There should even be an exchange rate for real money against ingame money, which would make ingame money more like a true currency, as you could allways exchange them for...

The exchange rate could be created through a kind of auctioning system where people can buy and sale other peoples ingame currency through this system..

The gamehost would take 20% of the money involved... after all they need to make money, and apple takes 30% from every Itunes sale, so 20% seems okay to me... it should cover their efforts well enough.

People could even pay their subscriptions with this money and actually play the game for free or even make money with it...

Every ingame auction or sale would be related to real money...

This would be a solution for many problems..

-People would be rewarded in real currency for time invested

-People with bussy real life schedules could still be competititve

-It illiminates item shops.... as they would be contradictionary to the working of this system

-The ingame econnomy would flourish as it will be tightly knit to the real life vallues of money..

-Goldsellers would be effectively be put out of buiseness... everyone can buy and sell gold...

Only down side....   It requires a real seccuritty system for the accounts....  which would be another win win situation as i am totally done with game accounts being hacked...

Im all for it actually. Anything that increases the potential for me to make money whilst playing games rather than doing actual work is all good with me.

The problem is that its still subject to the same IP laws and each game would have to willingly submit to such a system, and could just as easily exclude themselves from it. Plus I dont see outlined in your system how game developers would make money from the practice of selling their in game currency. You give 20% to the "broker" who I assume would be a 3rd party. Theres little to no incentive for game companies to go along with this on a massive level. The best we can hope for is a localized level like the station exchange servers.

Nevermind, the game host takes 20%...I just clarified that by reading your post again.

Originally posted by Inshalla

Im all for it actually. Anything that increases the potential for me to make money whilst playing games rather than doing actual work is all good with me.

The problem is that its still subject to the same IP laws and each game would have to willingly submit to such a system, and could just as easily exclude themselves from it. Plus I dont see outlined in your system how game developers would make money from the practice of selling their in game currency. You give 20% to the "broker" who I assume would be a 3rd party. Theres little to no incentive for game companies to go along with this on a massive level. The best we can hope for is a localized level like the station exchange servers.

Nevermind, the game host takes 20%...I just clarified that by reading your post again.

Actually the only place where real money transfers could be made would be this system... giving the 3rd party broker, which would be the gaming host 20% of all transfers....... making them good money...

And a reason to really guard illegal money trasnfers as they would cost them money..... I bet they will find an allgorythm to spot illegal money transfers ....

That would require very thought out and sophisticated game design to support such feature...

That I see as the main issue because your economy is bound to game economy and if game economy does not work, neither does yours.

Originally posted by Lord.Bachus

Originally posted by Inshalla

Im all for it actually. Anything that increases the potential for me to make money whilst playing games rather than doing actual work is all good with me.

The problem is that its still subject to the same IP laws and each game would have to willingly submit to such a system, and could just as easily exclude themselves from it. Plus I dont see outlined in your system how game developers would make money from the practice of selling their in game currency. You give 20% to the "broker" who I assume would be a 3rd party. Theres little to no incentive for game companies to go along with this on a massive level. The best we can hope for is a localized level like the station exchange servers.

Nevermind, the game host takes 20%...I just clarified that by reading your post again.

 

Actually the only place where real money transfers could be made would be this system... giving the 3rd party broker, which would be the gaming host 20% of all transfers....... making them good money...

 

And a reason to really guard illegal money trasnfers as they would cost them money..... I bet they will find an allgorythm to spot illegal money transfers ....

 

 So the point remains, what incentive would game developers have to submit to this system. Surely they're not going to do it out of the kindness of their heart. If players are making real world money off of playing their games they're going to want a substantial cut of that.

edit: oops, misunderstood you: only players would be paying for ingame stuff with real life cash. Get the item mall out of the claws of the companies :)

But that would make them competitors from the company who might as well sell stuff themselves and a formula like that would invite a lot of farmers, bots, grinders, etc., making it not much of a game but work, with many people who are only playing to make cash.

The best alternative is EVE's system: You can buy gametime with rl currency and sell it to other players for ingame currency: people that  are making a lot of cash ingame can play for free and people who are in need of a lot of cash ingame can buy gametime and sell it to other players, thus (to a certain debatable extent) locking out RMT.

Eve already does/did this with play-time cards.  I definately utlized it whenever I needed an expensive ship upgrade.

I am ALWAYS leery of any conversation that includes "People with bussy real life schedules could still be competititve".... No they shouldn't.  If you can only put in 2 hrs a day, you should NOT be as competitive as someone who plays 20 hrs a day.  The same way someone can't just get off the couch and play as well at sports as people who have trained their entire careers.

The elite are no longer elite because even a 12 y/o can accomplish everything.  Everyone is not equal and people who can't play or don't know how to play should not have the same access to things as people who make the game their life.

And for the record, I've never been a Raider.  I play the game, I level up.  I enjoy the stories.  I don't put the time or effort into Raiding because I don't feel like wasting that much time to effective.  Do I respect the people that do? Yes.

That's it.  That's my rant. I will say I'm a fan of paying for ingame money.  I don't like the Chinese Gold Farmers but you must admit how much it helps to front some money to gain useful items (Epic mounts anyone).

---

Originally posted by Ikeda

If you can only put in 2 hrs a day, you should NOT be as competitive as someone who plays 20 hrs a day.  The same way someone can't just get off the couch and play as well at sports as people who have trained their entire careers.

---

This is completely wrong.

Invested time into an activity does not equal your 'skills'. Usain Bolt anyone?

Everyone have different abilities, dispositions and learning curve. Games that requires you hours and hours of repetitive activity puts artificial boundaries on players to set a lowest common denominator because everyone can do the grind.

'Bad' players will still be 'bad', regardless how much real money or time they spent on the game.

Originally posted by Ikeda

 

I am ALWAYS leery of any conversation that includes "People with bussy real life schedules could still be competititve".... No they shouldn't.  If you can only put in 2 hrs a day, you should NOT be as competitive as someone who plays 20 hrs a day.  The same way someone can't just get off the couch and play as well at sports as people who have trained their entire careers.

The elite are no longer elite because even a 12 y/o can accomplish everything.  Everyone is not equal and people who can't play or don't know how to play should not have the same access to things as people who make the game their life.

People that put in huge amounts of time get rewarded in another way... (more time to train their skills, where more training in general creates a more skilled player>

And playing skill will be the only deciding factor on whome is the better player.. So if the person that plays only 2 hours a day is really gifted, why shouldn't he be the king of PvP?

Second Life does this already, sort of.

You can get a SL job or build things and sell them earning Linden Dollars.  Those Linden Dollars can be then converted to real currency.

They have a very complex currency market that one can by, sell, and trade Linden Dollars on and convert to US Dollars or other currencies.  LL takes a percentage of all sales of Linden Dollars for Real currency and vice versa.  Linden Labs makes bank on this.

The current rate for buying Linden Dollars is about 10,000 Linden Dollars for $38 USD.  The current Rate for selling Linden Dollars is about $35USD for 10,000 Linden Dollars.  That $3 differential is LL's cut.  One can try to bypass that via the ingame currency exchange to get better rates.  Like I said, it is complex.

There are people who make their sole living on Second Life.  Such folks are rare, however.  Folks like me, have it all set up to where SL costs nothing and I can even occassionally convert the meager amounts I make into cash-- as I did 2 weeks ago to buy a pizza.  I converted about 5K Linden Dollars into $17USD.

So yes, it could be done, but be very assured that LL devotes serious manpower and hours keeping their currency regulated (for obvious reasons).  It is no small task for sure.

I remember when games used to be designed to be entertaining distractions and people loaded them up to escape the realities of things like work.

Originally posted by Lord.Bachus

Originally posted by Ikeda

 

I am ALWAYS leery of any conversation that includes "People with bussy real life schedules could still be competititve".... No they shouldn't.  If you can only put in 2 hrs a day, you should NOT be as competitive as someone who plays 20 hrs a day.  The same way someone can't just get off the couch and play as well at sports as people who have trained their entire careers.

The elite are no longer elite because even a 12 y/o can accomplish everything.  Everyone is not equal and people who can't play or don't know how to play should not have the same access to things as people who make the game their life.

People that put in huge amounts of time get rewarded in another way... (more time to train their skills, where more training in general creates a more skilled player>

And playing skill will be the only deciding factor on whome is the better player.. So if the person that plays only 2 hours a day is really gifted, why shouldn't he be the king of PvP?

Some people feel that at their core MMO's should reward their players for playing more, therefore those people should have advantages versus those who've played (or paid) less.  Sort of a core design philosophy that is at odds with the newer player base which tends to favor more FPS balance where player skill trumphs all.

I really don't understand the whole mindset of how things like this need to be "fair". 

If someone is 30 hours into a game, they should be on a power level equal to that content.  If someone is 200 hours into a game they should be at a powerl level of that content. 

I've never understood the mentality that someone should be compensated for NOT playing a game.  It is a choice to only play 2 or 20 hours a week and in most games those people are not playing together or competing over anything. 

I think the problem is that most mmos rely on progression that isn't very fun and situations like this are born.  I would rather see games designed that are fun to play than games that are tedious to the point someone is willing to pay another player to progress them through it or avoid actually playing the game. 

Originally posted by Lord.Bachus

There should even be an exchange rate for real money against ingame money, which would make ingame money more like a true currency, as you could allways exchange them for...

The exchange rate could be created through a kind of auctioning system where people can buy and sale other peoples ingame currency through this system..

 

You couldn't make a viable exchange rate, all you could do would be buy a block of currency as some kind of item shop trinket...which would be naff. Or follow the EVE model, which is far from 'an exchange rate'.

 

The gamehost would take 20% of the money involved... after all they need to make money, and apple takes 30% from every Itunes sale, so 20% seems okay to me... it should cover their efforts well enough.

People could even pay their subscriptions with this money and actually play the game for free or even make money with it...

 

You mean credit farmers and afkers could?

 

Every ingame auction or sale would be related to real money...

 

Like a reverse cash shop, no thanks.

 

This would be a solution for many problems..

 

No it wouldn't..

 

 

-People would be rewarded in real currency for time invested

 

You are meant to be 'rewarded' with fun, mmos are games and not jobs.

 

-People with bussy real life schedules could still be competititve

 

I'm busy in rl, I don't feel the need for a cash incentive from playing a game to make me feel some sort of parity with younger individuals who can spend more time in a game having fun.

 

-It illiminates item shops.... as they would be contradictionary to the working of this system

 

No it doesn't, if anything it further increases their grip.

 

-The ingame econnomy would flourish as it will be tightly knit to the real life vallues of money..

 

Er no.

 

-Goldsellers would be effectively be put out of buiseness... everyone can buy and sell gold...

 

The people able to grind the most gold and thus make the most money would be 'put out of business'? No, actually you would be making them more money and increasing their presence in the game.

 

 

 

Only down side....   It requires a real seccuritty system for the accounts....  which would be another win win situation as i am totally done with game accounts being hacked...

 

How exactly do you 'value' a games currency against real money again? And exactly what rl currency are you going to value or possible even peg against?

Given that most ig economies (barring perhaps EVE) are totally shafted and/or so artificial as to be impossible to set up anything even remotely like an spot rate against a real currency denomination, I fail to see how it would work.

You can't set it up as an exchange rate, all you could do would be to throw the doors open to everyone to sell gold for cash at whatever price. Guess what, those gold sellers who have been doing that for years will corner the market anyway, so whats the point again?

I'll grant you it's a novel idea, but it is a bad one imo.

PS, The reason people who are 'really gifted' can often not 'be king' in mmos is that they are progression based... If I want 'fair' I play rts/fps or something like Bloodlines Champions.

Originally posted by Kyleran

Some people feel that at their core MMO's should reward their players for playing more, therefore those people should have advantages versus those who've played (or paid) less.  Sort of a core design philosophy that is at odds with the newer player base which tends to favor more FPS balance where player skill trumphs all.

Actually, we're the OLDER player base.  In a new wrapping.

MMOs and RPGs are a weird anomaly in the grand scheme of game playing.  A game that SIMULATES improvement of skill through time spent. :)

While there is some actual skill being improved by having say... thousands and thousands of hours into a game like WoW, most of the improvement is virtual.

If you go to a new game, or even make a new character, all that is lost.

Pretty much RPGs are the first and only time that has 'virtual improvement' as such a huge factor.  Older games are more a product of skill and actual physical improvement... even other video games, or other tabletop games.

MMORPGs and their parents RPGs are just strange, and I always find it even STRANGER that advocates of the time over skill method of leveling think they're more old school, when they're just this tiny little blip on the vast thousands of years of history of games. :)

Pretty sure Entropia Universe has already done this...