i would not vote on that poll, if someone said it was raining and it was. that poll is bias (for a start there must be a third option, 'i don't care' for example).
but obviously to stop people buying stuff, is not a good idea.
As this had already been mentioned on another thread, buying gold then transferring gold bricks to another account is going to be noticed. I read that, what someone said was, ban the credit card numbers to people who just harvest gold and get what they need and fuck everyone else. it is an idea. but then again, there could be innocent people gotten trapped in some conspricy.
The problem a lot of people don't realize is that you can't compare an in game economy to a RL one in any way. In a game there doesn't seem to be any restriction on the amount of money that can come into the game. You could attack the same low-level mob and get money every time that mob respawns and you kill it again.
In RL the Fed has control over the amount of legitimate money in circulation. So when you get paid the money you receive already exists it's just getting shifted from one person to another.
I know that Devs can keep track of who has how much money in game, but maybe someone should consider a design that gives them greater control over how much total money exists in the game at any one time. Obviously the amount that will need to exist will grow as the game matures but Devs should have the control over how much enters the game world.
I wouldn't mind seeing developers starting to hire economists to work on a system like this.
This would require a fair number of money sinks to keep the balance and might eventually lead to players learning to barter goods for goods instead of always trading for in game money.
Granted such a system will likely pose some new challenges but I think it would be interesting.
ok ive skimmed through some of the posts and realized that you are using tough words for a younger audience.
so i will make it simple for those who have trouble understanding why buying gold destroys an economy.
this is 1 of many examples
(this story is fictive)
you are level 1 with a wooden sword. You want to buy that shiny metal sword it costs 1000 gold.
the blacksmith has 10 of those swords to sell.
so you go out and kill nooblet monsters and you get 10 gold per kill (thats 100 kills to get the sword) that can take you 3 days
your neighbour (hes a doctor so he is rich) and buys 1000 gold for 10$ and buys the sword for 1000 gold (blacksmith has 9 left)
4 other guys also get the sword (5 left)
the black smiths says hmmm this is good business ill raise the prices to 2000 gold
other gold buyers buy 2000 gold for 20$ and say huh ill buy that sword no problem
then another guy buys more gold and says oh yeah well ill give 4000 gold (he bough on ebay)
then some rich CEO says ill give 10 000 gold for that sword (he also bought it in game) black smith is happy and says ok...
finnaly you made your 1000 gold but now the sword is worth 10 000 gold... so thats another month of grind with your stupid wooden sword....
then the blacksmith says i have one left selling to highest bidder... a supper rich guy buys 1 million gold for 1000$US and says ill give you 1 million for that sword...
now you do the math on how long its going to take you to get that sword.......
OK for me buying gold would just ruin the game play for me because I wouldn't get that warm fuzzy feeling when I know I have worked long and hard for the weapon/armor set I have been wanting for so long and not just go to some site and buy the gold and get it or anything else I want. Working for something is always better IMO You get what you want and feel good doing it.
I think that some people or I there have understood wrong... I think that "poiule" was talking about buying GOLD in game not mall items...
I personally not agree with the idea of buying in-game gold with real currency and i don't approve to buy mall items that increase stats or something like that. I think that the character in-game must be constructed only by the owner, not by buying there and there with RL money... That isn't fair play...
...buying gold then transferring gold bricks to another account is going to be noticed. I read that, what someone said was, ban the credit card numbers to people who just harvest gold and get what they need and fuck everyone else...
and i was talking about the game, not outside. please look next time .
as for me, if the gold your buying has been obtained by the seller in a normal ingame way then it will not skew the economy at all. but i really think that if there are shops or the developer tries to sell made-up gold then that is very stupid. the skew to the games economy is tremendous if millions start to pop up from nowhere. btw. i have never bought in game gold cuase i consider it cheating myself
I disagree, it really depends on how the game is designed.
Assume the game is designed for you to earn a little cash as you progress, then spend the majority that cash on some kind of money-sink like travelling, buying supplies from the npc's, upgrading your skills, and so on.
Now take your average professional group of gold farmers. 50 people who will play shifts 24/7, and constantly earn money without spending anything on the money sinks at all. They circumvent the sinks by stopping character progression (ala suiciding bots in Lineage 2), by not having to pay travelling fees from staying in the same spot for weeks, by not buying heal and buff potions from using an ideal party makeup. Let alone "novelty" and "status" type money sinks like fancy houses or mounts.
These guys will constantly inject a steady stream of money into the economy without putting anything back into the system. It causes inflation in the player market, inflation increases demand for gold, and the demand has to be filled.
It's true that we wouldn't have this problem if the game wasn't gear dependant, you hardly see this in games like guild wars where anyone can get the "best" stuff in about a week or two of playing, and where there are no uberepic items. But I like games with an intricate player economy, I've always liked it when you can make a living of crafting or trading, as it's a nice optional change of pace you can do as you see fit, and an alternate way to get that better gear without having to farm intensively. I would much rather have the gold buyers removed than to remove an element from the game which I enjoy.
No doubt it is against the rules/EULA, and that makes it cheating, there is no way around that. But it is NOT illegal, there is no law, in any country of wich I am aware stating this is against the LAW. I don't know how many times myself and others have to post this to get through to you people. It is ILLEGAL, read: AGAINST THE LAW. Copyright infringement laws have been on the books for years to protect companies, authors, artists, coders, consumers, and etc from people that STEAL information, in this case coding, to sell for their own profit. As well as the EULA, a LEGAL contract you agree to every time you play the game that states that you will follow the rules. Also, in games like EVE where you you can trade game cards for in game cash without breaking the rules, or everquest2 exchange server were this is also allowed. Add to this games life entropia universe, second life and a whole slay of f2p games with cash shops and you probable have a majority of games, as well as players that are doing this. It is true that there are games, and servers (in the case of exchange servers), that allow such practices. But this is only within the realm of those games and servers. In games not designed for it though, the RMT market has a negative impact on both the game and its economy, as many have stated here. Just watch the current VG economy and the money exploit there, RMT sites are selling incredible amounts for almost nothing, meaning that once the exploit is stopped the people who did not buy will be shafted in that economy for ever, ( if that game survives at all that is ). The people farming the cash will stop at NOTHING to gain gold, after all it is their job, they will exploit in any way they can, they will use of even manufacture software to dupe or cheat, they will if they are able steal your account and sell YOUR gold, ( this just recently happened to my brother in WoW, allthough he actually got his account and most of his items/gold back, meaning that whoever purchased it got shafted as well as those items were probably removed from the game ). These are NOT your run of the mill shops and allthough the big boys like IGE probably work within the law, the people they buy their gold from are the same people that would cut you down in an alley to get that twenty in your wallet, have no doubt about that. Some gold sellers have already been shut down and arraigned for court. Blizzard, or whatever company, takes them to court and sues the pants off of them. However, this is VERY expensive, and costs companies time and manpower that takes away from doing what they're supposed to be doing, making games. While companies spend millions shutting down ILLEGAL gold sellers, the gold sellers pay their fines, change the name and go right back into business. Meanwhile Blizzard, or whoever, recoupes a fraction of what was spent, and guess who pays their bills. The consumer, WE DO. We lose, no matter what the outcome. The consumer ALWAYS loses.
"Granted thinking for yourself could be considered a timesink of shorter or longer duration depending on how smart..or how dumb you are."
It's simply the sale of time for money ... that is all it is. And because there are many MMO players who have more money than time, while games remain fixed on designs that reward the time-rich, there will always be a market for people who wish to exchange their relat8ve monetary wealth for what could have been achieved if they were more time wealthy.
bahamut1 unless it is able to be brought to the court system and tried under a judge and jury, for not only WoW or a few other top named games but for any game created that does have tradeable items, then it isnt ILLEGAL. If it states in the EULA that they will not allow it to happen but it will be delt with by the companies actions AND ONLY that company and isnt going to be delt with by a Attourney General then its generaly legal.
But I'll agree it does give an unfair advantage to other people especially the ones that make more money then the ones who dont (like myself) but really thats like saying someone who spends 8 hours a day gaming gets a higher level than a person that plays 2 hours a day. But it doesnt give a crippling unfair advantage, it just means that they will be able to afford things when it comes around, its nto like they have godmode (unless you actaully do play WoW or any of its ITEM BASED allies).
It's not illegal on copyright grounds; usually, there is no copyright infringement.
However, it IS illegal on the grounds of breaking a written contract with the owning company, namely the EULA. The worst they can usually do to you for this offense is whatever penalties are laid out in the EULA, though - usually just cancelling your account.
It is also theoretically illegal on the grounds of fraud, specifically "attempts to sell something that does not belong to you". This is an area that is a bit legally grey at the moment, and rarely contested by gaming companies (it's basically the arguement that won Mythic's landmark case against item/gold sellers, however). Here's how it goes: if I own something, I can sell it, otherwise I cannot. If I don't own the Brooklyn bridge and try to sell it to you anyway, that is fraud. It's illegal, and punishable by criminal law (whereas contract/EULA violation is a civil offense).
Gold sellers have often tried to get around this by saying they are "charging for their time, not selling the item". Courts have consistently denied this defense, however. It's a thin shield, and not a legally recognized one. There is a product changing hands. A drug dealer (to use a MUCH more extreme example) cannot get off on drug dealing charges by saying "he was just charging for the time he spent getting the drugs into the country, not for the drugs themselves".
When a product changes hands, and money is exchanged, the legal system sees it as a sale, no matter how it is marketed. Since gold sellers do not own the product they are charging for, and on top of that are making the exchange against the explicit wishes of the actual owner (the game company), it is, technically, triable as fraud, with potential jail time for offenders.
This has not been done much yet, and as far as I know, NO ONE has gone to jail for goldselling. Yet. But do keep in mind that it is possible that as the laws become better defined in this area, that could be one penalty that might be sought for the crimes involved.
(Interesting to note however that buying is not fraud, and therefore just a civil crime - contract violation - rather than a criminal one.)
It's simply the sale of time for money ... that is all it is. And because there are many MMO players who have more money than time, while games remain fixed on designs that reward the time-rich, there will always be a market for people who wish to exchange their relat8ve monetary wealth for what could have been achieved if they were more time wealthy.
It really is as simple as that.
A truely brilliant post on the subject.....
Change the game design so that all players, both those who have the spare time and those who don't can compete more or less equally and you solve the gold selling/buying dilemma.
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
This is not a grey issue. There is just NO reason to do it. First place you are violating the game rules which labels you as a cheater.
If you can live with the nomenclature cheater, you should be playing your console games entering the silly cheat codes, because you certainly DON'T belong in an MMO.
Personally I can't believe so many of you condone cheating in this thread, it is appalling!
yet its mostly because i cant understand how someone could be so hardcore into a game that they would shell out real money for in game upgrades, i mean its only a game afterall meant to do no more than pass the time
People buy boats that are excess of 10,000 USD. A good boat with a 100HP motor is around 20,000 USD. Boats are just to pass the time. Hell, you can only use them in the spring and summer. Worse that a lot of people only use the boats a couple of times a year.
My point is people buy a lot of silly stuff for entertainment. I won't even get into beer and weed, which a vast amount of people spend a vast amount of money on. This is just one more option.
I do agree that it hurts the game, but its the gaming companies responsibility to cut down on virtual item sales if they want to. Not the consumer.
To me it's quite simple. If the company that develops a game encourages the secondary market, then gold trading is all fine and dandy.
However, companies like Blizzard and Sigil do not condone the practise of buying and selling gold/accounts whatever and they make sure that people know about it. It is utterly wrong to buy and sell gold in games, and I'm sick of seeing gold/platinum/isk advertisements.
If developers want something like mounts to cost a lot of money, forcing you to spend more time at the auction house, that's how they want their game to be. The economy is as much a part of the game design than dying is, or class balance. Screw those who cheat by buying gold. The philosophy that you want to play how you want to play is just the same as using a hack to cheat death, just because you want to play that way. Its is irrefutably cheating. And I hate cheaters
Playing on a MMO server is a privelidge, not a right. If the developer doesn't want you buying gold, you respect their rules, or I hope they ban your lazy ass.
Still waiting for your Holy Grail MMORPG? Interesting...
To me it's quite simple. If the company that develops a game encourages the secondary market, then gold trading is all fine and dandy.
However, companies like Blizzard and Sigil do not condone the practise of buying and selling gold/accounts whatever and they make sure that people know about it. It is utterly wrong to buy and sell gold in games, and I'm sick of seeing gold/platinum/isk advertisements.
If developers want something like mounts to cost a lot of money, forcing you to spend more time at the auction house, that's how they want their game to be. The economy is as much a part of the game design than dying is, or class balance. Screw those who cheat by buying gold.
Playing on a MMO server is a privelidge, not a right. If the developer doesn't want you buying gold, you respect their rules, or I hope they ban your lazy ass.
Originally posted by Xantax
Likewise, same here. it is not particularly nice. but what can be done about it? i bet these people have a random ip generator, a program to make sure, and a undetectable mod to the game that adds the bot...
usually mmos do not have 3rd party security, so that is a big downside. but humans have always found a way to hack into anything.
NASA and the Pentagon have been hacked, so this is nothing. i hope one of these days something can be done.
No doubt it is against the rules/EULA, and that makes it cheating, there is no way around that. But it is NOT illegal, there is no law, in any country of wich I am aware stating this is against the LAW. I don't know how many times myself and others have to post this to get through to you people. It is ILLEGAL, read: AGAINST THE LAW. Copyright infringement laws have been on the books for years to protect companies, authors, artists, coders, consumers, and etc from people that STEAL information, in this case coding, to sell for their own profit. As well as the EULA, a LEGAL contract you agree to every time you play the game that states that you will follow the rules. It is true that there are games, and servers (in the case of exchange servers), that allow such practices. But this is only within the realm of those games and servers. Some gold sellers have already been shut down and arraigned for court. Blizzard, or whatever company, takes them to court and sues the pants off of them. However, this is VERY expensive, and costs companies time and manpower that takes away from doing what they're supposed to be doing, making games. While companies spend millions shutting down ILLEGAL gold sellers, the gold sellers pay their fines, change the name and go right back into business. Meanwhile Blizzard, or whoever, recoupes a fraction of what was spent, and guess who pays their bills. The consumer, WE DO. We lose, no matter what the outcome. The consumer ALWAYS loses.
No mate, it is not illegal, it is not against any law of wich I am aware, I have never heard of a court ruling in this case, anywere.
And trust me, were one to be settled we WOULD know about it as the gaming companies would REALLY like to show the world something like that.
As far as I have read in this thread, and in pretty much any other on this subject you are the first and only to claim for it to be ILLEGAL so you yourself may want to say this over and over, but there are no others.
An EULA is NOT a binding contract or even legal, it never has been and I doubt it ever will, this has been covered on this site and numerous others time and time again, and there are no rulings here either.
I honestly doubt you know at all what you are talking about, more like making things up along the way.
Blizzard has never sued any RMT site or company, I have never heard of any gaming company that has.
I very much doubt they have even asked sites like IGE and mysupersales and others to stop what they are doing.
This site carries ads for RMT sites, level services and the like and I HIGHLY doubt they would do that if it was illegal.
The only thing the gaming companies can do is cut you out of their game, for a time.
Not trying to be a smartass here mate, but please get your facts straigth before posting?
There have been rulings against EMU projects and private servers, but that is another thing entirely.
I will agree though that the customers always looses, but so does the gaming companies because fewer people will play a game riddled with gold farmers.
Trust me, if there were ANY way of going after these people in court IGE would NOT exist.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Originally posted by Jerek_
I wonder if you honestly even believe what you type, or if you live in a made up world of facts. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In setting up a game account the gold buyer / seller most likely clicked "AGREE" to a EULA that states all virtual items are owned by the company. I guess an opinion whether it's right depends on one's morals.
I can see a casual gamer wanting to buy gold. The whole "Money vs. Time" for the same loot argument. What ever the reason the rules are still broke when buying / selling gold. The sad fact is that until all currency and loot is bound to a player the gold buying / selling will never go away. An exception in the binding rule would be made for crafters to hand items into an auction or market system for purchase.
I think selling/buying gold isnt that bad, especially when the gold is obtained via grinding/farming (monotone and boring WORK). Its been said before: Person A works the whole day as a fire fighter to save peoples lives and earn money. Your no life guy B works the whole day ingame to get virtual money. Both real life and the game are using the same unit of value: time. To get money in real life I have to do something for x hours. To get money in a virtual world I have to do something for x hours.
If A is not allowed to buy ingame money the no life guy B would have an unfair advantage. Why should he have an advantage just because hes got more time to dedicate to the low priority virtual world? The other guy A is outside saving someones ass. It is fair if A could decide to convert some of his "work time" (working as a fire fighter) to "game time" using €/$ as a trading object.
Look at it this way: There is no difference in working in a virtual world and working in a real world. Time is consumed and wealth is gained. Working in the real world has a way higher priority than working in a virtual world so he gains the advantage of being able to trade real world wealth for virtual wealth to stay on par with the players ingame.
One more thing: If someone is selling gold he is selling the time used to gain the gold and not the data itself which rightly belongs to the game provider.
--- Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
One more thing: If someone is selling gold he is selling the time used to gain the gold and not the data itself which rightly belongs to the game provider.
That's a good one but charging X price for Y amount of gold is not selling his time. The point is no real life money should pass hands (or modems) for what is gained or given once in the game.
as far as i see, there are no EULA or copyright infringments. which means gold farmers are allowed to do what they want. unfair as it is, nothing can be done, besides ip blocking, which does not work anyhow.
as far as i see, there are no EULA or copyright infringments. which means gold farmers are allowed to do what they want. unfair as it is, nothing can be done, besides ip blocking, which does not work anyhow.
Uh .. depends on the game but alot of US games have it in their EULA thats everything belongs to them etc some crazy wording basically saying that making money off their game is against the EULA. If it was the case you stated they wouldn't even bother banning thousands of accounts for gold selling.
Its not against the rules to farm but its against the rules to profit off items that DO NOT belong to you.
Please Refer to Doom Cat with all conspiracies & evil corporation complaints. He'll give you the simple explination of..WE"RE ALL DOOMED!
Comments
but obviously to stop people buying stuff, is not a good idea.
As this had already been mentioned on another thread, buying gold then transferring gold bricks to another account is going to be noticed. I read that, what someone said was, ban the credit card numbers to people who just harvest gold and get what they need and fuck everyone else. it is an idea. but then again, there could be innocent people gotten trapped in some conspricy.
In RL the Fed has control over the amount of legitimate money in circulation. So when you get paid the money you receive already exists it's just getting shifted from one person to another.
I know that Devs can keep track of who has how much money in game, but maybe someone should consider a design that gives them greater control over how much total money exists in the game at any one time. Obviously the amount that will need to exist will grow as the game matures but Devs should have the control over how much enters the game world.
I wouldn't mind seeing developers starting to hire economists to work on a system like this.
This would require a fair number of money sinks to keep the balance and might eventually lead to players learning to barter goods for goods instead of always trading for in game money.
Granted such a system will likely pose some new challenges but I think it would be interesting.
so i will make it simple for those who have trouble understanding why buying gold destroys an economy.
this is 1 of many examples
(this story is fictive)
you are level 1 with a wooden sword. You want to buy that shiny metal sword it costs 1000 gold.
the blacksmith has 10 of those swords to sell.
so you go out and kill nooblet monsters and you get 10 gold per kill (thats 100 kills to get the sword) that can take you 3 days
your neighbour (hes a doctor so he is rich) and buys 1000 gold for 10$ and buys the sword for 1000 gold (blacksmith has 9 left)
4 other guys also get the sword (5 left)
the black smiths says hmmm this is good business ill raise the prices to 2000 gold
other gold buyers buy 2000 gold for 20$ and say huh ill buy that sword no problem
then another guy buys more gold and says oh yeah well ill give 4000 gold (he bough on ebay)
then some rich CEO says ill give 10 000 gold for that sword (he also bought it in game) black smith is happy and says ok...
finnaly you made your 1000 gold but now the sword is worth 10 000 gold... so thats another month of grind with your stupid wooden sword....
then the blacksmith says i have one left selling to highest bidder... a supper rich guy buys 1 million gold for 1000$US and says ill give you 1 million for that sword...
now you do the math on how long its going to take you to get that sword.......
its a hard one i suppose..
some people really dont have the time to put int othese games so buying soem gold lets them keep up a bit i suppose..
I personally not agree with the idea of buying in-game gold with real currency and i don't approve to buy mall items that increase stats or something like that. I think that the character in-game must be constructed only by the owner, not by buying there and there with RL money... That isn't fair play...
Assume the game is designed for you to earn a little cash as you progress, then spend the majority that cash on some kind of money-sink like travelling, buying supplies from the npc's, upgrading your skills, and so on.
Now take your average professional group of gold farmers. 50 people who will play shifts 24/7, and constantly earn money without spending anything on the money sinks at all. They circumvent the sinks by stopping character progression (ala suiciding bots in Lineage 2), by not having to pay travelling fees from staying in the same spot for weeks, by not buying heal and buff potions from using an ideal party makeup. Let alone "novelty" and "status" type money sinks like fancy houses or mounts.
These guys will constantly inject a steady stream of money into the economy without putting anything back into the system. It causes inflation in the player market, inflation increases demand for gold, and the demand has to be filled.
It's true that we wouldn't have this problem if the game wasn't gear dependant, you hardly see this in games like guild wars where anyone can get the "best" stuff in about a week or two of playing, and where there are no uberepic items. But I like games with an intricate player economy, I've always liked it when you can make a living of crafting or trading, as it's a nice optional change of pace you can do as you see fit, and an alternate way to get that better gear without having to farm intensively. I would much rather have the gold buyers removed than to remove an element from the game which I enjoy.
"Granted thinking for yourself could be considered a timesink of shorter or longer duration depending on how smart..or how dumb you are."
It really is as simple as that.
But I'll agree it does give an unfair advantage to other people especially the ones that make more money then the ones who dont (like myself) but really thats like saying someone who spends 8 hours a day gaming gets a higher level than a person that plays 2 hours a day. But it doesnt give a crippling unfair advantage, it just means that they will be able to afford things when it comes around, its nto like they have godmode (unless you actaully do play WoW or any of its ITEM BASED allies).
However, it IS illegal on the grounds of breaking a written contract with the owning company, namely the EULA. The worst they can usually do to you for this offense is whatever penalties are laid out in the EULA, though - usually just cancelling your account.
It is also theoretically illegal on the grounds of fraud, specifically "attempts to sell something that does not belong to you". This is an area that is a bit legally grey at the moment, and rarely contested by gaming companies (it's basically the arguement that won Mythic's landmark case against item/gold sellers, however). Here's how it goes: if I own something, I can sell it, otherwise I cannot. If I don't own the Brooklyn bridge and try to sell it to you anyway, that is fraud. It's illegal, and punishable by criminal law (whereas contract/EULA violation is a civil offense).
Gold sellers have often tried to get around this by saying they are "charging for their time, not selling the item". Courts have consistently denied this defense, however. It's a thin shield, and not a legally recognized one. There is a product changing hands. A drug dealer (to use a MUCH more extreme example) cannot get off on drug dealing charges by saying "he was just charging for the time he spent getting the drugs into the country, not for the drugs themselves".
When a product changes hands, and money is exchanged, the legal system sees it as a sale, no matter how it is marketed. Since gold sellers do not own the product they are charging for, and on top of that are making the exchange against the explicit wishes of the actual owner (the game company), it is, technically, triable as fraud, with potential jail time for offenders.
This has not been done much yet, and as far as I know, NO ONE has gone to jail for goldselling. Yet. But do keep in mind that it is possible that as the laws become better defined in this area, that could be one penalty that might be sought for the crimes involved.
(Interesting to note however that buying is not fraud, and therefore just a civil crime - contract violation - rather than a criminal one.)
Owyn
Commander, Defenders of Order
http://www.defendersoforder.com
Change the game design so that all players, both those who have the spare time and those who don't can compete more or less equally and you solve the gold selling/buying dilemma.
"True friends stab you in the front." | Oscar Wilde
"I need to finish" - Christian Wolff: The Accountant
Just trying to live long enough to play a new, released MMORPG, playing New Worlds atm
Fools find no pleasure in understanding but delight in airing their own opinions. Pvbs 18:2, NIV
Don't just play games, inhabit virtual worlds™
"This is the most intelligent, well qualified and articulate response to a post I have ever seen on these forums. It's a shame most people here won't have the attention span to read past the second line." - Anon
This is not a grey issue. There is just NO reason to do it. First place you are violating the game rules which labels you as a cheater.
If you can live with the nomenclature cheater, you should be playing your console games entering the silly cheat codes, because you certainly DON'T belong in an MMO.
Personally I can't believe so many of you condone cheating in this thread, it is appalling!
My point is people buy a lot of silly stuff for entertainment. I won't even get into beer and weed, which a vast amount of people spend a vast amount of money on. This is just one more option.
I do agree that it hurts the game, but its the gaming companies responsibility to cut down on virtual item sales if they want to. Not the consumer.
However, companies like Blizzard and Sigil do not condone the practise of buying and selling gold/accounts whatever and they make sure that people know about it. It is utterly wrong to buy and sell gold in games, and I'm sick of seeing gold/platinum/isk advertisements.
If developers want something like mounts to cost a lot of money, forcing you to spend more time at the auction house, that's how they want their game to be. The economy is as much a part of the game design than dying is, or class balance. Screw those who cheat by buying gold. The philosophy that you want to play how you want to play is just the same as using a hack to cheat death, just because you want to play that way. Its is irrefutably cheating. And I hate cheaters
Playing on a MMO server is a privelidge, not a right. If the developer doesn't want you buying gold, you respect their rules, or I hope they ban your lazy ass.
Still waiting for your Holy Grail MMORPG? Interesting...
No mate, it is not illegal, it is not against any law of wich I am aware, I have never heard of a court ruling in this case, anywere.
And trust me, were one to be settled we WOULD know about it as the gaming companies would REALLY like to show the world something like that.
As far as I have read in this thread, and in pretty much any other on this subject you are the first and only to claim for it to be ILLEGAL so you yourself may want to say this over and over, but there are no others.
An EULA is NOT a binding contract or even legal, it never has been and I doubt it ever will, this has been covered on this site and numerous others time and time again, and there are no rulings here either.
I honestly doubt you know at all what you are talking about, more like making things up along the way.
Blizzard has never sued any RMT site or company, I have never heard of any gaming company that has.
I very much doubt they have even asked sites like IGE and mysupersales and others to stop what they are doing.
This site carries ads for RMT sites, level services and the like and I HIGHLY doubt they would do that if it was illegal.
The only thing the gaming companies can do is cut you out of their game, for a time.
Not trying to be a smartass here mate, but please get your facts straigth before posting?
There have been rulings against EMU projects and private servers, but that is another thing entirely.
I will agree though that the customers always looses, but so does the gaming companies because fewer people will play a game riddled with gold farmers.
Trust me, if there were ANY way of going after these people in court IGE would NOT exist.
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Originally posted by Jerek_
I wonder if you honestly even believe what you type, or if you live in a made up world of facts.
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OP: No, it's not right.
In setting up a game account the gold buyer / seller most likely clicked "AGREE" to a EULA that states all virtual items are owned by the company. I guess an opinion whether it's right depends on one's morals.
I can see a casual gamer wanting to buy gold. The whole "Money vs. Time" for the same loot argument. What ever the reason the rules are still broke when buying / selling gold. The sad fact is that until all currency and loot is bound to a player the gold buying / selling will never go away. An exception in the binding rule would be made for crafters to hand items into an auction or market system for purchase.
Just not worth my time anymore.
If A is not allowed to buy ingame money the no life guy B would have an unfair advantage. Why should he have an advantage just because hes got more time to dedicate to the low priority virtual world? The other guy A is outside saving someones ass. It is fair if A could decide to convert some of his "work time" (working as a fire fighter) to "game time" using €/$ as a trading object.
Look at it this way: There is no difference in working in a virtual world and working in a real world. Time is consumed and wealth is gained. Working in the real world has a way higher priority than working in a virtual world so he gains the advantage of being able to trade real world wealth for virtual wealth to stay on par with the players ingame.
One more thing: If someone is selling gold he is selling the time used to gain the gold and not the data itself which rightly belongs to the game provider.
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Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
Just not worth my time anymore.
Uh .. depends on the game but alot of US games have it in their EULA thats everything belongs to them etc some crazy wording basically saying that making money off their game is against the EULA. If it was the case you stated they wouldn't even bother banning thousands of accounts for gold selling.
Its not against the rules to farm but its against the rules to profit off items that DO NOT belong to you.
Please Refer to Doom Cat with all conspiracies & evil corporation complaints. He'll give you the simple explination of..WE"RE ALL DOOMED!