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Pay 2 win becoming legitimate? Have we really lost our way this much?
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Completely agree. And sadly....just reading the majority of the posts in the thread in response should give you your answer.
Gone are the days of MMORPG's being about the journey, not the destination..and replaced by these console games in an MMO wrapper. Everyone races to end game (Because that is where the game starts now) to get the shinies then sit in the main cities whining there isn't enough content. EQ is STILL going and has more expansions then most MMO's all put together! If players wouldn't try to make MMO's instant gratification games (There is a seperate genre for that called console gaming), they wouldn't have to agree to such a crappy system as P2W in the first place.
It's just as much, if not more, the players fault as the developer's.
Its a lot of good spin indeed.
However, you are falling for an old trick here... He is miss labeling things and you are not taking the time to investigate. Every game he mentions that is P2W is not actually P2W.
Its like calling the Pro Choice people "Anti Baby"
or the Pro Lifers "anti woman"
Its just spin.
Wow, what a religious debate about that matter.
Its a game so comments like ' time is money' alienate me a bit, give that we just talk about a game here.
A game is made to be fun. If the cashshops set me in a position where i cannot have fun in the game, i will not play it.
its realy that simple. And all the crusaders here and all over the place raising their flags should rethink about it. If Diablo 3 is NO FUN, it will not be played. If there is enough people that LIKE the game, there is nothing you can do about it.
i realy hate those weenies in baked rolls, and there is less and less weenies without that stuff and i wish the whole 'baked rolls' hysteria to perish. But tough luck, it seems like alot more people actualy LIKE em... meh
Nothing new, it's always being going on since commercial MMO's and even Diablo on the early battle.net. The only difference is instead of the company watching 3rd party farm off their game community with services, they're now offering them to nudge them over as way of can't beat them join them, but push them out the way and take their profits.
You want to get the attention of the companies? Don't purchase their poducts. It is the only way you're going to get their attention. Until the consumers take a stand from a product purchasing and support standpoint things are going to continue down this road.
I can't blame the companies for giving it a chance when you consider the amount of people that use third party sites to purchase these items or services anyways. I would do the same thing in their shoes. I wouldn't be surprised if it is a resounding success and this ends up just being the beginning.
1. For god's sake mmo gamers, enough with the analogies. They're unnecessary and your comparisons are terrible, dissimilar, and illogical.
2. To posters feeling the need to state how f2p really isn't f2p: Players understand the concept. You aren't privy to some secret the rest are missing. You're embarrassing yourself.
3. Yes, Cpt. Obvious, we're not industry experts. Now run along and let the big people use the forums for their purpose.
God I hope so. The video game world is so blah these days...I rather enjoy the prospect of being paid to play them. Especially MMO's....the little rats are basically second jobs anyway. Might as well get paid for em, I say.
Get off your moral high horse. All your saying is unlike most of us your to weak to ignore the little AH button. You can't help your self you have to be better then the jones so much you acknowledge you have to pay to try to win while the rest of us will simply play the game for fun.
You my friend are a sad sad player. No one forces you to buy anything. Having a option for those that might want to buy something or sell something however bothers you so much you feel the need go a some kinda rightous crusade to try and make sure we all play like you do, think like you do etc etc.
No ones holding a gun to your head saying you have to buy stuff, and if some players enjoy the game more because they don't have to play it like a second job all the more power to them. If your too weak willed to just play the game and have fun and instead feel that you have to have the best gear to show off thats your problem. maybe you are the one that should be looking for a new game
+1
Gaming since Avalon Hill was making board games.
Played SWG, EVE, Fallen Earth, LOTRO, Rift, Vanguard, WoW, SWTOR, TSW, Tera
Tried Aoc, Aion, EQII, RoM, Vindictus, Darkfail, DDO, GW, PotBS
First, I think you need to define what "win" means in terms of an MMORPG. You can't ever "beat" an MMORPG, so "winning" can be defined in terms of smaller victories. For example, if you are farming MOBs for a specific item, and you get that item, then that is a win, a victory. This is pretty common in theme park MMORPGs. They are more or less all about getting items and getting more powerful. Whenever you level up, that's a "win," whenever you get some rare loot that you really wanted, that's a "win."
So yeah, if you can buy items outright that you would have actually played the game for otherwise, I see that as pay to win.
Second, no a game that asks you to pay real money for anything at all is not pay to win. For example, if a game charges you for content, like a new dungeon or vanity stuff, like a new haircut, that is not pay to win. It's only pay to win if you can buy something that gives your character a real tangible advantage for real money. So yeah, D3 is P2W.
It doesn't matter that you're buying stuff from the auction house. You're still buying it with real money. In other words, you're buying items with something completely external to the game (real money). You don't have to play the game at all to get real money. If you were buying it with in game currency, then that would be okay because you actually had to play the game to "make" your gold.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
But you COULD get real money by playing the game in this model. Which means that real money is no longer external here..but deeply integrated in the very foundations of the game.
No it actually just means that the game has to economy. Instead goods in the game just become part of our (the Earth's) economy. Gold in the game will become almost meaningless. It will only be used to buy stuff from NPCs.
I actually like the idea of having a virtual world with its own economy. I always thought it was interesting. With things like RMAH, the game world just becomes an extension of our economy and has no real economy of its own.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
It's all fun and games (literally) until D3 profits are audited in your tax returns.
If you agree with the post above, you need to have one of those "step back and think" moments.
The post above is basically saying that P2W is better than "timesinkfromhell." In other words, the poster would rather just pay for a good in a game than have to suffer through actually playing the game to get the good. To this I ask...why are you playing that game? If you seriously think that the game is a timesinkfromhell, then why are you playing it? There are plenty of other games to play that are less painful.
In addition, this train of thought tacitly accepts games that are developed to be so painful that you literally are willing to pay money to avoid grinding. This is so ridiculous to me. Why would I ever play a game that is DESIGNED to make me want to pay to avoid grinding???
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
While I can see your point, the reality is that what some call P2W is little different from the reality that we all exist within. Those with the money to purchase politicians and thus power within the system, "win". The big banks and insurance companies are an example of this. They privatize their profits, and any losses get dumped on the tax payers. To paraphrase Mel Brooks, as he mugged for the camera in History of the World Part One. "Its good to own the king"... ^^
Many of the real (rather than alledged) P2W games are like that. Those with the ability (and willingness) to purchase in game power, end up far ahead of these who do not. Thats simply the reality of such games. I've played a few games like that. I've no problem with spending money on games I enjoy, so I didn't have any problem with the internal power system. for as long as I continued to enjoy the game.
But over time, this type of system, while profitable for the Dev's and their investors, tends to create a toxic feed back loop. that slowly eats away at their player base. Not everyone has the ability, or the willingness to spend what it takes to achieve power in such games. So, in that sense, their appeal is already rather limited.
But it does appear that some games have managed to continue with such a business model. Many Asian games, and Entropia Universe come to mind. As far as concepts like "legitimate" and "fair" are concerned, thats up to each player to decide for themselves.
I see the issue here, you don't understand how money works or what an economy is. I won't lecture you, the internet can teach you more if you'd honestly like. Suffice it to say, there is no such thing as an ingame economy in any game I've played. There is a rather nice imitiation of one, but as its based on a currency that is limitless it is always unstable and full of inflation. The most accurate thing to say here is that NOW the game will have an economy with set value rather than a failing imitation that reeks of power gaming redundance.
I don't think anyone from the US selling stuff in the D3 auction house will make enough for the IRS to care
. I'm sure they will try, but the reality is that making RMT much more accessible to players will result in the market being flooded with goods and prices sinking fast.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
In my opinion Creslin321 does have a valid point, You have only to watch yr guild chat to see players asking to be power leveled or for a high level to kill a boss for them. These type of players just want a f10- button 'pawn all skill' the same players will do anything to have the best items in a game eg credit card.
Gone now are the days of a level playing field for all. The richer you are the better items you will have mentality has now been introduced to most mmo's.
Game companys want to change to this new format, for they know there are impulse buyers out there and these people far outway the old school players who will grind for their items. Take a look at Funcoms AOC games Cash Shop for a B2W start to your gaming.
I blame all the easy pc and console games of the past 10-15 years, some gamers have grown up with cheat buttons / websites with walkthroughs / god modes etc, these people are the targets for P2W / B2W game companys.
I cannot forsee any change in the future of online gaming for RMT P2W games are what the majority of gamers seem to want.
An economy is just any system in which the agents compete for scarce (i.e. not unlimited) resources. Do people compete for scarce resources in MMORPGs? Uh yes. Prices in the AH go up or down as affected by the forces of supply and demand. If you still want to be obstinate, you can look here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virtual_economy.
You talk about inflation in your post, yes MMORPGs suffer from a lot of inflation because of the "money faucet" design of MMORPGs. But seriously, what do you think happens in our economy? Whenever you put money in a bank, they "multiply" that money by lending out like 10 or 20 times what they actually have in their vaults (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Money_multiplier). By the same token the government prints money ALL THE TIME.
The only problem with MMORPG economies is that they are poorly designed that leads to a lot of inflation. But when you talk about inflation...there has to be an economy that said inflation happens to. So if MMORPGs suffer from inflation...they obviously have to have an economy.
Seriously though, next time you decide to be a preachy know-it-all jackass, you probably want to make sure that the person you are saying knows nothing about economics doesn't have a masters in business
.
Are you team Azeroth, team Tyria, or team Jacob?
I think it really depends on how many alternatives you have out there ( be honest- there aren't a lot of quality MMOs out there) as well as how much of the game you enjoy. For instance, I enjoyed playing Rift from 1-49 and at level 50 it just becomes a gear grind. I mostly PvP'd to level as the game's questing was extremely shallow and just boring, really.
At 50 the gear grind awaits which in PvP means you get stomped by people if only because they have more time put into the grind than you do (premade > gear > skill). If I could have paid to rank up faster or just paid for ranks completely I'd have seriously considered it because I enjoyed the PvP while leveling where I could simply buy better gear from the in game AH (for game currency). That is largely unavailable as aside from new items added in 1.4 you have to grind some type of currency (be it plaques or favor/prestige). In the end I chose to just roll alts and enjoy what i liked about PvP in that game without what I didn't until I unsubbed entirely because I don't care for leveling a toon from scratch and then dumping it at cap because there was too steep a grind to continue. I liked the gameplay, but I wanted to be on an even playing field, so I would have thought about paying to get there up front rather than paying subscription months to grind out those ranks.
LOTRO's F2P model is nowhere near a Play2win model. if you believe that you have never played LOTRO since F2P and have no idea what you are talking about because nowhere in the store can you buy gear or even the items to make gear for end game or even pvp for that matter. Secondly, LOTRO DOES have a means of earning points to be used in their stores so does DDO and thus has the best F2P model since you can do just that. I've earned almost 2k points in the store to be used for purchases for FREE just by spending time on the game. and Finally, the model that D3 is giving us isn't a Standard F2P model it is an entirely new thing, it is a corporate GREED model and will lead to either a complete downfall of a company or a complete change in the way our world handles online play. Either way it is greedy to an extreme and does not reflect the cosmetic/enhancement model that some F2P models hold true to like LOTRO. You need to do more research before you post next time.
It opens the door, though. There's already been much talk of taxing virtual goods and now there would be a legitimate company behind the wheel rather than third parties that can't even be held accountable for breaking a game's TOS/EULA. Especially with botters and such don't underestimate how many players would choose to cheat when there's a chance at profit.
For real money, huh? So Blizzard has this set up to work like Linden Labs Second Life with their RMT now? I have this sneaking suspicion that selling things for real money....isn't going to work quite like you're thinking. But I guess we'll see, huh?
President of The Marvelously Meowhead Fan Club
I look at it this way. In RMT models like these, companies give you an option. Either play the normal way or just buy gears, weapons and everything you need from AH. I am a patient guy and know self control. That is the reason why i have never spent a dime on in game stores for all these years i have been gaming. I plan to continue to play my way but if anyone else want to just buy everything..well it is their money and not my business to tell them how they should spend their money and where.
It opens the door, though. There's already been much talk of taxing virtual goods and now there would be a legitimate company behind the wheel rather than third parties that can't even be held accountable for breaking a game's TOS/EULA. Especially with botters and such don't underestimate how many players would choose to cheat when there's a chance at profit.
If the amount you've earned selling stuff in D3, plus your other income is such that you'd end up paying taxes, you have to declare it on your tax return. It's like selling anything else. It's considered income unless it's below a certain amount (I believe that amount is $600).
I can not remember winning or losing a single debate on the internet.