Although the news of SOE’s decision to facilitate the sale and exchange of items, money and characters is a few weeks old, I and others who comment on the MMORPG industry are still troubled by the direction the online gaming industry is heading. Thankfully we are not alone in our concern as online gaming honchos like Sigil’s Brad McQuaid and Mythic’s Mark Jacobs are similarly in shock. Instead of opposing shady operations like IGE and Yantis, SOE has chosen to join them in an effort to get a piece of the lucrative action.
There are other gaming/entertainment organizations like professional sports that also have companies that make millions of dollars from the existence of their product but receive no compensation: it’s called sports betting and gambling. The NFL and Major League Baseball know that they can never get a cut of those millions because to do so would ultimately taint the integrity of the game. Take away the “game” element from professional sports and you end up with the phony sports fiction of the World Wrestling Federation. So why does SOE feel compelled to corrupt the “game” in EverQuest by capitulating to the baser instincts of those that would buy and sell our online worlds for real-life money?
In America where most of these online games are conceived, created and maintained the worship of profit is pervasive. This attitude that if it makes money then it’s ok has now infiltrated the psyche of the online gaming world in a big way. Many in the industry and in the MMORPG blogging world feel that in a Gordon Gecko way that “greed is good” and that this is a coming of age for the video game business. There’s a feeling that real life cash for in-game items is inevitable and we may as well just get used to it. Therefore it comes as no surprise that SOE’s CEO John Smedley would be introducing this scheme to EverQuest. Mr. Smedley speaks with the aura of an accountant unlike his ex-associate Brad McQuaid who appears to be someone who is genuinely passionate about creating online worlds.
As far as my position on RMT (real money transactions) within online worlds, I would like to leave you with a few quotes I made on the subject. The first from a comment I made on a Grimwell Online article entitled $49.99 For The Box of Empty Promises :
One of the basic premises of an online world is that all players start out equal: penniliess, powerless with rusty sword in hand. I believe this equality is part of the attraction of online words. It gives those of us the chance to escape the drudgery of real life and start anew — free of the shackles of education level, societal status and income. Gaming companies should be duty bound to provide and maintain a level playing field for all players to ensure the integrity of the virtual world they are hosting.
Yet there is a silver lining in all of this. Sigil now can point to itself as being a shining example of a company that makes games based on integrity. Vanguard will be able to differentiate itself from the competition that seems to have sold out to convenience-driven dumbed-down gameplay and the unethical practice of selling ingame items for real world cash. I really hope Sigil and their partner Microsoft stay the course and stay true to the values of creating a online game of integrity.
In so many parallel ways we are at a crossroads in the development of MMORPGs. The lines of gaming and entertainment seem to be blurring into one huge bottom-line. Gaming companies have many choices to make that will determine the future of this relatively new genre. Some are choosing the path of least resistance while others are choosing a more ardous route. Those of us that feel strongly about our opposition to real money transactions need to stand firm. We need fight fire with fire and vote with our dollars. We need to support online worlds that don’t sell-out their principles. Each of us in our own small way can help chase the money changers out from the temple of online gaming.
–Wolfshead
So RMT is bad because SOE in the past mishandled their Legends servers? I don’t see the connection. I can feel your quasi-religious passion about the issue, but the arguments are weak.
That is mainly because neither SOE or IGE or any other “money-grubbing” company is to blame for real money trade (RMT). You could as well blame EBay, who are making a good amount of money from people selling virtual goods.
And it is no wonder that people like Brad McQuaid or Mark Jacobs are in the front line of accusing the companies handling the trades, instead of pointing out the real culprits. Because the real culprits are they, the game developers. Create a game which is all about gaining phat l00t, where gaining phat l00t takes endless hours, and where phat l00t can easily be transfered from one character to another, and you create people who are willing to buy that phat l00t, instead of grinding for it. Once the buyers are there, there will always be sellers.
If you want to eliminate RMT, it is pointless and futile to chase the money changers out of the temple, as long as there are large numbers of people in the temple who absolutely want to have their money changed. You need to create games where *acquiring* the phat l00t is more fun than just having it, and where that phat l00t can not be handed to another player. A game where all the good stuff is soulbound / NOTRADE. And all the problems of RMT will vanish in a puff of smoke.
SOE’s Legend’s server fiasco and the decision to faciliate RMT is part of an established pattern of putting profits ahead of the integrity of their world. The problems that resulted from the Legends server affected many people and I was one of them. This blog is about my personal experience in the gaming world and I felt compelled to tell the truth of what happened by sharing my perspective. SOE has shown time and time again that they will corrupt the integrity of the game to increase their profits. RMT is just one snapshot of a much bigger problem with their profit mentality which I despise.
I do agree with you that game developers need to do more and look within themselves for more answers to the problems. I just don’t agree that just because the players “want it” that we should capitulate and let them trade real life cash for virtual items. Perhaps online games where skill is more important than items could hold the answer.
The case against RMT has been made quite adequately by many people long before me. Instead I’d like to hear from you why RMT is good for the MMORPG industry. There has to be something better then the old saying “the customer is always right…” and “giving the players what they want” to support the concept of RMT. To me those are truly weak arguments in this debate if you can even call them that.
You made comments in another of my blog articles that MMORPGs should be more about the “game” then the world. How then does allowing one to essentially cheat by trivilizing an encounter with superior gear support your view of “the game” as being paramount? If you cared about the sacredness of the game then you would be against RMT.
–Wolfshead
First of all I have to say that I don’t believe in the “sacredness” of the game. A MMORPG is no more sacred than a Harry Potter book or a TV episode of Friends. I believe in games as a form of entertainment. The best game is the one that offers the most fun to the largest number of people.
I also don’t mind cheating in non-competitive environments. I could never have finished GTA:Vice City without cheat codes, I’m simply too old and slow for that. Cheating enabled me to access content I would otherwise have been excluded from, thus more fun for more players, thus better. Obviously cheating would be bad in competitions, but I don’t really see MMORPG as being competitions.
I’ve participated in RMT in the past, as a buyer. In one case I had done everything in-game to build my own house, but was prevented from actually doing so by there being no flat space to build it on left. So I bought the house of somebody else for $30. The money didn’t hurt me much, and again it opened up content to me from which I would have been excluded otherwise.
In another case I bought credits in SWG. Because buying the credits cost me a sum of money I considered as being insignificant. While earning the credits myself in-game would have meant repeatedly doing the same stupid survey mission for many hours. I basically exchanged money for time, which was a good deal for me, because I had excess money and not enough time.
But I never claimed RMT to be good for the MMORPG industry, there could be much better systems. I’d call myself neutral on the issue.
The case that other players have made against RMT doesn’t convince me. They basically claim that RMT is “unfair”, turning an otherwise “fair”, “skill-based” game into a money-based game. Sorry, but existing MMORPG are neither fair nor skill-based. They are simply based on time, and what friends you have. It is a perversion that the same people who say that buying 100 gold for $10 is bad would seriously complain if the developers stopped them from receiving 100 gold for free from a guild mate. Both are asymmetric trades that are equally bad, both are cheating, both are spoiling your treasured “sacredness of the game” in equal measure. Why should one of them be allowed, and the other one be forbidden?
And how do you control if Player A sent Player B 100 gold out of “friendship” or because Player B sent Player A $10 by PayPal? Or gave the money to him in cash? It is impossible! I dislike hypocrits like Brad McQuaid and Mark Jacobs who basically do nothing against the asymmetric trades in the virtual world, but try to put up rules against what people are allowed to do in the real world.
I’d be perfectly *for* a MMORPG which had no RMT, because asymmetric trades would be impossible. No gifts to guild mates, no twinking an alt, every avatar has to earn his own gear. That would be fair. The current games are not, with or without RMT.