Diablo 2 Items Bringing Home the Bacon 329
||Plazm|| writes: "I read an update over at Diabloii.net that talks about how some items in the game are producing sizeable income for some people. It points to an article at the San Francisco Chronicle describing some of these money makers. One banker claims he's made $25000 since he started with Diablo 2 and Ultima Online! Who are the people paying real money for this stuff? A few bucks is one thing, but a few hundred? I believe this has been talked about on /. before, but is the 'problem' getting worse? Is it a 'problem' at all?"
Infoceptor had great coverage (Score:5, Informative)
Free Market (Score:3, Insightful)
Buying this stuff is not for me, but I'm not one to stand in the way of capitalism.
Re:Free Market (Score:3, Insightful)
Personally, I would think part of the njoyment of online games is the chalenge of ganing a position of power withing the game universe. A vary high quality game will operate as a free market economy, where players can take on any profession withing the game, that they see fit. Likewise, the transition between the game universe and the real world is made possible by the quality and attention-to-detail found within the game. It's a testiment to the brilliance of the game designers, that people will allow this monetary and social transition between the game universe and the real world. They deserve our respect for their great accomplishment.
--CTH
Re:Free Market (Score:3, Interesting)
Players buying accounts, selling items, all of that, introduces the element of corruption into the game. What's more important, in my opinion, is garunteeing the authentisity of the commodoties in the game.
Example: I'm playing "Diablo IX: Diablo Comes back for some more because he's a masochist." I've reached level 97 and have recently picked up a "Tactical Thermonuclear Weapon +12" on the Fourth Level of Hell by kicking the crap out of a Tax Accountant. Now, Tactical Thermonuclear Weapons aren't terribly common in the Diablo IX universe, let alone +12 ones, and I'm allready armed with a Mighty Spork so I decide to sell the damn thing to help cover my ISP costs for the month. When I sitck the Tac Nuke up on Ebay, however, I discover that there's no market for Tac Nukes because someone's developed a crack that allows them to create any item instantaniously. This sucks. All my effort is for naught. I can't even sell this thing for cash because there's no way to garuntee that I'm selling a legitimate Tac Nuke. Even hard core gamers who don't want hacked weapons won't buy it from me because there's no way to garuntee that isn't not illegit.
That's my question. Why can't we work out a way to ensure the authenticity of the items in a game. If we can do that, why can't we develop a way to either disable or destroy inauthentic items?
Would you believe it's against the law? (Score:2)
If the people at Blizzard have ways of logging these things (the purchase would be logged by ebay, etc, but the game mechanics would pretty much have to be logged on battle net), it could make for a very interesting court case / slashdot article someday in the future.
Seeing someone sucessfully prosecuted for selling a fraudulent item would also be an interesting way of discouraging duping, etc.
You're not Don King by any chance? (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't play these online roleplaying games, but let me give you a real-life example...
Let us say I am beating the snot out of Mike Tyson (hey this is my example, I can beat up Mike Tyson in my exmples) and I'm up by several points. Don King comes over to my corner, hands me some cash and I take a enough hits to give Mike some more points.
Money for a score, where as this Ebaying is money for an item in a game without scores. Either way you're taking a dive.
Re:You're not Will Smith by any chance? (Score:2)
What, are you the Fresh Prince [sing365.com], pre-BelAir?
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Free Market vs. A Game (Score:4, Insightful)
I'm going to stretch my analogy to apply to people who can kick your ass in Diablo II not because they are more skilled but because they do nothing but play. Random Dude 1, who works a full time job, can never possibly keep up with Random Dude 2, who is in school and plays Diablo for 30 hours a week. As devil's advocate, I ask why shouldn't Dude 1 be able to level the playing field with money? 1 has money, 2 has time. Why is time considered to be the more acceptable currency with which to purchase online prowess?
There are games out there that wrote this into their business model- the ability to outright purchase, from the game company directly, items and status. For people who have more of the currency "money" than the currency "time". Either way, you're buying it.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Free Market vs. A Game (Score:2)
> another and let the best player win, not to sell
> the victory to the player with the most
> disposable income and least scruples.
Congratulations. I think you've summarized the DOJ's case against Microsoft.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Free Market (Score:5, Insightful)
There are already enough lowlifes to worry about in normal online games (take Counterstrike as an example). However, when there's the possibility to win real cash in a game is where the bottom feeders really begin to show up and ruin everyones fun.
In Everquest, this has lead on some servers to a total cornering of the item market by ebay-sale-guilds. If you wanted a rare item, you had no choice other than to buy it for cash, since all the important places in the game had been occupied by them.
This had such a profound impact on most people's gaming experience that (as mentioned in the article) sony's lawyers approached ebay and were able to shut down the sales.
In Diablo 2, real-cash sales have lead to a staggering surge in cheats and scams. Whole game accounts were cracked by brute force and all their contents sold away on ebay.
Other people used exploits to allow them to loot duel players, often leaving more unexperienced players without a single dime while all their stuff was sold away by the looter.
There have also been numerous hacks to steal and duplicate items, mostly with the intention of selling them away for hard cash.
All in all, the ability of making cash has severely damaged the playing communities of the affected games.
I definitely hope that any future online games forbid the sale of items. And the final statement from Paul Sams gives me a little bit of hope that it will at least be so in Blizzard's future game World of Warcraft...
Re:Free Market (Score:3, Insightful)
You are correct, there are problems with treating online game space as market.
I definitely hope that any future online games forbid the sale of items. And the final statement from Paul Sams gives me a little bit of hope that it will at least be so in Blizzard's future game World of Warcraft...
Ok, now you have gone too far. It is no solution to stacker development of online communities. Real money trading in online world is not inheritly evil. It is just that current worlds are not mature enough to handle the real money. Let's not forbit real money, let's hope that next game world is well enough to hadle it.
--
nyri
Re:Free Market (Score:4, Insightful)
But even before UO, there was that obscure trading card game called "Magic" where rich nerds, the same that buy items in Diablo, shelled out big bucks for the Black Lotus.
And before Magic, there were all the kids who collected baseball cards. Some lucky kid got a Mickey Mantle rookie and he sells it to the rich nerd across the street.
Real money for unsubstantial things (electrons or paper card) has been with us for awhile.
Re:Free Market (Score:2)
Another issue is that a lot of people get these items by being in a Monarchy that runs quests. It's really frustrating to go to the trouble of setting up and running quests just to see the items in an Auction on acvault the next day. If I saw my vassals selling the stuff I helped them get on ebay I'd release them. I play for the fun of it, if you want to take advantage of my generocity, then you arent really my friends, and I don't need you ruining the fun for me.
People selling stuff on Ebay definately makes balancing the game and the game's economy more of a challenge for the developers. You can't prevent people from doing it, so I think that designing the game so it plays a very limited part is important. The developers of AC have done this well, and it's one of the reasons I play that game rather than another on-line game.
If you want to play to make real world cash, go play another game, we're both happier that way.
At any price (Score:5, Insightful)
At least this time it is costing them something in real money to get these kind of advantages. I tip my hat to blizzards work that they have locked their game down tight enough that people are going to extremes outside the game to get these kinds of advantages.
Re:At any price (Score:3, Interesting)
I know someone in real life who has shelled over at least three digit dollar amounts for Diablo items. He does not fit your stereotype of a god mode Quake cheater. In fact, he was a dedicated developer on one of the most popular Quake mods of all time, which he played very often with his clan in all seriousness.
I would more quickly equate the type of person to do this sort of item purchasing to be the same type who would purchase stand up Street Fighter arcade machines: the hardcore gamer who [has a lot of cash and] is willing to up the ante and excitement by adding as many elements to the experience as possible.
Re:At any price (Score:5, Insightful)
You make it seem as if there's some real-world morality issue here. Remember it's just a game.
The people who are buying items, services, or characters for games like Diablo, Ultima, Asheron's Call, Everquest, etc. are doing it because it's their way of having fun; it's their way of enjoying the game. As long as it doesn't interfere with others' ability to enjoy the game (and if it does, it's arguably a fault of the game's design, not of the purchaser), why should it matter to you?
The fact is, these people are just playing a sort of game within the game: pushing the limits of the system within the parameters allowed (or at least, not explicitly disallowed) by the game's designers. Think Kobayashi Maru (sp?) and Captain Kirk (though there the "unfair" advantage was brains, not cash).
Morality is kind of irrelevant here. If you're upset because people can buy the best items in role-playing games online, then you are just role-playing a victim yourself :-)
I heard someone spent $400... (Score:5, Funny)
To each, his own.
Re:I heard someone spent $400... (Score:2, Funny)
Trading real time vs. real money (Score:2, Insightful)
So doesn't it make sense?
As for whether or not this is a "problem": let people do as they please with their money, as long as they don't harm other people.
Script Kiddies (Score:4, Funny)
The Script Kiddies have to do _something_ with the credit card numbers they steal.
Re:Script Kiddies (Score:2, Interesting)
This is sickeningly true, actually; at least in my case.
A couple weeks ago I got a notification from iBill (ebay's online billing service that let's people pay with their credit card). Someone used a stolen credit card to buy some Everquest stuff from me a few months ago and it's finally getting sorted out. At any rate, I'm shit out of luck, as I can't prove that I delivered the items, so iBill is taking $300 out of my checking account.
Only saving grace is that I know that the person who ripped me is in jail right now.
Make Money Fast! (Score:4, Interesting)
Get a Sorceress, put some diamonds in a helm, and wait. Your odds of finding magic items goes up.
As you fight on Battle.net, have a really good Telekenesis skill, so that you can steal every dropped item. Have a goodly stock of identify scrolls/books so that you don't need to Town Portal to check the items as you grab em.
Do this for 4 hours a day for 3 weeks and you'll have enough items to start eBaying. Happy hunting.
Re:Make Money Fast! (Score:5, Insightful)
Um, that's perfect topazes, not diamonds. Current reports suggest that a magic find percentage over 200 doesn't do much good, so there's no need to go overboard.
And they 'balanced' telekenesis so that you can only pick up minor items (like potions). This is very annoying in single player mode, where there is no one to steal drops from...
As for the economy aspect, I think it's kinda dumb to spend real money on Diablo II items. However, some people want uber-characters than can walk into any game and kill other players. Or maybe they're not good enough to take on Hell mode without help.
Dunno. Spending money on Diablo II items isn't any worse than spending it on an astrologer or the lottery.
At any rate, the economy associated with Diablo II has been interesting. There's been a lot of shifts in the marketplace in response to bugs allowing duplication of items, and the changes to gambling rules. Some moderately valuable items (like the Stone of Jordan ring or perfect skulls) became the new currency for a while. SoJs have become much more rare these days, and aren't used as currency as much. Pskulls are an interesting currency, because they are constantly being generated, but also constantly being used up.
Interestingly, gold (the currency inside the game) isn't often used for trading, because it isn't valuable enough!
I've also seen people auctioning off fully equipped high-level characters on eBay. However, with the balance changes in Lord of Destruction, some of these characters (which might have sold for hundreds of dollars) are now nearly worthless.
All in all, it's not too easy to base your economy on factors (like rarity) that can be changed at the whim of some programmers.
More clarifications (Score:5, Informative)
In the most recent patch (v1.09) Blizzard implemented a Diminishing returns formula for items that added a % chance to find magic items (magic find). A full explanation of magic find is here at Blizzard's official strategy site. [battle.net] Items can drop normal (white colored), magical (blue), rare (yellow), part of an item set (green) or unique (gold). The diminishing returns formula is not posted on that site, but basically diminishing returns kick in bigtime for unique items around 200% increased MF, kick in later for set items and even later for rare items. If you're wearing items that give you a 400% increased chance to find a magical item, you only get like, a 220-230% increased chance of getting a unique.
Blizzard probably implemented this because with the previous patch (1.08), magic find worked on all monsters, including bosses (who always drop at least magical items), so characters were loading themselves down with MF gear and "farming" the bosses over and over to get rares, sets and uniques to drop. (Normal monsters don't always drop, so it's simply more reliable to farm bosses for drops). So since people were abusing magic find, it was decreased in potency ("nerfed").
"And they 'balanced' telekenesis so that you can only pick up minor items (like potions). This is very annoying in single player mode, where there is no one to steal drops from..."
Actually, telekinesis (TK) was changed because someone (or a group of someones) wrote an "item-grabber" hack. The hack basically was a packet sniffer/sender, and when it registered that a rare, set, or unique item had dropped on the ground, it send a packet to the server saying "I picked that item up." Of course, the program could be configured to also grab gold, potions, scrolls, runes, anything. I don't recall if Blizzard broke the functionality of the hack in a patch before deciding to kill Telekinesis to solve the problem...but if they did it most likely took about two days for the people writing the hack to figure out the new packets and re-write the program. The program still works, but since TK is broken it only lets characters pick items up if they are right next to it (I think, there were rumors that players could send packets to make the server think they walked over to an item and picked it up when they didn't move, but that sounds fishy).
"Some moderately valuable items (like the Stone of Jordan ring or perfect skulls) became the new currency for a while. SoJs have become much more rare these days, and aren't used as currency as much."
The Stone of Jordan (SOJ) became a currency because it was a useful item, took up one inventory slot, and was relatively easy to get if you had enough gold (prior to patch 1.08 you could "gamble" for items. The Stone of Jordan is a unique ring. There are two other unique rings, but since before 1.08 uniques couldn't generate if one was already in the game, you could hold the other two rings and spend lots of easily obtainable gold gambling on rings and makes lots of SOJ's).
"Pskulls are an interesting currency, because they are constantly being generated, but also constantly being used up"
PSkulls used to be currency before patch 1.08. PSkulls could be used to "re-roll" the stats on a rare item (rare items have up to 6 modifiers, magic items only 2), and this reroll could produce ANY stat available, with better stats possible than any drop you could get from a monster. PSkulls were also rare, since gems dropped *very* infrequently from monsters, and the highest quality gem that could drop was a normal (3 normals make a flawless, 3 flawless make a perfect, or a gem shrine makes 1 normal go to 1 flawless, etc. there are also chipped and flawed under normal). Now, in 1.09, flawless gems (skulls are gems, technically) can drop, and do drop quite frequently, so they are much more common. Also, the main reason PSkulls plummeted in price was that the way to use 6 PSkulls and a Rare to reroll the rare had it's power decreased GREATLY. It can now produce items with stats 40% as powerful as the previous max (item level of 100 previously possible, max level of 40 available now).
Interestingly, gold (the currency inside the game) isn't often used for trading, because it isn't valuable enough!
That's because you lose a set percentage of your gold when you die, and you can only carry a certain amount of gold. There are other smaller reasons, but those are the main ones.
All in all, it's not too easy to base your economy on factors (like rarity) that can be changed at the whim of some programmers.
Then the programmers deliberately try to affect the economy. Right now new SOJ's are going up because no new ones are coming into the game, and all other items are being produced at an alarming rate. A few more weeks of this and the SOJ currency *might* break, but I doubt it, it's too ingrained in people's minds.
That's about all I can think of about the subject. Hope it helped.
~Moller
makes sense. (Score:2)
But yea, that explains why the economy suddenly went to hell over the past week. A huge influx of new, powerful items with no increase in the amount of currency. That easily makes the currency unit skyrocket in value, or makes everything else drop drastically in value. Probably mostly the value of everything else dropping, since the rate of SOJ's coming into the game since the expansion came out has been effectively constant (at a rate relatively tiny to the previous rate).
~Moller
well... (Score:2)
This is why most of the hardcore treasure hunters don't look for loot in MP games. They make password games (or limit the # of people in a game to 1) and do repeated Mephisto/High Council/Baal runs on Nightmare or Hell. So you don't have the inflated hit points from multiple people in the game and Boss drops are not affected by the number of people in the game.
Besides, the problem you described also applies to bowazons and necros. None of them are close enough to the action to pick up the drops before the tanks. Sorcs have an advantage over zons and necros because they can teleport in...but in the end it's still impractical to treasure-hunt in games with other people.
Unless you're lucky enough to play with people you know and trust. If you are, I envy you.
~Moller
The thing is, a lot of nerds w. money play D2 (Score:2, Insightful)
It sort of reminds me of Magic (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:It sort of reminds me of Magic (Score:3, Insightful)
Intellectual property? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Intellectual property? (Score:2)
Bryguy
Re:Intellectual property? (Score:2)
If you sold me the right to come into the garden and pick the flowers (and don't explicitly prohibit selling them), they yes, I would say it is ethical.
If you just had the garden, and I came in without asking and picked some flowers, well, no, clearly not.
Why should virtual property be different from real property in that respect?
Re:Please not another IP morality dilemma (Score:2)
This question is somewhat solved by dividing output up into two catagories, one where the writer of the program created most of the output (e.g. UIs, statistical compilations, etc.), and one where the user created most of the output (e.g. compiled programs, word processor documents, etc.). But what about things that are half and half, such as game screenshots? Or things that are neither, such as computer created symphonies? I think this is a question that cannot be answered easily.
Karma for sale... (Score:5, Funny)
Yes, that's right. If you want to be influential in the
Leave the dirty work to us. We here at KarmaCo have the knowledge and experience to create YOUR perfect Slashdot ID. Our trained Karma Consultants know how to build Karma quickly. We post early, we can be funny, we say nice things about Linux and Open Software, and mean things about Microsoft. Once your ID has reached the magical 50 point Karma Level, and after we've received your payment, we turn the password over to you.
Once you take control of the ID you can troll all you'd like as you wait for your Karma level to slowly decrease. Alternatively, you can post non-troll messages without having to concern yourself with others' opinions of you. Remember, your new Slashdot ID makes you look important and smart. Because not only do you get the +1 bonus, but other people will recognize you as that-guy-who-said-that-cool-thing-last-month.
But wait, there's more. Act now and we'll include a limited edition Signal_11 flame.
Act now, low ID #'s are going fast!
Re:Karma for sale... (Score:2)
Buy now while suppiles last!
What's 50 karma worth? (Score:2)
Buy from me! You have an account that was in effect before there was the Karma Kap! Get an account where you can troll for much longer than the 50 karma ones!
This has been tried (Score:5, Informative)
Somebody with a high-hundreds/low thousands karma (i.e. a student with *far* too much time on their hands) (was it FascDotKilledMyPR? apologies if I'm wrong.) tried to flog their account on ebay. Apparently, there were some ridiculously high bids (some valued karma more than dollars)
In one of his rare moments of creative lucidity, Rob 'CmdrTaco' Malda aranged for the karma for this individual to vary (at random) between a cap value and zero, with the cap value reducing at a rate that would bring it to zero at the moment the ebay auction closed.
The whole debacle is best recorded in an IRC log where the
This ends your "Boring And Useless" slashdot history lesson.
{ps - no URLs, because I have better things to do than look them up}
Re:This has been tried (Score:2)
Re:This has been tried (Score:2)
Re:This has been tried (Score:2)
You mean 'arranged for', meaning 'ask one of my friends who actually KNOWS perl and SQL to do this cool[1] thing to this guy's karma'?
- A.P.
[1] and rather disingenuous
Re:This has been tried (Score:2)
The way to go about it is not to give the User ID or number. They can't slap what they can't find.
I'll give it to anyone with a PayPal account and 10 becks to spare. Email or reply if interested.
Re:Karma for sale... (Score:2, Informative)
And if the inspiration runs out, KarmaCo also has enough accounts that it can do cooperative Karma farming. With an average catch of 40 randomly assigned moderator points per day, KarmaCo can guarantee its production even when there's a shortage of like-minded independent moderators.
:-)
Re:Karma for sale... (Score:2)
Personal Choice (Score:4, Interesting)
The only problem I see is the fact that you can win at something because you have lots of money. But you know what, isn't that what the real world is anyway? I think Microsoft used this tactic, and someone by the name of my favorite breakfast juice...
It's worse than..... (Score:2, Interesting)
We've sunk to a WHOLE NEW LOW.
People sure do suck.
Re:It's worse than..... (Score:2)
Re:It's worse than..... (Score:2, Funny)
-Legion
at a price (Score:2, Insightful)
And when the programmers sell the items... (Score:3, Interesting)
It could turn into an extra revenue stream for the developers if used very carefully, but such a thing would eventually destroy the game for average players. And here is another question for you to consider. Is it illegal for a hacker to create these items using a bug or hack, and then sell them for cash? And of course, I mean outside of the legality issues of hacking onto the servers in the first place.
END COMMUNICATION
Re:And when the programmers sell the items... (Score:2, Interesting)
So what? (Score:5, Insightful)
Wake up guys, MONEY IS NO MORE REAL THAN THESE GAME ITEMS.
What is the value of a $20 bill? The paper and ink (and metal threads, and whatever else they throw in these days) aren't worth very much. The value of a $20 bill is *whatever people will give you for it*.
I think the people who are trading hundreds of dollars for these game items are paying far too much, but there is no inherent reason why such transactions are wrong.
Re:So what? (Score:2)
It is no more real, but there are more people trying to make it hard to duplicate, and the penalties for being caught duping money is much higher then being caught duping a Helm Of Random-Name-Here...
Plus there is a whole government agency that attempts to keep the value fairly stable (and like most government workers their success rate is pretty variable -- but sometimes it beats nothing).
So I think that makes money a better long term investment then game bits.
Plus the strong likelihood that most people will give you almost the same stuff for it next week as they will now (this is sometimes a disadvantage, frequently an advantage).
Re:So what? (Score:2)
No, just that despite neither dollars nor Diablo trinkets being tied to real world materials (at least not since we went off the gold standard) there are differences between "backed by the full faith of the United States Treasury" and "um, we kinda try to prevent counterfeiting".
I'm pretty much against adding regulation to anything, I would like less of it.
Well, other then having a pretty good mid-end notebook, I don't own any high end computer gear (unless something with a 20G SCSI drive counts). Given a ton of money I would be more likely to "waste" it on all manner of photography crap.
I'm pretty happy if other people would rather buy different things. In fact if they all wanted the same crap I did that would rather drive it's price up, and make it hard for me to buy.
Re:What is the value of a $20 bill? (Score:2)
Any questions?
Re:What is the value of a $20 bill? (Score:2)
Until then, you can decompose a bill into its constituent atoms and price each one, but that is missing the point. It is worth $20 because the US government guarantees to pay the amount printed on the face.
This is not gold we are talking about here dudes.
Gold is more like the commodities being sold in these games. There is no value printed on them backed up by an institution. Commodities, unlike currency, are worth whatever people are willing to pay.
Wrong (Score:3, Informative)
It used to be that people would write into contracts that a certain portion of debt had to be repaid in gold, as protection against devaluation of the dollar. By making the greenback legal tender, these sorts of contracts were made unenforcable. Furthermore, in the options and futures markets, one does not necessarily have to pay in shares of stock or barrels of oil, or whatever. One may instead delviver the fair market value of those goods. Finally, if you were to offer in trade a car in exchange for (for example) two cows, then you would be legally obligated to accept the dollar value of two cows.
Basically what I'm driving at is this: it is illegal to refuse to accept US dollars within the borders of the US. You are right that hyperinflation could devalue currency very quickly, however as long as the police and, push come to shove, the armed forces, have enough power to keep the population in line, the value of a dollar cannot hit zero.
That being said, I agree with your point that if people will give you money for your Diablo stuff, it has value. It is certainly a highly unstable investment, but that doesn't mean its necessarily worthless.
Re:Wrong (Score:4, Interesting)
Similarly, when you go in to a fast food place like Burger King, and they refuse any bill larger than $20 or a whole pile of change. How is that legal? If I show up with $100, its real US money, why don't they have to take it?
Or are they required to take it, but will give you a real hard time about it?
Re:Wrong (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Wrong (Score:2, Informative)
Basically, you can tell Burger King 'I refuse to pay in $20 bills, I'm only going to pay in $100 bills', but they can say 'we don't want to sell you anything, please leave'. They don't -have- to take your business; contracts (buying a hamburger is an implied contract) are completely optional for both parties, and they don't have to enter into them if they don't want to.
--Dan
legal tender (Score:4, Informative)
read the full explanation [snopes2.com]
here's the problem (Score:3, Informative)
When this happens it takes away from the people who need that item for game play. There are whole guilds that just farm, and camp the monster with the items and don't allow anyone else to fight that monster, even if its neccesary for the continuation of the game.
of course I have no sympathy for the makers of these game since they insist on not solving these problems programatically.
Its really not that hard.
SOJ (Score:2, Informative)
Parents Were Wrong! (Score:5, Funny)
What the hell -- people auction off domain names. Isn't that the same thing? It isn't "real", either.
The wife... (Score:5, Interesting)
This sort of thing is no worse than the Beanie Baby craze. If you can make good money playing games (or buying and selling stuffed dolls for hundreds more than the 50 cents worth of material they're made of), more power to you. I'm not into gaming as much as I used to be, but if I was I'd be more than happy to harvest items and sell them for cash. Talk about the ultimate job.
Re:The wife... (Score:2, Troll)
...made $150 000 selling pictures of herself masturbating, because her hubby was too damn busy playing Everquest to give her the bone.
Re:The wife... (Score:2)
Er, izzat because he isn't playing Everquest all the time any more, or for some other (unrelated) reason?
Legitimate but lame (Score:4, Insightful)
Sure, you can probably find someone to sell it to you. Sure, you can pick it up and start using it in game. Sure, it'll help you survive (probably by a large margin). But then where's the fun?
The game
If you leapfrog that whole phase and jump right into the uber-powered elite, then you've just skipped over all the enjoyment. It's just like when I was playing AD&D all the time and constantly encountering players who didn't want to play mages below 5th level "because it was just too hard". Phtt. Rodents.
Sure, I'll accept that the overwhelming majority of players out there don't appreciate the pleasure of struggling at the low power levels. These guys just hate that low level crap and want to get over to wailing on critters so large that only its ankle appears on their monitors.
Let these guys waste their money robbing themselves of the true pleasure of the game. It doesn't do anything to reduce my pleasure, and it removes these weenies from my immediate surroundings.
They're doing what they want and giving me a reason to call them lamers. I like that. Everyone wins.
Re:Legitimate but lame (Score:2)
I completely agree that the challenge is the whole point of the game. Of course winning is fun, but of course I enjoy the process. It is a game. That is why games are cool.
Maybe I should start a game that allows people to win immediately. "Click here to win." I wonder if I would get any takers.
have you played diablo 2? (Score:2)
That couldn't be farther from the truth.
Diablo 2 (with expansion, since that's what most people on the Closed Battle.net realms* use these days) has 3 difficulty levels and 5 acts. The difficulty levels are normal, nightmare and hell. You must beat each act in sequence progress to the next difficulty level.
Normal is easy. Normal is *ridiculously* easy. The ONLY way to make normal SLIGHTLY difficult is to play a sick variant character (like a sorceress that doesn't use spells and tries to compete in melee combat).
Normal is also boring. There's no fear of dying. The first act plays the same every single time, and it's damn slow.
Never mind that each character class will generally play the same way through normal. It normally isn't until you reach mid nightmare or hell that a specific character is developed enough (with skill distribution and equipment) for you to start being able to use strategies you've developed or had in mind for the character.
"Sure, I'll accept that the overwhelming majority of players out there don't appreciate the pleasure of struggling at the low power levels. These guys just hate that low level crap and want to get over to wailing on critters so large that only its ankle appears on their monitors."
Perhaps there's a reason for this? Why do people play video games. In most cases it's to have fun, right? What would most people consider to be more fun, tromping around a small grassy field with a disk of wood strapped to one forearm and a small pointy piece of metal strapped to the other, poking zombies that are so slow they routinely die before they can even take a swing at you...or running (or teleporting) around wearing a powerful set of armor you wrested from the cold body of some vile demon, wielding a magical weapon you had to work long and hard to acquire, fighting hordes of demons that *will* kill you if you falter? There are reasons most people like the mid-to-end-game more than the early game. What's wrong with that?
"Let these guys waste their money robbing themselves of the true pleasure of the game. It doesn't do anything to reduce my pleasure, and it removes these weenies from my immediate surroundings."
Obviously you think something is wrong with that. They're "weenies" and "robbing themselves of the true pleasure of the game." This is the "true pleasure" defined by you, right? Where no one else could really be enjoying the game as much as you are because they aren't playing the game the way that gives you the most enjoyment?
"They're doing what they want and giving me a reason to call them lamers. I like that. Everyone wins."
What reason is that? The fact that they:
a. don't enjoy playing the game the way you do
b. do what they want and not what you want
I'm not convinced those are reasons enough to call people lamers. Sorry, take your rant elsewhere.
~Moller
so don't comment on this game then. (Score:2)
You don't talk about how a game plays if you've only played the demo. Honestly, I would say you shouldn't talk about how Diablo 2: LOD *works* unless you've gotten characters to level 70+. Pre-LOD I would have said 50+, but you can get to that point now without ever leaving normal difficulty. You're simply not going to understand the overall picture without having invested enough time into the game to do so, or had someone who *has* invested that much time distill down the relevant points for you.
But the argument that you present here isn't an argument in favor of buying those neato magic toys to leapfrog over the lower levels. Instead, you've presented an argument to avoid Diablo II entirely.
No, the main argument I was presenting was that you shouldn't classify a huge group of people as "lamers" because they enjoy things that you don't.
The reason that your second scenario is more fun is because there's challenge. It's not that you're playing at a higher level. Your first scenario has no challenge. What possible source of enjoyment could that have?
Simply because something isn't challenging doesn't mean it provides no enjoyment. It does not logically hold, nor is it backed up by any facts.
A properly designed game maintains the same level of challenge regardless of a player's level. Different level characters merely encounter different types of situations. But relative to the characters' own skills, the challenge is the same. Any game that falls short of that is faulty.
That would make EverQuest faulty, right? The game is ridiculously easy at the low levels, and insanely hard in the end game. Unless you're going to tell me that 70 person raids of 60th (or near 60) level characters to kill one mob is the same level of challenge that a 1st level character has trying to kill things?
And I'm doubtful that a "properly designed game" would have the same challenge level regardless of a player's experience level or position in the game. I'm having trouble thinking of a game that follows such a challenge curve, every game I can think of starts off easy to allow you to become accustomed to the game environment and typically pushes all of your skills to the utmost during the endgame (while still remaining beatable).
Then again, I'm not a game designer, so I really shouldn't be commenting too much on what a "properly designed game" is, since I don't know that much about it. Imagine that, refraining from commenting on something I don't know much about.
~Moller
The problems of virtual scarcity... (Score:5, Interesting)
A couple examples of what could go wrong:
1) Somebody buys an item for $1000 figuring that it's going to go up in value. A few days later, the game designers decide to make that item very common. Can the game designers be held liable for financial losses incurred by that person's failed speculation?
2) In a permutation on item 1, what if the developers had made that change intentionally to destroy the market for those items?
3) What if a game designer adds a powerful item so that they can corner the market, selling them off for a handsome profit?
4) What if a bug in the system accidentally causes a fluctuation in the scarcity of a particular item (making it much easier to come by)?
Re:The problems of virtual scarcity... (Score:2, Interesting)
yrs,
Ephemeriis
Re:The problems of virtual scarcity... (Score:4, Informative)
HEADLINE (Score:2)
IMF endorses Everquest as economic development platform for emerging nations.
Think about it. MMORPG's have succeeded in creating one of the only virtual economic systems that has established trade & currency rates against the world's established economies.
You could take a computer and satellite net access nearly anywhere, teach someone who currently makes US $0.35 a day how to play the game, and make back the investment of computer and net access withing a few months. After that, an adapted player might be able to make $2/hr-$100/hr. Most of these sales might not support an american in the lifestyle they have become accustomed to, but nearly all of these reported bounties might go a long way towards (as mentioned) funding a college tuition or even the development of a whole community.
It might be far fetched, but it also might be the leading edge of some of the things the net promised and never delivered in the
Since I'm way out on a ledge predicting things that will probably never happen let me continue.
2004: After launching a mostly unsuccessful MMORPG company XYZCorp slowly begins selling rare items via ebay on the sly. Discovered and villified by the press and fans, this company's game is soon abandoned. However, it plants the seed in a few heads.
2007: Company ABCCorp launches an MMORPG that includes various features, items and abilities that can be augmented by paying ABCCorp directly.
2013: A "lottery" MMORPG is created that includes a complex form of gambling that involves paying for the opportunity to enter areas, receive quests and conduct raids. HAlf of this money is returned to the game in the form of prize pools that reward the luckiest and most dedicated players with cash prizes for completing very hard tests & adventures. Incredible feats and new discoveries could pay out "lottery" style winning of tens of thousands of dollars.
sleeper
(OK, I am putting down the crack pipe now)
Problem? (Score:3, Interesting)
It can be a problem for those who spend more money than they have, and end up going into debt or denying themselves food and the like for weapons.
It's the same as any other hobby, y'know? Why single it out as a "problem" because it's with video games instead of baseball cards or something?
This is why I play Half-Life (Score:2)
recent ebay sales (Score:4, Interesting)
See for yourself. [ebay.com] Recently closed items w/ "Diablo II" in the title, sorted by closing price.
Re:recent ebay sales (Score:2)
$700 Diablo 2 II USWest LOD INSANE 344% MF BOW?! [ebay.com]
$500 Diablo 2 II USWest Pally Paladin +6 Ring +6! [ebay.com] [ebay.com]
Both of these items were created because of bugs on battle.net's closed servers. Blizzard has stated that these items WILL BE DELETED when the bugs are fixed. They're also most likely prone to random morphing and other such strange occurances as Blizzard changes game code server side.
So you have people paying real money for items that are guaranteed to go away.
More on the buggy items at Diabloii.net [diabloii.net]. Including this quote: "Blizzard is aware of these buggy items, and there are plans to wipe them from the realms in the future, so it's not a real good idea to trade big for one, since it might vanish at any time.
~Moller
This story is (probably) BS (Score:4, Interesting)
4397 of the items were priced less than $10.
456 of the items were priced between $11-25.
227 of the items were priced between $26-$50.
95 items were priced between $51-$100.
38 items were priced between $101-$200.
and 14 were priced higher than $201 (and one of those 14 isn't related to the game, it's a windsurfing sail).
Eyeballing the lists, it appears that more than half of the auctions at all level have no bids. This is just a guesstimate (I don't have time to count up the number of bids on the 5,080 items less than $50, it is true for the items over $51)
I'm highly skeptical that anyone could routinely make >$5000 month, easy, as is claimed by the guy in the article.
Finally... (Score:2, Funny)
Item cost VS. time (Score:3, Interesting)
I play EverQuest in my free time. In EverQuest, there is a very cool item I wanted called A Flowing Black Silk Sash. The sash is a rather powerful item, is always in demand, and is somewhat rare. This has created conditions that make getting the sash take anywhere from a few hours with help from some friends, to a few days with a bit of luck. Given my character's status on her server, it probably would have taken me six to twelve hours to get this item. That works out to $150-$300 US of my time.
Instead, I tracked down someone selling his EverQuest account on ebay. I emailed him to see if he had said sash for sale on one of his characters, and sure enough he did. Within 24 hours we had exchanged the money via paypal and the item in game. Total cost to me = $100 and about ten minutes of free time, and I actually did the work while on the job. I was then able to use those extra hours study new things to do as a sysadmin, thus increasing my marketability, and in the long run, my overall salary.
Some people call me a cheater, I think of myself as economically minded.
Re:Item cost VS. time (Score:2)
Sounds cheap to me, the guy who fixed my roof charged me $40 an hour and that was a bargain compared to the going rate arround here.
If the game is soooo boring that you charge the time you would spend playing it one wonders why you bother. Before I stopped consulting I charged $400 an hour for my time, at that rate it would cost me about $2,000 to hear Gotterdamerung, perhaps I should send someone to Beyreuth to listen to it for me? If I sent them coach class I could save big on the airfare as well.
Re:Item cost VS. time (Score:2)
Just a note: $50k/year is cheap. very very very cheap.
Re:Item cost VS. time (Score:2)
Pretty common (Score:2)
A couple of friends of mine made some serious amounts of money selling/buying/trading Asheron's Call characters and items last year. You'd be surprised how close to 'real world' markets some of these deals went...Often they would buy a character with decent items cheap on eBay, hold it for a week, and then just split the character up and sell the items and character seperately making a profit on the whole deal..Somewhat similar to robber barons buying up companies, spliting them up and selling off the pieces. Pay Pal and eBay both acted as great facilitators, with electronic money changing hands back and forth fludily between parties.
Having said that, no, I really don't understand the mindset of someone who pays $500 or more for 'uberloot' or a very high level character.
Why everyone is calling about cheating? (Score:2)
Trust me, I can do more, way more, than I spend on a virtual item than I would invest in my time to get it. Not that I would ever buy some, but I have played virtual games a lot and I know what kind of killer it is!
And to be honest, I rather pay $25 for a virtual sword that I for a DVD, because I will have way more fun with it. People have just no idea about what the real value of money is, when they complain about these purchases or sound like its any good living.
Oh, my so two skilled computer wizards got $2000 cash each in two weeks. Is this anything special? There are people paid way more for computer support and its as virtual as these items. :)
Consider the following... (Score:4, Interesting)
He's already got some real kick-ass gear, chief among those a war club capable of basically insta-gibbing Andariel on normal difficulty and a set of ancient plate providing 700+ in defense.
Now, I've had some folks lambast my character due to the fact that he uses this big old hammer without the use of a shield, but I figure that's okay: It's within his character to get hit a bunch by the boogerheads, and I accept that outcome during a normal gaming session.
Now, with the expansion pack, I see on Diabloii.net that there is this new item set that seems for all intents and purposes to be genetically designed for my character: big honkin' hammer, plate, belt, boots, gauntlets, and helmet -- all way more better than what he's currently packing.
Now that he's passed all the trials before him, I see no better way for him as a character to wile away the days than to search for that complete item set.
However, in all honesty, it would me/him YEARS to collect them.
I myself would pay a premium for the complete set from some other D2 player, but certainly not in triple-digits. I would do so because the D2 character I run in question is ready to ascend to NPC status, I have no interest whatsoever in playing him other than to have him help out other folks finish the necessary quests.
Maybe I might be interested in getting him to clvl 99, but not nearly as much as I'd like to see him get that set.
I'm ready to retire him to being a secondary character to someone else's adventure, I'd just like to get him 100% complete in the process.
If the game itself would only drop *one* of those items, I'd forego the monetary route, but in all sad honesty, it's not gonna happen.
Does this make sense?
IF.cmg
Why You Should Not Sell Game Items Offline (Score:2, Insightful)
"we reserver the right to ban your account(s) or revoke item(s) without prior notice if you are caught selling items outside of the game."
This phenomenon has given rise to new terms such as "item farmers" and "rare-drop campers". These groups of unprincipled players make it nearly impossible for a small party or individual to "win" the item(s) through proper gameplay and skill. This has a deleterious effect on the gameplay and reduces the overal value of the game experience for all the other players. What economists call a negative externality, that is to say a negative result for a third party to the original transaction. In this case other players being unable to acquire rare items in the ways that the game designers originally intended because people are greedy and take them to sell offline. If you play these games (Ultima, Everquest, et al) and you participate in the selling of game items outside of the game then I respectfully ask you to consider the harm that you are doing to the game. In the same way that parasistes are not beneficial to the host so you too are not beneficial to the growth and continued enjoyment of the industry or the game. If you get your account baned for selling items outside of the game believe me when I say that nobody will sympathise with your plight in the least. In conclusion, Please do not sell game items outside of the game (eBay, BidBay, whatever). If you are a player who buys from these people then you are just as much a part of the problem. Remember that as long as people demand these kinds of transactions somebody will supply them. If you care about the game and its continued growth then you will not engage in these kinds of purchases. Thank you for reading.
I can confirm.. (Score:2)
Contrary to what people think...most of the sales are NOT for large money. They are from a couple bucks to about $20, that's it. You make the money on volume.
It's not like it takes no effort either. The time taken to acquire the gear, complete the auctions, devlier items, post new auctions, etc, can be considerable.
Some say it's rediculous; I say, it's great. Some people can play D2 for 6 hours a day or more. Some have jobs, and can only play a couple hours.. so they have the option of going online, and reliably buying a few cool items to play with, rather than spending the time (time is money).
Cheers.
You guys (Score:2)
"Bloody hell josh, it's a car, you'll never get your money back"
"You're gonna do WHAT to your car now!!?!??!?"
Same sort of thing... To me, it's money well spent (I don't expect it back, I expect increased enjoyment driving my car), but she just couldn't understand it.
I think it's just funny. =) (Score:2)
Sadly, the only game I have godly items for is Diablo 1, and those don't sell too well (plus there's that whole sentimental value thing
Just learn to live with it, and to laugh at the cretins who paid 100 bucks for a Stone of Jordan.
-Kasreyn
Re:Hard work == Money (Score:2)
Re:Just normal trading. (Score:2)
You're also talking about a enclosed economic situation. Meaning if I need sword type A to achieve something, and sword type A can only be gotten from 1 place that other players prevent me from getting to, thats a problem. Sure in meat space if I don't like the price a store sells milk for, then I can go to one thats more reasonably priced. But if a store has a monopoly on milk, then uses that monopoly to gouge customers and stop others from competing, thats wrong.
people can still sell there login and password for others to use, but there are a lot less people selling high level characters, then there are people selling stuff. Mostly because it take longer to achive a igh level then it does to kill something.
Re:Huh? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Not exactly a profitable activity (Score:3, Insightful)
you're missing econimies of scale, or in this case, power.
If you have one or two killer items, it then becomes much, much easier to aquire other killer items.
Otherwise known as "it takes money to make money" (but once you have it, many doors are opened to you)
Here's how. (Score:2)
How can you sell things that belong on someone elses server? You aren't 'selling' an item. You are simply giving someone the benefit of the results of your own work in exchange for money.
Why do you have a problem with people selling the items to others who wish to buy them?
How does it ruin the game? and what game are you referring to? It certainly doesn't ruin diablo2....
Games where you get people camping out to sell stuff online.. I can see your point. But banning the online sale is not the answer; modifying the game to prevent camping is the answer, whether by not having items spawn on the same character all the time, or other anti-camping features.
Why should people care what happens outside their game? Sorry.. welcome to the real world. If something has value to someone else, then cash can be exchanged for it.
Also. (Score:2)
The problem, of course, is there are some players with jobs/money to burn, and others who don't, and it would seem unfair to those who don't.
However.. I know full well that people also monopolize areas of a game for OTHER reasons besides e-bay... in-game reasons... so really, it's an overall game-design problem.