You know, maybe I even derive a bit of glee that RMT causes so much panty-bunching in folks who have epeens. A journey of self-discovery, this is!

I dont think the concept of being able to buy your way out of playing a game is really a threat to my epeen. More so it is an affront to any concept of fair play and entices even more invasive nickle and diming schemes.

Either you understand what fair play is or you do not. Developing a game with reference to how tedious you can make some aspect of it to generate additional revenue to avoid it does not seem to have an upside to anyone but those with epeen envy.

You don't seem to understand that the "buying your way out of playing a game" type of RMT (read: not station cash, not LoN) is limited to servers that have a no-transfer policy to regular non-RMT servers. Also, it's facilitating player to player transactions, you're not buying a sword from SOE, you're buying it from another player. Same way I was selling fishbone earrings back in 1999 in EQ. Why shouldn't SOE get a cut of what's going on anyway, and even better to segment players inclined to that ruleset on their own servers, which means LESS RMT on normal servers. I'd think you'd like that.

The game is already developed to be tedious, it's an mmo. Is it fair that some people can play for 8 hours a day, but I can only fit in 2? Isn't that an 'affront to fair play'?

I think it is. I think time sinks should not have the same kinds of rewards as other types of play. Like WoW rewards PvP with PvP rewards, and PvE with PvE rewards (although there is some crossover, natch) timesink rewards should be like... cosmetics or titles. People who have extra time should be able to benefit from that, but not in core gameplay ways... does that make sense?
We still have to come up with a baseline for what kind of time spent is "fair" though.  :uhrr: :oh_i_see:

Players hate grind, but if you take it away people would go ape shit considering that grinding is the only way they think will keep them or anyone else for that matter playing. RMT simple allows developers to cater toward the catch 22, providing the grind that all mmo gamers figure is necessary for an mmo while at the same time providing a easy out. Because while mmo-gamers will fight you over whether grinding isn't necessary they will happily pay to remove it. To be honest there is nothing really unfair about it.

I dont think tediousness is a desired goal... As opposed to calculating the RMT profitability while developing a game.

But yes the time one has to invest is completely irrelevant to "fair play" in the context of the game. Allowing ones real world wealth to gain advantage or benefit not available to others of lesser means is not.

I completely understand why SOE would want to cash in on RMT. But as a player RMT will only have negative repercussions. Since barring very few examples RMT is not going to effect me at all in regards to player interaction. But i still consider it cheating and will only have negative long term results if RMT is adopted as the industry wide standard.

@DLRiley

Yes it also provides incentive for developers to create content for the sole purpose of making RMT attractive. How buying virtual progress can be considered "fair" in a game is beyond. And beyond the ability of those with epeen envy to satisfy themselves it can have nothing but a negative impact for the rest of us.

Hey before I say anything you just have to know that these following smileys held my facial expression  :awesome_for_real:   :oh_i_see:    :roll: . I mean I couldn't stop laughing, you honestly think that developers of monthly sub mmo's don't intentionally make their games tedious? Good lord, i haven't seen someone that naive since WAR was in beta. Damn I can barely type any anything further, I'm laughing way too hard. Developers of mmo's will love for you to play 8 hours a day because other wise you might question whether their game is worth $15 a month. It's really that simple, in order for a developer to not design their game that way is to assume that their game is worth $15 a month on the merit that its fun. But wait even the mmo-gamers will say that requiring 8 hours a day to accomplish anything is the only way to keep players playing which in turn is the only way to justify paying $15 a month. Hell devs would love for mmo gamers to play even 12 hours a day but that seems to the magic tipping point for north american/euro gamers. Attempting to argue that RMT is somehow more damaging to players than the current status qoue is....damn I don't have word for how dumb that is. Especially since time = money for all intent and purposes. 

If you really believe that developers sit down and design a game based around creating tedium you are a fucking idiot. more so you seem to think the words tedious is a synonym for repetitiveness which it is not.

You don't understand the distinction between something being tedious accidentally and designing tedium so can sell a way around it? Its not that hard of a distinction to grasp. Tedium does not promote continued play nor renewal of subscriptions. But it sure as shit promotes RMTing your ass around it.

Repetitive task aren't tedious because?

Is this a trick question?  :awesome_for_real:

When will you be banned?  No, it's not a trick question.  I genuinely want to know because every time I have read one of your posts I feel like I've lost something.

Sniffle

Might as well be.  :oh_i_see:

You are a terrible person.

Repetitive actions that are fun or otherwise entertaining tend to not be tedious. I expected such a stupid question to be a riddle or some form of trickery.

99% of every game i have ever played is based on a series of repetitive actions.

Didn't Kaplan state that a something is a grind only when you aren't enjoying it?

100% of mmo's I ever played were based off a series of mind numbing repetitive actions that stopped being fun the first dozen times I performed them.

Neato

Why are you two even posting anymore?

Anybody hear about that New Game Experience? Is SWG any good now?

This debate is so quaint. It's 2001 again. Man, I've been saying that about as much as schild's "broad tastes" of late  :oh_i_see:

These games have always been grinding. They've always had trade. And they've always had people who can achieve better/faster/more-efficient than others. Ever since the days when "graphics" were restricted to the map you sketched while exploring a MUD dungeon.

Nobody is to be blamed here. Developers grew up playing games they started careers around to make better. The players who stick to these games index high for packratting and the constant need for improvement. And many of them eventually reach the wall they know they can't climb without either a serious lifestyle change, or at least a personality one.

Do you blame the players for wanting to constantly self improve?
Do you blame the developers for wanting to fill the market with games players want?
Do you blame the bookies who connect suppliers with consumers?

No. Because you only need to look anywhere else in entertainment to see that even normal consumers don't mind this model. They'll pay their monthly fees for phones and buy new ringtones, music, movies and apps. They'll pay their monthly cable bill and still do OnDemand (or pay someone separate for NetFlix). They'll buy the same movie on DVD, then the Blu-ray, then the iTunes M4V, then pay to stream it on their Xbox because they forgot to bring the other ones. They'll buy comic books monthly and then the graphic novel anyway.

This is not restricted to one genre of one type of gamer behavior. This is general consumer behavior that has been proven to work time and again. An MMO geek is still a general consumer.

So it would actually be irresponsible for companies to not try it  :grin:

I don't understand what you mean.

Damn you could have just said consumers are idiots Darniaq.

Comparing RMT in a game that involves player interaction and competition to ring tones doesn't seem a bit fucking stupid?

You're looking at it wrong.

It's a value added service - both ringtones and XP potions.  We're conditioned to pay more for extra little frills, and big time stuff that goes beyond frill.  The fact that it hasn't been implemented yet in MMGs (and gaming in general) more than it already is is astounding.  The next generation of gamers (and in particular, MMGers) are being brought up on RMT stuff.  They don't know games without them.  Games aren't being made for old timers anymore.  We're dinosaurs.  And I'm pretty sure <whatever> gaming studio isn't worried about losing your business because you hate RMT.  They've got 1000's...millions...of young gamers coming up that don't know gaming without it to take your place.

Besides, ringtones, in and of themselves, can be viewed as competitive products between friends.  As in 'who can get the coolest one?'.

You're going to see more and more RMT as time goes on.  It will be something like "Here's the base game.  It's a good game, with lots of hours of enjoyment.  But lets say after a while you want to do/be/have X.  Well, for the low low price of 4.99, you can download Y to allow you to do X.  But you don't have to have it, as the base game is more than enough.  But just in case, you have that option." 

The point is, damn near EVERYONE is connected to the web somehow.  Whether its their phones, their xBox, their PS3, or whatever.  Broadband is probably the biggest push behind RMT. 

Buy now, get now (or 30 seconds later) without ever getting out of your recliner.

As a follow-on to SnakeCharmer's value-add point: I play CoH/V and have bought every booster pack launched so far. I get a few more costume items and maybe a few cool emotes or powers for $10. Firstly, I think it is worth it and secondly me (and a lot of other people) paying $10 means that CoH/V can develop with those extra funds independent of its slowly shrinking player base. For CoH/V it's a value add to those players who want what the booster packs have, for the devs it's being able to get more money from the playerbase of an almost 5 year old title.

And you can't really blame a company for using alternative revenue streams other then the traditional monthly subscription fees.  Plus having a set up like the station marketplace lets them to things like :

http://www.gamasutra.com/php-bin/news_index.php?story=22479

No. Not when you understand that an "MMO player" and "consumer" are the same thing.

But SnakeCharmer and UnSub covered that already.

While i do agree RMT and micro-transactions are going to become more and more common. I also think that is going to assure a large portion of gamers wont even try the game. I guess until blizzard adopts micro-transactions and makes it a standard.

MMOers are consumers but the distinction is MMOers are playing a game. And a great many people will not play a game in which they perceive they are at a disadvantage due to cheating. If blizzard started Micro-transactions for XP potions and gear there would be a shit storm of monumental proportions. I cant be the only one who finds Micro-transactions to be a black flag to even trying a game. Do asian MMO's who use item malls and the like generate more revenue per "player" than western monthly subscription systems?

A large portion of older gamers may not try the game.  But that's merely speculation and nothing more.  Going by the gnashing of teeth of old fogies that still say "we had to EARN it when we were gamers!" doesn't count.  Vocal minority and all that.

And those older gamers?  We've already got one foot out the door.  The other foot is just waiting on something to push it out - just getting older, having another kid, losing interest.  Any number of reasons.  They aren't counting on us for revenue streams - unless you count our credit cards being used for our kids enjoyment - which is who this is being targetted at.  Like it's been said, there's an entire generation of gamers being brought up that RMT is normal, and no big deal.  They are the "next big thing".  Not us.  They've already got years and years of our money.

The way it has always been done is not the way it shall always be done.  It's archaic, backwards thinking.  Things evolve.

Either evolve with it, or get left behind.

You can sit there and say "I've never bought gold, and none of my serious gamer friends have either" and feign thumbing your nose in the air.  To that, I'm going to say "bullshit".  You probably know more that have bought gold or whatever than you care to admit - or your friends just won't tell you.  It's like the dirty little secret no one wants to admit to.  Hell, I've bought gold/credits/whatever.  Quite a large percentage of some gamer friends have as well.  The huge number of vendors selling gold wouldnt be what it is without the demand for it. 

Like it or not, the RMT seal has been broken.

From what I've found, it's something like this:

10% of all players you attract will invest something into the game.
5% of all players will invest deeply in the game.

So companies scale development to recoup in that range. There's apparently some other advantages as well, particularly in Korea, where the mobile and banking industries are more integrated to support these type of rapid-succession impulse-buy high quantity levels of small transactions. But then, the market's been like this for many years over there. Whereas on this side, our MMOs subscription models seemed to start by cribbing the AOL flat-fee idea, which itself did so because of years of experimental pay-by-use/pay-by-hour models that preceded it.

That is the cultural precedent that goes right to your point, why most veteran MMO developers know not to bother with MTX models for veteran-targeted MMO. So instead companies focus on new markets, ones with fewer predilections and therefore a lot less prone to groupthink on what's right or wrong.

There is no single "MMO market".

Untill blizzard adopts it i can safely say "bullshit". There is also a vast chasm between people "illegally purchasing gold" and having a developer design around the assumption of selling the ability to circumvent the very game they are developing. Once you "break the seal" and start developing with the intention of RMT and micro-transactions a whole lot of suck is going to flood in. Korean MMO's dont tend to get much praise by us westerners. Anyone who is desperate enough for epeen to cheat is a pretty sad creature regardless of justification. SoE is a non factor in the genre currently i find it highly unlikely that is going to change. Lets rank current MMO's played by westerners. How many of those allow RMT. Why aren't the rest of them doing it if there are no negative consequences?

But more than the "you are a fucking cheater" disdain i have for RMT,MT. Its that if it becomes profitable and viable developers are going to start to develop tedium intentionally to push me towards buying out of it. And i dont see games developed in that manner being able to compete with those that don't. So until Blizzard starts doing it i think any title that does it is assured to be minor.

Im sure that MMO developers do studies in demographics to see if the idea would work for western markets. I could tolerate EVE levels of  RMT. But the ability to buy exp,items etc is a game breaker for many.

http://us.blizzard.com/support/article.xml?tag=CRCFAQ

Tip of the iceberg.

Also :

(http://www.penny-arcade.com/images/2005/20050826h.jpg)

That sucks...

And thinking back blizzard already KINDA allows RMT. With their card packs that have game codes in them. I sold a turtle mount for 200$.

There's two types of RMT.

There's "I can buy my way to awesome" RMT. And there's "Costume Shit" RMT.

People will accept the later -- although if you offer a way to grind for it in game, they'll be even happier. They'll fork out for mounts that are, at best, no better than easily-accesible ones in the game. Or costume pieces that offer no bonuses but looks. Or nifty auras or effects, so long as varients of those effects are in the game.

In short, players will accept RMT of things that don't really matter to gameplay. "Looks cool" RMT.

They get pissy, and leave, when you're given the ability to buy stuff that DOES affect gameplay, and is manifestly superior to what's in the game -- or is inferior only to high-end cockblock shit that 99% of gamers will never see.

CoH can offer auras and costume pieces because, well, they don't change a damn thing and people already have a zillion choices there. Blizzard can offer slow-ass turtle mounts, or pointless pets, because you can already have a pet or mount.

Not all RMT is the same. Some players will accept, some they won't. At least in the US. Fuck if I understand the Korean gaming culture.

Ya we are talking about the game effecting RMT i believe. Or at least i am.

Indeed. Basing a decision to pursue RMT in a western game because the idea's sucessful in Korea seems kind of disconnected. We'll never know for sure until some game comes along and goes hog-wild instead of this trepeditious dipping-of-toes-into-the-water shit.

Call me when that game comes out and we can properly gauge it's sucess. Until then, I'll fear change, dammit!  :oh_i_see:

Aeria Games (http://www.aeriagames.com/)

OG Planet (http://www.ogplanet.com/main.og)

Nexion (http://www.nexon.net/NX.aspx?PART=/Main)

<insert several other gaming portals>

<insert major MMO makers which are slowly changing to this model>

Individually, each game offered by these companies is a tiny portion of the market.  Each portal offers between four and a dozen RMT games though.  Their total subscriber base is large, they're fine with RMT, and these kids are going to be the market in five to ten years.

Anyone who says it's not a real market until Blizzard does it?  For one, I would debate that as long as enough companies manage to thrive off the markets.  Also, remember what Blizzard does best -- take a concept and refine it into an art form.  Just because they aren't using it to any serious degree yet doesn't mean they're not going to show everyone just how successful it can be a few years from now.

Those Rang Rang gaming portals sure are a good example.  :awesome_for_real:

Actually they are.  You can bet your ass western developers are watching it.  And they are dipping their toes in the waters intentionally.  It's not something that you would cannonball into.  Gamer perception hasn't shifted far enough yet.  But it slowly is.

Look, SOE or whomever (or even Blizzard) isn't thinking about/doing RMT because they want to offer their players an even gaming experience against those evil Chinese gold farmers.  They're doing it because they have their own research as to how much money those credit farmers are making.  They want their piece of that pie.

Can't say I blame them either.

Depending on how big of a conspiracy nut one is, it's not out of the realm of possibility that any one of these gold selling companies aren't indirectly owned by SOE or Blizzard as a means of revenue as well as keeping prices at an even keel for their own games.  All they'd have to do is have a GM level account to dispense gold/plat/whatever.  No farmers needed.

Fuck, by the time it becomes a "probrem", I'll be too old and decrepit to play video games anyway. A few weeaboo games that let you buy bunny ears for your avatar don't bug me.

I always wondered why they would be allowed to exist once MMO's got to be such a huge cash cow.

And while im certain Blizzard has all sorts of information for the profit generated by gold sellers. I am also sure they have information on how much of their player base finds the concept detestable. Ill be pretty shocked if a western MMO in the next decade uses RMT as major component in its billing scheme. RMT is not some new market or concept it has existed for over a decade (that i am aware of). Yet remains strangely missing from every major western MMO.

There is a reason Korean and Chinese MMO's are rejected wholesale by western audiences. You notice Blizzard bans thousands of accounts for RMT and related activities. Why would they do that if they had a stake in the RMT market. Why would they do that if they didn't view it as harmful to the game. I can see them cashing in on aesthetics but XP potions and gear? Not if they want a successful game. Its barely tolerable in EVE.

gPotato (http://www.gpotato.com/)

Ncsoft (http://www.exteel.com/us/) 2 (http://www.dungeonrunners.com/)

Habbo Hotell (http://www.habbo.com/)

club penguin (http://www.clubpenguin.com/)

Pocketvile (http://megtoys.com/)


Its only harmfull to games that are not designed for it. You seem to keep forgetting that RMT, and a games design, matter. Its not Black and white.

SOE will keep trying RMT in various forms until Smedley quits or gets canned.  The problem they have is they need cash and end up getting greedy and pissing off players.  Look at their whipping boy SWG, they introduce a CCG that they say is completely separate from the MMO, the tell their players that ideas generated in a "what would you like to see implemented" thread can't be done due to various reasons/lack of devs etc., then introduce those ideas into the card game a few months later which just happen to be able to be used in the game.

So development of new stuff is withheld so you can buy it in card packs later, all while still paying your $15 bucks a month.  Now thats how SOE does business.

Both Ace of Aces (WWI dogfighting game)  and Lore (mech simulator game) have pretty much proven to us at least that their are ways to do incremental transactions that affect game play without completely destroying your player base--and our first attempts at the concept (Galcon and Rokkitball "3 plays per day trial") proved that there are many ways to screw it up, too.

In Both Lore and AoA, you can play the full game with a limited subset of planes/mechs for free, and if you choose purchase additional planes (AoA), or use of the Mav Lab to totally customize your Mav. There was a tiny bit of complaint in the forums initially, but we've not heard a single complaint in months, and people are buying up the planes/Mav Lab like hotcakes.

Its not a Black and white issue to be sure. But i must say games "designed around" RMT suck huge amounts of ass. EVE is a good example for how RMT can be implemented in a game i suppose.


Have not heard of either game. And cant seem to find them. Have a link?

I knew the future was doomed.

Ace of Aces was a two player picture book game made around 1980.  Wiki link here. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ace_of_Aces)  Pictures here. (http://www.boardgamegeek.com/image/157321)

God I played the hell out of that game. 

For some reason i don't think he means that game.

Wonder how much per page they charge.

He means the 1999 remake.  I just like to point out the classics when I get the chance. 

MMO players are not virtuous.

The reason is grind and bad game play.

I disagree, im playing a few that if they were subscription based, i would not be. I enjoy the ability to use Ala cart game content. I currently play Wizard 101, and only ever give them money when i run out of content in the zones i have unlocked.

Same thing with Exteel, however Exteel is designed such that "The best" items are from in game credits only, and the Micro transaction ones are slightly bellow.

Runes of magic is another good one, i have yet to give them ANYTHING and have been enjoying the time i play, and have not once thought "I have to have this to play". I MAY however buy a permanent horse, but fuck, horses are a loot drop, and you can rent them for in game currency, AND they have added a 3ed type of coin that is used to buy cash shop items, but are ONLY gained in game. Quite the poster child for "Whats my time worth?". Grind out 20 quests, or pay 2$.

This, also has not one single impact on anyone else, and if you think it does, you have a severe case of "Keeping up with the Joneses", only, this is a fake world where it doesn't fucking matter, your only competing with yourself.

Design and implementation matter, so its hard to use blanket statements, because you would be wrong.

Ya, sorry every game you mentioned i have tried other than Wizard 101 (strangely saw a commercial for it today) and are below my standards for time investment. I am not a very picky gamer trying to say those games are in any fashion "good" or "well designed" is kinda silly.


Disdain of cheating is widespread. Western expect fairness and equality in all matters. Especially in regards to competition.

.

Ya strangely that grinding seems to be linked to trying to milk people to avoid it.

People hate cheaters... but will cheat if given the chance.   When caught, we cry for exploits to be fixed.. and grumble that it's 'not as easy' later.

We only hate cheaters because they got caught, and made cheating harder.  :awesome_for_real:

 :roll:

Multibillion dollar RMT business. In the West. Disdain of cheating is spoken more than it is practiced. And that is the point.

Also, someone mentioned there's two types of RMT. There's actually RMT and then there's MTX.

RMT is generally buying something after-market (as in, no money back to the developer) that does make you better. This is not technically cheating because someone did play the game to get that thing. But as we've seen in the last few years, smart developers design around that by locking good-item trades behind BOP.

MTX is about enhancements that do NOT convey advantage over other players in the game directly, are managed by the publisher or direct partner, and is the only type of real world purchase that developers have been willing to try.

There's a bunch of other ways players cheat too. But that has more to bad code/support and/or emergent behavior.

Not every player reads and posts on the forums.  Millions of them just happily log into their game and do their thing without ever having even signed UP on the forums.  They don't care.  Hell, many probably don't even know they exist - though that number is probably dropping.

Besides, if Joe Bob ever received a little pop up that said 'Get 5 percent more damage / 10 percent more xp for 1 hr! / whatever for 99 cents', you could bet your ass he'd happily buy it.  Because think about it, what's 99 cents?  It's nothing.  And they would never be the wiser that a whopping ~10 percent of the ~20 percent of the total population of the game (that actually logs into the forums and makes a post) says "itz cheatin damnit i quit ballzard you suck!".

Forums are not indicative of the actual paying playerbase.  Most of the players bitching about the game/whatever play the forums more than they play the game.  They latch on to whatever is popular at the moment and run it into the ground.  I personally subscribe to the mantra that its best to worry less about what other players do/have and just play your own game.  I've got no need to play Keeping Up With The Jones for virtual items.  If its cool, I'll play it.  If it makes my game more fun, I'll buy it.  To hell what anyone else thinks.

Seriously though.  This whole thing is absurd.  What's next?  Bitching about how some players can afford better rigs / internet connection therefore they have an edge and zomg it's not fair?  

My only answer is: Cry More Newb.

While I did play that game, I actually mean two of the games on instantaction.com. They are both in Open Beta/Live Development right now.

Just so you know, on a pure RMT game, that part of the playerbase doesn't matter a lick unless you've got a full development team.

If a dev team focused around selling new areas and such, you can bet your sweet ass that they'd try to cater to as many as possible.

If a dev team purely localized a game and their only source of income is selling weapons and such since they can't create new assets, than the part of the playerbase that finds it detestable is nothing but a bandwidth leech and costs them money in the long run.

It all depends on what the dev team can do, rather than what the player wants. I'm very sorry if X game isn't for Y player, but that's just how things go. If I had the opportunity to put together a game that could be RMT rather than subs, I'd go with RMT. If I could hybridize it some how, I would. E.G. $5 for each content pack or $12 for 3 months worth of whatever new content was put out.

You know, i have tried to explain that distinction in other places, most can't (Won't) wrap their head around it, they just default to "Its all RMT".  :oh_i_see:

When im talking about RMT im not including bundles of content for a set price such as new zones or class availability. Im talking about micro-transactions for currency or pieces of gear. Micro-transactions in the terms of content packs is something completely different and none of the criticisms i have apply to it. And its not that RMT offends X type of customers. I just believe it would alienate a large portion of the western userbase. Especially when WoW the industry standard does not use it.


Please my opinion is not from forum opinion on the subject. Ive played games for many years and most assuredly do many people buy gold or other things. And i cant really say what in their deepest hearts what their opinion is. In my opinion there is heavy resistance to that sort of billing model. And honestly RMT/MTX in the context of this argument are equatable. Someone illegally purchasing gear is still cheating. And i am not exactly sure what kind of enhancement has no direct effect on others. Do you mean like XP increases or other PVE advantages?

Am i projecting my personal beliefs onto the subject? Of course i am to some degree. So even if most gamers are not morally against RMT i still believe there would be a huge swathe of MMO users that wont accept it. Especially with competition that has a flat subscription rate.

I guess when a game based on micro-transactions becomes a hit in the West you will have some basis to claim this. But until that happens how the fuck do you know? Its accepted on a very small fringe scale currently.

It occurs to me that you don't have any clue what is and isn't successful in the online world.

Lurk more. Research more. Talk less.

Since you got a new and different plane in Ace of Aces by buying a new book, I think that actually matches cash shop gaming.

But in a game like Eve where there is a player created economy, what other players do is important to how you play the game.

Too far in that direction, and you're bascially playing a single player game online. Which isn't bad... but isn't relevant to MMOGs anymore.


It's a problem that devs do consider. That's why most MMOGs are designed to deal with latency and performance. Planetside's cone of fire... WoW's empire is built partly on their low system specs... etc.

Your mixing the categories again. Which is fine, because so many people do too. But let's be clear:

• MTX: Legimitate, about selling clothes and buffs. No abilities nor advantages over other players are conveyed. Publisher collects the fees direct or taxes the transactions between players.
• RMT: Illegitimate, about farming the game concept so a third party can sell items that nominally do convey substantive improvement and advantage over other players.
  
  

MTX is the business model many western publishers are looking at, because it has been so successful in the Eastern markets. This is what I talked about earlier when I said 10% (number of registrants who may pay something) and 5% (number of registrants you can hope pay deeply). You'll find most Western attempts at this to be in the tween-target games, virtual worlds, and whatever Akklaim is importing this quarter. These are also categorized as "Free to Play" (F2P), but there's some trying to change this label. Veteran gamers seem somewhat ambivalent of this, because normally this practice is tied to games we wouldn't really play anyway (ie, I don't care how big Maplestory is... I just don't enjoy the game).

RMT is the model the traditional genre has been against. WoW is no different. Their scale is merely different.  This industry is older than UO. It is many billions of dollars. The entire concept of "gold farmers" comes from this industry. If you're not familiar with this term, nor have heard of, say, Yantis nor IGE, then you need to do some research about the genre before 2004. Protip: Google "RMT business". This is the model you don't like, and many veterans don't. Except this wouldn't be such a big business if there wasn't a market for it.

I have to research more to have a conversation on the topic? Im not claiming ultimate knowledge and anything said i will attempt to learn from. Its not a pissy match based on ego. Just in my experience and base of knowledge a western audience seemingly does not warm up to micro-transactions in MMO's. I admit they do accept it in console related areas. And even with illegal buying of accounts and other things.

But the people that will kick down 2,000 bucks for an account do so purely for epeen. If everyone has the ability to purchase such things i dont think people will be inclined to do so. Nor do they seem inclined to do so by the games that are available to a western audience with item malls and the like.

Is there an example of a western MMO with micro-transaction based system that has done well?


I understand the distinction and am aware of IGE ive played multiple MMO's and sold off my accounts when i have finished with a given game. But the distinction between RMT and MTX is fairly irrelevent from my perspective which is "any advantage paid for cash beyond a subscription is lame". I really cant imagine a "buff" that does not have an impact on other players. Competition is a prime motivatator for many players and any advantage gained through cash equates to the same thing.

Even in a game like EVE which honestly is the only palatable system to purchase characters/isk is still kind of appalling to me. The only things that balance it in EVE is the way the game is designed. Even with a great character with billions of isk if you suck you are prey. You can lose that advantage easily. I am just of the opinion that making a game with the intention of having a MTX market is still shit from my perspective. I am not the sole individual saying RMT in any form is shit in this thread.

Allowing the purchasing of advantage in any form does nothing but degrade the gaming experience for myself. It offers no boons and only negatives. Do you really believe my opinion on the matter is rare?

Yes, this isn't IGN or MMORPG.com.

Darniaq's already come in about legit vs illegit RMT. A lot of the social stigma of RMT has come from external RMT groups who come in and screw with the game. The pure sub model is going to be diluted over time (it's already begun) and titles like Wizard101 are showing how it can be done (https://www.wizard101.com/site/home2/wizard101/menu_8ad6a4041d9a5271011d9bfe99e70041), where you can buy:

 - a monthly sub of $10 (or less if you buy in bulk)
 - the option to just buy access to particular areas for $1 or so
 - the ability to turn RL cash into in-game cash that lets you buy things quicker and grants access to some unique items iirc.

It gives the players a lot more options about how they'd like to play.

Pretty much my take on it. If SOE's next game features MTX, moderatley or heavily, it'll be the kind of game I'm not interested in playing. What will amuse me is if they try to make a hybrid, featuring both MTX and traditional MMOG gameplay styles. I bet they'll shoot themselves in the foot over players who aren't interested in MTX, and not appeal enough to players who are.

So if I have access to "Tomb of the Beguiler" and my friend doesn't, we can't explore it together?

How do any of these options increase the options to the standard WoW model of monthly subscriptions. What am i being granted that is an assumed ability in a monthly subscription. I just have to pay more to play the full game.

One could argue that expansions are nothing more than glamorized MTX, especially with how much in love developers are with BoP.  After all, you can continue to play the 'base' game, you just won't have access to all the shinys, new classes, and content.

It's just packaged better and more widely accepted, that's all. 

When i ran a guild in EQ2, we did events, and i would buy winners the adventure packs.

I'm a bad bad RMT man.  :why_so_serious:

* So they make a content pack that people buy for X dollars and it's okay.

* They make a smaller content pack that people buy for Y dollars and it's still presumably okay.

* Now they separate out their content packs into single items that people buy for Z dollars and it's cheating for people to use?

SnakeCharmer basically said this, but the only difference between an expansion, an adventure pack, and an individual item is the scale.  Ironically, given your complaints, most MTX games have items that do little to nothing for the power of your character, whereas expansions and mini-packs dramatically increase it.  You should be railing against expansions hurting those individuals who don't buy them.

It's just another wall built with bricks of pure semantic and perspective. Consoles conquered it in their own way, and it's only a matter of time before it's done in a way thats palatable to Western MMO gamers. Go back in time and technology and I'd claim that card/board games handled it, and it's only a matter of time until consoles do.

As to the related topic: as people play more and more of these games, I feel like their stance changes on the issue. It's not a really long trip from "It's cheating and even though it's just a game, I'll still play it honorably" to "I don't have time to grind your shit to have fun. The time I'd spend/waste is worth more than the cost of this transaction".

That's why I'm mildly against expansion packs as well. But they're slightly more palatable than MTX in their presentation and execution.

[mole disclaimer] : Both of the games I mention below are funded and published by my company, on our www.instantaction.com web site. [/mole disclaimer]

To clarify something: the games I mentioned previously--Ace of Aces, and Lore, are both computer games available right now on our site that use a baseline free mode of play, and game affecting "add ons" that can be purchased through our store to give you an advantage in game.

With the case of Ace of Aces, you start with only 2 planes of each side (Ally or Axis), and can purchase planes with better performance either indvidually, or as a bundle.

In Lore, baseline players are limited to only being able to use pre-configured mavs during the game, while players that purchase access to the Mav Lab can configure custom Mavs by hand selecting the weapons, armor, power packs, and other game affecting features of the Mavs themselves.

Our market is world wide, but current demographic is primarily western. Our scale isn't of course as large as most MMO's, but we have found that a statistically significant portion of our users have no problem whatsoever with either side of the equation--playing as individuals that do not purchase the "more powerful" capabilities of either game, as well as those that do.

To be honest, this was a surprise to me as well--I'm an old school gamer, and "buying advantage" goes against the grain for me as well--but the user base numbers don't lie: more than 50% (significantly more, but I can't reveal exact numbers) of our total user base for each of those games dropped the dime without a qualm.

That's not really a valid argument to be honest. For a start, items aren't usually restricted in expansions - sure you may not be able to go to the Plane Of Madeupia if you didn't buy the expansion but the stuff from there can trickle out via trade to the playerbase as a whole.

Secondly there's a difference between being able to play the game to achieve shiny_item_#368 and flexing the plastic to have it delivered to your mailbox.

I work for a game that is dependent on microtransactions as a revenue model, I've also worked for games where RMT was antithetical to the basic design and I still believe that RMT in subscription games is a bad thing. It has a measurable and negative effect on the game as a whole, nobody can say 'it doesn't affect me' unless they are hopelessly casual or blind to reality.

By all means, tell me more. What's the measurable, negative effect? That selfish, broke people are selfish AND broke? And you know how many of them there are because they get their jollies off by complaining about how selfish and broke they are? So they in turn complain out of the game to you and in the game to the other users who have those items thus making the non-selfish and broke feel bad about not being selfish and broke who just want to play the game the way they want to play it? Like I said in a previous post, if it's sole revenue is RMT, the people who aren't buying anything are not your demographic. And if you have to please them to sleep at night, figure out something you can sell to them to shut the hell up.

Perhaps maybe, sell the ability to chat and post on the forums for 30 days at a time.

Honestly the MTX aspect irks me, but it's more of a kneejerk reflex.  It's been conditioned into me.  After thinking about it, the only reason I'd be upset with it would be if there was no bundle-as-expansion option.  If they have an expansion worth of content (an arbitrary amount, I admit) and the micro-transactions added up to be considerably more than what we would normally pay for an expansion... I'd feel somewhat cheated.

Imagine Wotlk: New class, new profession, ability to level to 80, 9 zones (not including dalaran and crystalsong), 13-ish dungeon runs (separating wings), Naxx, and now Ulduar.  That could easily be nickled and dimed to well over the 50 bucks I paid for it.

As a full time student, I'm not rolling in cash and I play MMOs because its cost effective entertainment.  That, and it beats alcohol poisoning.

I don't understand your point Schild. Of course if your sole revenue is via RMT then you need to be putting shit in that people can buy. The quote you pulled out is regarding RMT in subscription games that aren't built around RMT as a revenue model.

In fact I'd go so far as to say that you're wrong when you say that "the people who aren't buying anything are not your demographic". Even in a fully RMT driven game, you very much have to take into account the people who aren't spending money because sometimes they are the people who are paying for stuff just not right at that moment. You need to pace the amount that you tap their wallets. If they need to be paying all the time then most sane folk will probably leave, only if they can still have fun and 'win' (for whatever value of win your game has) without paying will they be more malleable to the idea of giving you money from time to time.

While it is most certainly a matter of degrees its not a valid comparison. But i feel similar to constant and content lacking "expansions" as well. Expansions are granting access to new shinys and classes. Its not giving me an item or gold straight up. I still have to "achieve" these things by playing the game. If you intend to use MTX as a major source of revenue you have to design the game to compel the purchasing of that content. And i can not see how this wouldn't negatively impact everyone playing.

And honestly if i have to purchase additional advantage for the game to even be palatable i wouldn't be playing it in the first place.

When did I say anything about people that buy stuff sometimes but not all the time? If x group of people bought something at y time and not z time, find out what made them buy it once and not the other. I'm specifically talking about people that buy nothing. Nothing. For example, I really wouldn't call myself the target demographic for aeria game titles. No matter how you slice it. Some of them have gameplay that I enjoy but it's not the sort of game I'd spend money on. Whereas Magic I would, and I'm apt to spend tons of money should they make a decent client. Do you see how I'm a targetable demographic in one and not the other?

This is your problem. I'm not talking about a sliding scale. I'm talking about people willing to buy things via RMT and people that aren't. Not people that are going to buy certain kinds of content and not others. That would be a poorly constructed straw man of an argument.

It seems like your entire point is hinged on getting people to buy stuff more often than they don't, which is great in theory, but then we're talking about people who will buy stuff in RMT versus people who won't. Which is exactly what I was getting at, some people just won't buy it for most/some types of games. The people that will buy it from time to time fall into the first category, not the second.

I'm not sure what wasn't clear though and I quote myself:


People who aren't buying anything.
Who aren't buying anything.
Aren't buying anything.

I'm not saying "people that sometimes buy stuff and sometimes don't."

Sorry to repeat that over and over but I'm just not seeing where you got this other group of people from. This "casual purchaser" group. Those are simply people that are willing to buy stuff via RMT. Not some mythical third group.

I'm not talking about people that aren't going to pay for your content but who would be paying for something else, that would be crazy like saying that WoW should put some content in for people who enjoy working on their car. So clearly I'm assuming that you're a potential customer of mine otherwise you wouldn't be attracted to the game in the first place.

For a F2P game with microtransactions as a revenue model, the numbers I've seen show that at most 10% of your players are going to give you money. The other 90% are still adding value however because they are filling up your game and providing 'content' or opponents or even just activity. Clearly you should be trying to part some of that 90% from their cash but you have to be realistic and figure that the majority of them will never pay you a cent. You don't want them to leave though because then your game is emptier, people who want to pay you money will have less opportunity and less inclination to do so. So yeah, you do need to take the guys who don't pay into account.

Oh, a slight tangent here. I almost bought some paid points for my froob account to get some of the social hoverbikes. Funcom spent a week sitting on my payment, and I finally got tired of waiting and cancelled the transaction. That week gave me time to go "WTF am I doing?"  :drill:

Of course there are hundreds, if not thousands of variables that go into conversion rates, but as I indicated in my post above, we found the trend to be completely opposite: a large majority of the user base for our two games using this model were in the "pay at least something extra above the free play version".

The point about keeping the two communities (totally free, paid some money) together however is incredibly important: our first attempt at this type of model was having players pay to purchase extra levels that weren't available to the non-paying community--big mistake (for our test games anyway), and we ultimately made all of those levels free.

F2P/MTX might actually make a decent large-scale pvp game if your purchasable content isn't excessive, seeing as how it would provide a steady stream of sheeple who are free to come and go as they please.

First off there is a market for EVERYTHING. A company could literally give you a paint by number canvas and charge you for each separate color and someone out there would pay.  The whole debate of whether RMT works or not is flawed, of course it works because there are hundreds of examples out there. What we should be discussing is how popular they can actually be and in what context.

I'm of the opinion that free games or one-time fee games with RMT work well but those with subscriptions tend to do worse that regular subscription style games.  Buy any xbox/ps3 game and you'll be offered little goodies online for a small fee, some people will go for that. Make a game like EQ2 and not only charge for the game but subscriptions and then on top of that add RMT and the number will drop significantly. 

There will still be a market for RMT in subscription games but what I want to know is if RMT for actual in-game bonuses will shy other players away who are already paying a monthly fee. Say every month the company added a ring that was best in slot or something else that gave an advantage that min/maxers want and they charge $5. With that extra charge you're effectively upping the entry fee to 'the end game' and yes many will pay for that but many many more will just say 'fuck it' and it has nothing to do with how poor they are. 

I myself have enough money to support my gaming habit but EQ2 for instance really turned me off when I bought the game, paid my monthly fee and then heard of their plans for quarterly expansions and then little bonus packs for extra money. Sure I had enough money to pay for those but my initial thought was "well fuck, if they are just going to nickel and dime me in addition to my subscription ill just go play wow"

Games like puzzle pirates though, that are up front about the cash to play? Those I can appreciate because A.they're already free and B.it's not a game I feel obligated to be any good at, unlike most mmo's.

I think blizzard draws the line well when it comes to how RMT should be done in big games. As long as it doesnt affect actual gameplay, then you throw everything and the kitchen sink at your audience. Transfers, name changes, TCG's, minis, books and any other thing you can think of.  The truth is there no need to sell in game advantages or content because there are so many different avenues you can exhaust until you get there.

Expecting people to pay a monthly sub and minor goodies is a bit much especially when directly related to gameplay. Fact is the market for f2p games supported solely on RMT already exist, is already huge, and is the only thing truly making a profit in the mmo business besides WoW. No only real problem is if your game is successful enough like WoW you don't need RMT and its counter productive. For everyone else they really don't have a choice, EQ2 needs to nickle and dime the remaining player base or it closes, WAR and AoC could probably do the same. I do believe that if ncsoft was willing to bite the bullet, TR could have been supported solely on RMT.

I stopped reading there. Try doing some research.

They've been trying to nickel and dime since they opened. In fact I'm pretty sure they have a chart in their offices that says.

1. Create Game/Expac
2. Nickel
3. Dime
4. Repeat

EQ2 did poorly because of their practices, not in spite of them. Though if I'm being fair there are a LOT of factors going into eq2 but I feel constantly asking players for more and more cash was one of the biggest ones.

LoTR, COH/V, Lineage 1 and 2, and FF 11, and EVE. I wouldn't count star wars galaxies I'm sure there just paying the bills. EQ2 has the problem of sucking ass first, charging its playerbase to suck it's ass second. Though I wonder if EQ2 would be still operational if it didn't nickel and dime whoever thought that piece of crap was fun from the start.

I find SOE's moneygrubbing to be offputting in the extreme and I suspect it has cost them money rather than brought it in, but EQ2 is doing quite well as far as I can tell.

EQ2 had to remove the suck from their game for several years before managed to reach their current level of subscriptions.

The Live team of EQ2 is responsible for its ongoing success, Hartsman took a meh punitive game and made it into a great mmo.

As far as EQ2 nickle and diming, I've paid for nothing but a monthly subscription and I'm doing just fine. I fail to see the problem. The adventure packs were free for Station Pass (hey, I played SWG and PS once), and I believe they're included in newer retail boxes. Fuck, blizz nickles more by making you buy each expansion, SOE includes all previous packs in the retail box.

I think people just like to make a big stink about something that's trivial (xp potions) to non-existent (if you don't play on exchange servers).

I'll admit, when I subscribing having to weave my way through the repeating attempts to get me to pay $2.95 to get web based services that LOTRO, WoW, DAOC, War, etc all offer for free honks me off.

We don't know what their current level of subscriptions is, but yes: they had to remove the suck. That only took them 14 months from launch though (when they removed sub-classes and add Inscription). Since then the title has been very solid. Never a real competitor to WoW, but a great alternative to it for someone looking for diku with housing and a tad more immersion with the game world.

Nickle-and-diming, yes. Anyone whose been in the genre awhile has seen all the tricks, and a lot of them were started by SOE (charge for name changes, charge for server transfers, charge extra for server transfers with name changes). Then they launched guild tools and other things and finally the RMT-enabled servers for players.

We really can't fault them for this. It's not like the resources and talent for designing a fulfilling game play are the same as business development and sales. Yes, game design will impact the motivations of players (ie, this entire genre is built for RMTing). But you're not pulling an engineer off of the linked-mob mechanic to make them work on e-commerce checkout functions. And I'm sure their headcount budget for the game development side is separate from their infrastructure/ tech/ billing/ account management side. So, whether the game is fun or not is based solely on the talent working on the game.

Also, and more importantly, these are all opt-in areas that don't affect game balance. You're not buying items, you're not getting special buffs you can use against others, none of that.

The pace at which one person advances does not impact anyone else except emotionally.  :grin:

Customer satisfaction, brand loyalty and consumer confidence are very real things. I'm not saying there is anything ethically or morally wrong with SOE being cheap pricks but what I'm saying is the more you go that route, the less inclined people will be to pay you a regular fee.

SOE's paid armory type service isn't as bad as your making it out to be, I don't pay for it and I'm not offended they are not giving it away for free. The basic character profile is available for viewing for free and 3 bucks nets you:
Advanced Leaderboards - if your into that sort of thing
Advanced Guild Tools - including a web based chat interface that talks to the game
Screenshot and Image Storage - 10mb, not much but still
Dynamic Item Database - I guess like a wowhead for eq2
Advanced Character Profiles - you do get most of these for free in other games.

Its not like they are forcing your to pay for this or that. but to be clear when a game has something like "Hey you now have enough XP for the next level, would you like to advance? your credit card will be billed" I'm out.

I paid for some of those. Especially the web based guild chat.

Your issue is that you are equating "truly making a profit" with "making more money than was ever expected of a video game ever". It blows my mind that WoW brings in over US $1 billion to Blizzard every year, of which something like 40% is pure profit (someone else can link the finer details, but I'm pretty sure that was the operating profit for 2007). AFAIK, Meridian 59 and ATITD make enough profit to keep the servers running, while some of the F2P such as MapleStory make big money from their playerbase.

Here's a [ur=http://www.fatfoogoo.com/2009/02/free-to-play-maple-story-ranks-among-top-moneymaking-mmo%E2%80%99s-of-2008/l]list of the most revenue-generating MMOs for 2008[/url]. It's all based on estimates, but MapleStory and Club Penguin get more income than LOTR, AoC and WAR (and this was during AoC's and WAR's launch year, when they make a lot of money off box sales).

Finally: is MTX the new cool way of saying microtransaction? I'm a bit slow on the uptake today, but didn't see a direct explanation when everyone changed terminology.

Someone explaining the distinction from a few pages back.

Thanks gryeyes - I did see that, but never an explicit reference to what MTX is, other than a way to say RMT without the associated stigma.

MTX= MicroTransaction
RTM=Korean gold farmers  :awesome_for_real:

Yea, sorry about that. I get tired of typing "microtransactionationism" all the time, so use what I've seen used as an abbreviated version elsewhere :-) If you strip away the stigma, the only real difference is that MTX is used when the publisher is making the money while RMT is used when they are not.

Absolutely. Certain groups of gamers just don't go for certain types of financial models. You'd never see a WoW killer come along based on microtransactions for the same market. At this point, the only way subs get replaced is when us, the deepest investors, are replaced by a bigger demographic.

I just don't think that event is far off. It's not because tweens and teens prefer mtx. It's more that they don't really as quickly go for the diku.

Exactly. I've used the distinction of internal vs. external RMT before - the problem is if an external entity is doing it because it often completely borks up the intended system. Well, worse than when it is exposed to the player base, anyway.

It should also be pointed out that MTX games are infested with RMT as well. RMT is about cheating, no matter what the payment model, people always want to cheat.

If there is a rule, there will always be someone trying to sell you a way around that rule.  Even in the case there are no ways around a rule, there will be someone claiming to have a way around that rule.

It's like Field of Dreams for retards.

That's because the people that hate that sort of thing dumped your game. Remember when Atari crashed in the 80's? Remember why? Do you guys ever learn?

Both games are seeing amazing growth, and continue to have both high conversion and in fact, requests for more things to buy.

Has nothing to do with Atari at all--and honestly not sure what conclusion you're trying to make there ;)

They squeezed their consumers for cash... got it, then kept squeezing. Eventually everyone stopped buying.

(http://images.mmorpg.com/images/latestgucomic.jpg?030409)

HA HA!

(http://www.virginmedia.com/microsites/games/slideshow/moviegames/img_4.jpg)

I just involuntarily shuddered like a Pavlovian response. 

Squeezed customers for cash? The game is free--and if you wish, you can make small purchases to further increase your experience.

That's hardly squeezing customers for cash--especially when those purchases are most of the time less than bargain bin prices.

Not sure where you were going with the Atari comment but Atari crashed in the 80's partly due to the insane amount of shitty third party software being produced and also due to the fact that Atari tried to be too many things at once. When it was just 2600/400/800, things were pretty much ok. But then, they went insane with system releases. 600XL, 800XL, 1200XL, 65XE, 5200, 7800 (all basically the same system just rebranded and tweaked), several iterations of the 2600 and other announced but never delivered models. And then came the ST lines which were great but never marketed properly here in the States. Atari ate itself from the inside out.

I had that game. But I was like 8 or something. And it was everything they said it was.

I managed to miss E.T. the first time around. My big game was Raiders of the Lost Ark. That fecking game took me 7 months to figure out. It was Adventure on steroid.  I regard it as my first real foray into the adventure game genre and I've been a sucker for all the adventure and rpg games since.

Oh those motherfucking tsetse flies. 

Actually, by the time the ST line was produced Atari had already crashed and burned. It was bought by the former CEO of Commodore, and is now owned by a disk drive manufacturer.

I upgraded from a //c to an ST. Oh the ancient days.

I never figured out how to get anywhere in Raiders. Recently I read someplace (maybe here?) that you were supposed to use the second controller or something...I dunno, I never got what I was supposed to be trying to do. I tried it for a couple hours once every 6 months or so, very frustrating.

ET was just boring. Fall into a hole, float out, another game where I didn't really get what I was even trying to accomplish. The two games were pretty similar in that what the hell was even going on was a total mystery to me. Whatever they were trying to convey they failed utterly. Just take the pitfall dude and give him a whip or something...Atari was the wrong system to try to make games with a lot of diverse elements that mimicked a movie plotline. And count me as one who never understood the difference between the 2600, 5200 and 7800.

The funniest thing about Atari was after Nintendo first came out Atari games shot up to something like $29.99 in order to appear relevant competitors. Whereas the year before they were something like $9.99.

I feel like our (my) generation is very lucky in that we experienced games right from their inception. I've been playing games since almost day 1, which gives us a much greater understanding of history than people who got on board in the last decade or so.

Also, for the most part, it makes us better at games on a wider scale. Sure, someone may be good at fighting games, or fps titles, or RPGs. But generally they possess skills that focus on one or two (at most) genres. It's interesting to be sure, the hardcore gamers today are nothing like hardcore gamers back then. It's part of the reason I still try to play nearly everything.

It's the skills you get from having to make 20c / 40c last in a game with one hit deaths and only 3 lives. Or adventure games that went "you made a spelling mistake, command failed, hello insta-death and we're deleting your save file as punishment". My exposure to gaming sadism has only made me stronger!

We had a homemade MAME cabinet in the computer class for a couple of years. All the 1337 Counter Strike kiddies would make fun of myself and the teacher for our lack of skillz. We then challenged them to Robotron. A couple of them fell into puddles of tears and urine when they saw me hit 395,000 on one match.

I'm not entirely sure what that proves. Did you beat them at Counterstrike afterwards or something?

No, but it was good to know I was batter at something then they were. I'm almost 40. I need to feel superior to these young whipper snappers.

(http://www.clisham.com-a.googlepages.com/rolled.JPG)

Mmm, batter.

Anyways.

SOE's next big hit is gonna be Free Realms - even I have more than a passing interest in it.

As far as their next contender in the standard MMO arena, they'd be dumb if it's a standard fantasy MMO, but it probably will be. Oh well.

Sci-fi expansion 500 years in the future after the cataclysm consumes Norrath, led into space using gnome tech.

You heard it here first!

I... would TOTALLY play that.

Can I launch gnomes into space?  Without protective gear?

Punt is the correct term, I think. Laces out, Dan.

And yeah, as I was posting that in jest I thought it might actually be a cool idea. Too bad Raph and Scott don't work there anymore, my pipeline, it's broked.

Well, Lum is now working on a supra sekret MMO. Tell him your ideas and I'm sure he'll include them.  :why_so_serious:

I'm trying to think of what the reaction to the end result of that collaboration would be around here.

"Meh.  It's still a little grindy, but man, you can sure sit the hell out of some chairs."

The only gamers you really should bother with are the ones on your employer-funded insurance plan  :grin:

Arm-chair Developer Wars.

Best.  Game.  Ever.

;D

Problem is that whole Therom of:
("It's really easy to hack an FPS" + "No one will play an MMO that can be hacked." = "MMO's can't be FPS") + "Sci-Fi games with Swords Suck" = "All MMOs have to be Fantasy or they'll fail.

Fix that FPS hacking problem and there ya go. God knows a real Cyberpunk FPS Shooter MMO would be huge.

What game that features pvp as a central theme doesn't have game-killing hacks? I know AC was rife with them. In pve hacks and spoilts are obnoxious to game-breaking, but for pvp it removes any reason to ever bother playing.

None... and that's the problem. It's just even easier to do in an FPS because your attacks are player skill based and not based on statistics governed by level and equipment. You can get away with player skill based mechanics in a single player game like Oblivion, because no-one cares. But online... exploits will send your client base running.

 

EVE?

No. (http://tinyurl.com/cxonsr)

Ya those sure do kill the game.  :uhrr:

WoW? I'm not initiated to the point where I can tell whether this is actually true, but PvP need not be central to motivate cheating. With WoW's subscriber base there are more people enjoying that PvP than any other, despite the PvE focus, so collorary it should be the most motivated game to cheat in at the moment?

Yes I see that eve wall climbing hack...

Cheats don't need to be in the code when they're in the staff  :awesome_for_real:

I was going to guess the cheat was in the keylogger you would be downloading.

There's some awesome noclip hacks in there.