Oolite Bulletins

Hmm... maybe the solution would be to trade in-game currency on the global market. Have an exchange rate for, say, the Linden v the US$. Then it would be in the games companies' interests to keep their game currencies cheap, but not too cheap, and reasonably stable.

See: http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q= ... inden+doll

It would appear 1US$ = 235L$

As somebody who has just become responsible for CUI (Cranfield University Island) - a chance mention of a "wacky" idea at a meeting that has been "run with" I shall see and report back!

DaddyHoggy wrote:

As somebody who has just become responsible for CUI (Cranfield University Island) - a chance mention of a "wacky" idea at a meeting that has been "run with" I shall see and report back!

That's what happens if you turn up late to meetings.

DaddyHoggy wrote:

See: http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&q= ... inden+doll

It would appear 1US$ = 235L$

Hmm... interesting! I knew it was possible to convert the one into the other but I didn't know there was an official exchange rate. The real breakthrough will come though when game currencies are floated alongside all other world currencies. Just because your country is imaginary (or rather, even more imaginary than real-world countries are) doesn't mean to say that your notional currency has any less pretend value than anyone else's!

But if currencies float against real world money, then it takes a lot of the grind out of online games. Why work your way up, when you can put down x dollars and buy your way to the top?

I think thats one reason many games like WoW try to stop gold farming/selling.

The other thing is that there may be serious legal implications for having tradable currency. Im not an expert, but people like the SEC might start to show an interest, and I dont think Blizzard et al. want to be involved in audits and all that kind of stuff. They are games companies, not banks.

HSBC Virtual Fantasy land. Now there's a sobering thought.

Don't get me wrong, I don't really mind planetside and things like that. You can go in with your eyes open. It's a war. Expect a war.

It's the sneaky ones that do my head in.

Cmdr James wrote:

But if currencies float against real world money, then it takes a lot of the grind out of online games. Why work your way up, when you can put down x dollars and buy your way to the top?

I think thats one reason many games like WoW try to stop gold farming/selling.

The other thing is that there may be serious legal implications for having tradable currency. Im not an expert, but people like the SEC might start to show an interest, and I dont think Blizzard et al. want to be involved in audits and all that kind of stuff. They are games companies, not banks.

I have no issues with the concept of paying real life cash for in game items, hence I also had no issues selling in game currency for cash either . As far as working your way to the top, Ive been known to pay my children for levelling services . I see a world where mmorpgs are funded by microtransactions for in game items, currency instead of subscriptions.

Theres more than enough demand for "cool" items even if they are gameplay affecting, youd be surprised what people will fork out their hard earned cash for in game... I know for sure that theres plenty of people out there who would fork out £10 a time for a "unique colour horse" for example, or a "specially cool helmet" etc

A game company could get away with charging for purely ornamental upgrades - pretty pixels and make a fortune out of it. Whilst allowing the cash poor, time rich to game for free \ reduced subscriptions.

I think real world versus in game currencies are definetely a legal mire which games companies are desperate to stay out of, they REALLY dont want people to have any case to sue them for loss of real world value during a nerfing spree etc. This topic is however way behind government bodies I believe the American tax bodies were keeping an eye on game currency conversions as an issue several years ago.

Games companies COULD defeat gold sellers overnight as they have ultimate control over money generation. They could "sell" credits rake in the money whilst selling game time in exchange for in game currency to reexport the cash.

A lot of players dont like the idea of someone "buying" there way in a game with real cash, but I dont really see an issue. A person can have a job and a life to run and so be cash rich and time poor, but still want certain in game achievements.

I think allowing cash poor players to spend their gaming time hunting down loot items to sell to those who buy their credits from the game manufacturers then the loot hunter paying for their game time with those credits \ gold makes a lot of sense. Sure those people buying their credits arent putting in the work in game, BUT they are putting in work elsewhere to get that money in the first place and they are subsidising the sellers game play costs.

Of course theres nothing stopping a time rich person from raising enough currency in game to "play for free" without having to sell loot etc to cash rich players so they could literally game for free, if they have that much time spare on their hands. Thats ok, Im pretty much certain that there would be demand enough from the "paying" players to cover those isolated cases.

99% of my "real world" money is nothing more than bits and bytes. I dont deal in cash much at all these days. Even cash has little "cash value" since we stopped using real precious metals. Id say most of the worlds "money assets" are every bit as virtual as in game currency. The value of a £20 note is purely notional, its material value is very limited its a patch of cotton...

I am happy to spend out big money to make pixels prettier in the form of monitors and graphics card why not for in game items etc as well. The Sims thrives on the idea of paying for "virtual" items with real cash.

A gold buying player is a lost income stream for a game company its a market they are turning down.

Im not entirely sure but didnt Sony Online Entertainment experiment with a "sanctioned" real world cash for in game items market for some of its games?

Cmdr James wrote:

But if currencies float against real world money, then it takes a lot of the grind out of online games. Why work your way up, when you can put down x dollars and buy your way to the top?

This happens already, but I can see that it's an issue. Maybe the virtual currency trades could only go one way ... you could sell gold zonkers and buy dollars, but not the other way around.

Or – and this is getting more hypothetical by the minute – this could have an interesting effect on the global economy. At the moment, capital is free to move anywhere it wants, but labour (i.e. people) cannot. Obviously capital can move electronically, but physical labour can't. But I can see how, if physical labour became virtual, then people in poor nations could earn money by, essentially, being background characters, shopkeepers, traders, orcs etc. in the gameworlds of the rich.

This is obviously not a morality-free proposition, but it's potentially interesting. Just as Western corporations farm out call centre services and indeed computing jobs to places like India and the Far East, so it might be possible for a truly massive online game to pay people in developing countries to be "actors" in a persistent online world – and indeed to allow them to set up shops selling virtual junk to people with more money than sense. In many respects it's no more immoral than setting up Third-World sweatshops to manufacture trainers and jeans for a few pennies a piece then selling them for ridiculously inflated sums to people who want to pay to display some corporate logo somewhere on their person. In fact, it might be less immoral, since it could conceivably allow someone with skill and talent to access a rich market directly, with no resources consumed (except the power to run the computer). Such a game would be vastly more involving: NPCs who can think, and talk, and act and react realistically. Such a game could be very appealing to those people who want to play out fantasies online, and could charge appropriately high subscription fees.

Cmdr James wrote:

The other thing is that there may be serious legal implications for having tradable currency. Im not an expert, but people like the SEC might start to show an interest, and I dont think Blizzard et al. want to be involved in audits and all that kind of stuff. They are games companies, not banks.

This also is true. But as – or rather if – these games get bigger and bigger, and more and more complex, then things would change. Games servers could be located in countries who, in return for a slice of the action, could legitimise the currencies.

It's all totally hypothetical. But (at the moment, anyway, and to me at least) it seems like a definite possibility. Entertainment is a huge, vast industry, right up there with oil. Online games are obviously popular, but right now they're not very good: everyone in the game is either a player or a bot. Players want to play, and the bots are pretty awful. In the absence of anything like real AI, it might be worthwhile letting human beings fill in the gap, in return for the chance to earn money.

There is more than a whiff of something distasteful about this idea: the poor scrabbling along, working away while the rich disport themselves. But in all honesty, is it any different from current reality?

Disembodied wrote:

Or – and this is getting more hypothetical by the minute – this could have an interesting effect on the global economy. At the moment, capital is free to move anywhere it wants, but labour (i.e. people) cannot. Obviously capital can move electronically, but physical labour can't. But I can see how, if physical labour became virtual, then people in poor nations could earn money by, essentially, being background characters, shopkeepers, traders, orcs etc. in the gameworlds of the rich.

This is obviously not a morality-free proposition, but it's potentially interesting. Just as Western corporations farm out call centre services and indeed computing jobs to places like India and the Far East, so it might be possible for a truly massive online game to pay people in developing countries to be "actors" in a persistent online world – and indeed to allow them to set up shops selling virtual junk to people with more money than sense.

The Infamous Chinese Credit \ Gold Farmers are ahead of you, they are already playing the game in their native countries to earn in game currency to sell to rich westerners. They arent enriching the depth of the game, but they also dont need english qualifications to do their job, they literally earn their wages by playing the games for other people they also charge to power level characters. Already the third parties are virtualizing their labour, the great thing morally is that its not large corporations dictating conditions etc, its private entrepeneurs going into business for themselves, they determine their own prices and their own conditions etc. Doing in game work from their home countries for games based in Europe and the US. They also get involved in selling loot items as well.

Some Gold \ Credit Farmers do a nice sideline in credit card fraud as well, which is causing nightmares for mmorpg billing departments. Basically they use the card details from currency purchases to open up a load of accounts which they use for their farming purposes - they have a high "ban" rate when normal players spot them, which costs them activation fees etc every time. In some games there are tradeable purchase rewards which get sold off in game as well...

Obviously credit card companies get peeved with all these fraudulent payments to games companies. Unfortunately its hard to detect such use because multiple accounts on one card is very very normal, either from multi account players or from whole families buying on the same card etc.

Thank god I was in Eve Beta, so I feel no need for trying it out...

No one dared to mess with The Imperial Navy our corp could have that name at the time)..

So we scrunched around in unsafe space, and we protected all the newcommers, that came there... But it degenerated, more and more "we wanna be bad as pirates", came in until we gave them all a well earned lesson.. usually that was in the ambush style...

Warp scrambler on a blackbird (no affordable battleships at the time)
and merlin pounding the crap out if the would be pirates. We also had More merlins in reserve at the "home" station, in case one of them blew up..

We had a crapload of players in the system, we forged alliances with other corps, dictating the need to protect newcommers...

but when the beta was over, we didn't return. So many bugs had not been solved... and the battleships fighting that took place in the final day of the beta.. was just so much fun...

Can You can Imagine 12 battleships side by side... aye, fun, especially when a single battleship starts to engage us all...

however, I know what happens when something goes public..

The Tards, the 10 year olds, arrive.. The Victimizers, I Think our entire Cooperation was tired of acting peace keepers. And we knew, it could only get worse. So we simply stopped playing.. also more and more because, of the

"I got to go, diner is ready, and my mom will scream if i do not attend", in the middle of something "important"...

MMORPG is suffering from the fact that people cannot be online at any and all time,...

Oolite however, is there at all times, and never has "connection problems" or is "lagging"

Ok quick question. Could an online game be used for money laundering?

Yes, obviously. I take my illegal money, invest it in-game, do all kinds of transactions which are impossible to follow, take the cash out (perhaps as a different character).

In fact if the currency is easily converted then I ought to be able to perform any real world money laundering in-game. Typical examples might include gambling or investment. And if you allow investment how are you going to control things like insider trading?

Davidtq wrote:

Theres more than enough demand for "cool" items even if they are gameplay affecting, youd be surprised what people will fork out their hard earned cash for in game...

No I wouldnt, I know full well how much rubbish people will pay for -- ringtones anyone?

Davidtq wrote:

I see a world where mmorpgs are funded by microtransactions for in game items, currency instead of subscriptions.

I understand what you see, what is less clear is if the game companies want that, and if players want that. I know there is a huge market for farmed gold, and I understand the time/money rich/poor thing. But that doesn't mean that I follow the argument that it makes for good games.

Let me give you an example of why not. I loved playing Zelda, but it took a huge long time, there were lots of things to collect, lots of things to look for. I could have paid someone to help, or I could have bought a book with a walkthrough, or no doubt found one online for free. For me personally, I would not have got the same out of zelda if I only played against the bosses, having someone else do the grind. If the game playing public would prefer to pay-to-advance then I guess you are right, but it isn as clear as you make out.

Disembodied wrote:

There would need to be a method of extracting game-money out, permanently. Having people who inhabit the game-world, who use it to make a living in the real world, might be a way of doing that. Every gold zonker or Imperial Credit they earn they take out of the game into the real world, to eat with or pay rent or whatever. It would stop the game-worlds filling up with ever-larger amounts of pretend money.

Hmm... maybe the solution would be to trade in-game currency on the global market. Have an exchange rate for, say, the Linden v the US$. Then it would be in the games companies' interests to keep their game currencies cheap, but not too cheap, and reasonably stable.

With several real-world economies currently having failed to learn the lesson of what happened to Germany last century, and effectively printing money hand over fist to solve current woes, an injection of game currency into the real economy would probably only contribute to the galloping hyperinflation certain nations are likely to see in the next few years..

Cmdr James wrote:

Davidtq wrote:

Theres more than enough demand for "cool" items even if they are gameplay affecting, youd be surprised what people will fork out their hard earned cash for in game...

No I wouldnt, I know full well how much rubbish people will pay for -- ringtones anyone?

Davidtq wrote:

I see a world where mmorpgs are funded by microtransactions for in game items, currency instead of subscriptions.

I understand what you see, what is less clear is if the game companies want that, and if players want that. I know there is a huge market for farmed gold, and I understand the time/money rich/poor thing. But that doesn't mean that I follow the argument that it makes for good games.

Its already standard practise in Japan with huge mmorpg player bases. Its already here with Second Life. Its already started. Ive read many comments from western industry leaders who see it happening as well. Codemasters a year or two ago changed one of their less well known mmorpgs from subscription based to microtransaction based. I think over here there is a resistance from players to the concept. I suspect a few good games that they can play for free, or buy shiney toys and that would change. Theres a huge amount of players who buy new retail copies of a game they already play just to get the "unique" free items. Ive done it! Ive got 3 different full game versions of Lotro. 6 copies brought as my wife plays as well. We are FAR from unique in being prepared to do that .

Cmdr James wrote:

Let me give you an example of why not. I loved playing Zelda, but it took a huge long time, there were lots of things to collect, lots of things to look for. I could have paid someone to help, or I could have bought a book with a walkthrough, or no doubt found one online for free. For me personally, I would not have got the same out of zelda if I only played against the bosses, having someone else do the grind. If the game playing public would prefer to pay-to-advance then I guess you are right, but it isn as clear as you make out.

Ive never played Zelda, but I assume when you talk about boss fights that playing through the game that it means there were huge "levels?" to cover? not that you had to spend hundreds of hours sat at the same spot whacking the same creature on the head?

The problem with many MMORPGS is that there are deliberate time sinks, boring repetetive play, just designed to keep you online and playing till the next "fun" part. Theres a "grind" that is generally "not fun" but an essential part of getting where you want to be. Single player games dont generally have so much of a "grind". They can be long and hard, but they are still only designed to keep you gaming for a month or so, mmorpgs try to keep you going year on year

Even the better designed games where there is actually enough quest content to level you all the way will have grinds which you will have to do for rare loot, cash etc etc. Repetetive unchallenging game play just isnt good content. Thinking also of resource gathering grinds from crafting in these games.

Lets take Star Wars Galaxies, In their space section they have "Reverse Engineering" Where you take several looted Ship parts and combine their stats into one piece - How cool a concept is that you can literally have a totally unique engine youve built yourself with the best stats you can find. The number of individual loot items you can add depends on the "level" of the equipment so for a level 8 engine you need 8 Level 8 engines and you get the best stats from each combined into one new shiney engine. You get at best one piece of loot every 4 kills. However you can not pick a mob to get level 8 engines from it doesnt work that way, anything that drops level 8 engines will also drop level 1-7 engines and level 1-8 items of other types as well... Next you take into account that Reverse Engineering is about creating something "special" not just average, so ANYONE reverse engineering is looking for the upper centile parts as the lower ones are literally worthless. so for each and every stat on that level 8 engine you are going to want a top 1% part for that stat. Meaning that to create that "Worthy" level 8 engines you are going to have chewed through 800 level 8 engine drops. with level 8 engines being a 1 in 64 drop thats 51200 loot drops to make one "worthy" engine, thats an absolute minimum of 204800 Kills to build that one Engine! (Of course in the process you will likely have built a few other components at the same time - most likelly enough to kit out your ship completely). Even so 204800 kills is an amazing amount of time to spend in space shooting the same respawning mobs endlessly. It most likely equates to at least 1140 hours sat at one spot killing the same stuff repeatedly. Its no wonder that prices (in game currency) on these parts are "exceptional". Its also no wonder that many people would happily fork out £20-30 to get one finished engine of that spec to cut out hours upon hours of mindless shooting just waiting for the lucky loot roll.

For me I did the grind but I sold (for game currency) 99% of my good parts instead of using them and used the money to fund building a Zoo . And later sold excess credits for RL money. In most mmorpgs there are similiar grinds that can take hundreds of hours of less that entertaining game play to get to a desired goal. World of warcraft has its crafting grinds and raids, Lotro has a killer crafting grind etc etc. I gave up trying to master crafting in lotro and carried on mining resources but instead of using them myself sold for large ammounts of currency to those with in game cash to spare, and then bought the ready made items .

In Lotro if I were to rely on pure game mechanics for making money and not trading with other players It would take about 150 hours repeatedly killing mobs to gather enough loot to pay for 1 piece of high level armour. 900 hours for one suit of armour. Its really no wonder that the gold sellers do well.

But even without bypassing repetetive game play theres great examples of people paying cash for no game benefit whatsoever... Star Wars Galaxies again, The difference between this? and this :- in game play terms they do EXACTLY the same job. The first one takes 5 minutes of danger free game play to obtain for free. The second one you had to buy a new retail version oof the game to get - but could add it to your existing account. The two perform exactly as well as each other, but players were happily paying out £20 a time just to get the second one.

Another fine example of shiney baubel madness in mmorpgs the difference between this:-

http://swg.stoutman.com/showpainting.php?Painting=4

and this?

http://swg.stoutman.com/showpainting.php?Painting=80

The top painting is worth about 1 billion credits the lower one about 1-5 million... depending on server.

I think the resistance is because theres a lot of players who dont like the idea of being "owned" by an adult with more disposeable income who doesnt get to play as much. There may well also be concern that the same group of players with cash to spare might get shinier baubels than are available to earn through in game means. However this already happens in most games, there are already untradeable rewards exclusively available to those buying certain retail packs or expansions etc etc. The Games companies are sensible enough to make these items able to be added to an existing account instead of only available to new accounts started with that retail pack

Right, like I already agreed, people will pay for stuff, ringtones, skins, content unlocks and so on. They will even pay for a collectors edition with a different coloured box. This surprises noone.

The only question I have ever attempted to raise is if people should pay real money for game-money or to progress (pay to cheat).

If you send me 10 pounds and your oolite savegame, I will change the number of kills you have, and save you grinding to elite. Sound like a good plan?

Cmdr James wrote:

If you send me 10 pounds and your oolite savegame, I will change the number of kills you have, and save you grinding to elite. Sound like a good plan?

This is a keys to the kingdom issue thought isn't it? Went the system isn't open source and a group come together to play it you'll get economies springing up. For anything that is transferable.

The infinitely hackable nature of OOlite makes this pass time pointless in the extreme. (And yes I know your joking.)