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Virtual goods, how MMO staff are trained to relieve you of your cash
ArcAngel3
Member Posts: 2,931
I recently reviewed a presentation that trains online game providers how to manipulate you, the gamer, out of your hard earned cash via RMT shops.
I share this information with you for your awareness, so that you as a customer/gamer know what the strategy is, and can make an informed decision regarding how you choose to spend your gaming dollars:
From the training:
Why will people want RMT items? Because...
- "people are impatient: time = money
-people want better stuff [e.g. superior items]
-people want to feel important
-people want to express themselves
-people want to build relationships
-people want to show they care
-people want to feel good about themselves"
Why do virtual goods work? Because...
-the social context of the game gives meaning and emotion to the virtual items; your game makes them emotionally important to people.
The presentations also highlight that virtual goods give you an opportunity to monetize your most engaged players.
Here are the 5 steps to getting cash from your players via RMT:
1. Create a meaningful context
2. Prime the pump with free goods or currency
3. Create demand for premium content
4. Offer fresh content at a range of price points
5. Make it easy to purchase currency.
"So remember, virtual goods evoke real emotion, in a well understood social context. Virtual goods enable self-expression and enhance social activities. Virtual economies drive ongoing use and turn a game or website into a service." (all information taken from this link: http://www.slideshare.net/amyjokim/virtual-goods-why-how-they-work)
So, the game is just there to give emotional meaning to the virtual items. The virtual items appeal to people's impatience and social-emotional needs. The game company is supposed to prime the pump with free items. "Engaged" players are then monetized.
And here I thought the focus of online games was to provide quality online video games for our entertainment. Imo, that didn't seem to be the focus of the training.
Comments
If people want to spend their weeks pay check in a virtual world, let them, its their problem.
Really who cares what the company is trained, people should have enough common sense to budget their cash and not buy pointless items if they cant afford it in the first place.
My Guild Wars 2 Vids
That pretty much falls under the heading of: Business
But I get your point. I've always thought the term F2P was misleading since while it is technically true, realistically, they should be called UGWUP42P (You get what you pay for to play).
That pretty much falls under the heading of: Business
But I get your point. I've always thought the term F2P was misleading since while it is technically true, realistically, they should be called UGWUP42P (You get what you pay for to play).
I see some people responded before I was finished the O.P.. Sorry I tried to let you know that more was coming. I hit tab while typing, and the message was sent before completion. I'm done now ^_^. I'd love to hear your feedback on the finished post.
I think people should definitely be encouraged to spend their money as they see fit. What caught my attention about the training is what appears to be its manipulative nature. It seems as though the customer is led to the item shop by a number of strategies that often take place outside of people's awareness.
For instance, when people join a game and get free items, do they realize that they are being "primed" for later monetization? Do they realize that the social context of the game is being provided to create demand for virtual items? Do they realize that devs are being encouraged to actually create demand for premium virtual loot? Did they know how thoroughly their social needs were being targetted as a potential revenue stream? I doubt it.
Well, now they know ^_^. I'd sooner see gamers know what's going on and make an informed decision, rather than being manipulated outside of their awareness.
This is exactly the kind of thing i started my crusade against. The gaming aspect has become way less important than the business aspect, for a lot of companies out there. To a point where it gets shady.....bugs, half-finished products, broken game mechanisms that get compensated with RMT items, and the list goes on.
A few exceptions of the rule, aka companies that put gaming before business (and still make a ton of cash): Blizzard, CCP.
Currently playing browser games. Waiting for Albion Online, Citadel of Sorcery and Camelot Unchained.
Played: almost all MMO pre 2007
I think you're right. Some games seem to be created for gamers to enjoy (e.g. EVE, aka game of the year); others seem to be little more than an elaborate strategy designed to access your credit card as often as possible.
What really stood out to me were the lines like: create demand for premium goods, appeal to people's impatience, prime the pump with free stuff to begin with, monetize your most engaged players. The last comment imo is a polite way of saying, "once you've got them good and hooked, here's how to get at their wallets."
It all just felt very "behind the scenes" and manipulative to me.
Welcome to Marketing 302.
im curious to know what company actualy had to have a sit down about what they can sell. Which in my mind is some of the most commen sense BS i can think that would be cake to sell without the need of manipulation. I just want to know what company needed a guy to come in and tell them all that BS that should have allready been known from the get go.
This is why game devs gargle my balls. And they need everything spelled out in crayon now. You know if you do something right it will pretty much sell itself. Then there wont be a need for everyone to pay some guy to tell you a bunch of shit you should allready know.
My point on this is very simple, as long as RMT items are only cosmetic i have no problems with that. The day a MMO company will charge me a monthly fee and at the same time sell epic weapons & armors for real cash, they'll loose my business.
I'm wondering what the problem is here. This is sales course and what they talked is the basics of all sales. Create demand, create an emotional attachment of the product or service with your customers.
Be it food, clothes, cars, games, real estate. It all follows the same formula. We've known for centures if not longer that people buy based on emotions needs (most people that is.
How is this any different? Why is it a surprise that it would operate any different? I mean they are trying to sell something after all.
Venge Sunsoar
All f2p mmos are the same, selling virtual goods. I prefer p2p games.
F2P is really P2L (pay to level). It may not start that way, but look at how the cash shop of some of the best known titles have developed over time. PW being a perfect example.
There's such an arbitrary gamer bias* towards P2P, it's amazing. It's part fear of Change, and partly the numerous bad F2P games (which causes most gamers to think F2P can never be done well, rather than muse at the potentially good ways it can be implemented - some of which already exist.)
It's simple: don't play (or pay) bad games. Pay for good ones, and don't get caught up on some arbitrary belief that P2P is somehow inherently better than F2P -- actually consider the benefits of each.
(*speaking of grognard gamers mostly; the true gamer bias favors F2P. Especially well-designed F2P systems.)
"What is truly revealing is his implication that believing something to be true is the same as it being true. [continue]" -John Oliver
I tried out Dungeons and Dragons Online mostly because it had gone free to play.
It's not really free to play. Yes you can reach max level without paying a dime, however it would require an epic grinding of the same dungeons over and over.
I wound up subscribing for a month.
I found out Dungeons and Dragons online has some serious flaws. The content becomes very boring. Grouping is pretty much optional. Game vets know the dungeons so well that when you do group, they race through the content.
In the end, I felt Dungeons and Dragons was a rip off.
Should you try it? Sure. Should you spend money? No.
EDIT: typo
Well shave my back and call me an elf! -- Oghren
Fully agree with this, I kinda think some people don't know business, sure we have things that might look bad from within but that's just the way things work in the real world. I geuss some don't know that entertainment is business, and business means money, how they get it may be many way's, even way's I dislike or dispise.
I would suggest to the OP to watch some commercials, just for daily stuff on tv, are they being truthfull?, if you drink Coca Cola zero do you expect some hugh band of Swat team members to help clean your room?, do you think when you spray on AXE that thousands of woman come at you with a sexhunger?, do you feel when seeing a MCdonald commercial that you actualy get that great looking burger?
I still believe many people today have lost their sense of being responsible for their own doings, yet take the easy road or try to find anything to blame but themselfs, again I might not like certain practices, but I am mature enough to look thru that.
But think regardless Arc will find something new again....hehe, no offense Arc....but seriously
I don't quite see the problem either. The discussion about the value of virtual goods is old. I play sometimes MTGO (the digital version of the trading card game magic the gathering), where you also pay with money for virtual stuff. But who cares? It just depends what people agree on. They agreed that banknotes are worth something, even though they are just colored pieces of paper. They could also have agreed that rabbit teeth are a currency, would work the same. And that's also the same as information. Information is no tangible object, but getting it and dealing with it is a business old as time.
The focus of online games is NOT to provide quality entertainment. The focus is to pay the people who work on the game and make some money in general. It just happens that quality entertainment is often good in making money, so sometimes it's about the same.
Let's play Fallen Earth (blind, 300 episodes)
Let's play Guild Wars 2 (blind, 45 episodes)
this post makes too much sense, no one likes this kind of thing on forums, ban i say, ban.
I need more vespene gas.
this post makes too much sense, no one likes this kind of thing on forums, ban i say, ban.
I think the bigger message is getting lost in the with the focus of virtual sales being good or bad. The real message that is getting overlooking is how this affects game design.
In the original post there is nothing about how to make a game fun which is the core problem of the message this training is sending out. The entire focus is about how to alter a game so that people have to spend more money. Everyone so far has read in the assumption that this is aimed only for free to play games. This can apply to any game. Think about that for a moment before going any further. How would this affect your favorite game?
This design mentality overshadows the core concept of making games, which is to provide entertainment. For example, in subscription based games the incentive for game developers is to create engaging and entertaining content. The more content they offer, the longer people will play and thus pay money. It is a somewhat symbiotic relationship where both company and customer benefit.
In virtual sales games, the motivation for a game designer is to push people towards virtual items sales, possibly at the expense of everything else. That could directly contrast the design of making a game fun and often does. That is why so many free to play games are often grindfest and lack that certain something. Think about it from a design standpoint. Withholding content is in the best interest of the company to encourage more sales. Withholding gameplay features is in the best interest of the company. Designing gameplay that is intended to not be very engaging without .
Where is the best interest of the players in any of that? It is just hard to make a compelling argument that great gameplay design comes from companies withholding content, features and gameplay from players.
The design doesn't encourage creating better and more challenging content. Instead it encourages the designer to create bigger and greater desire to spend money in the cash shop. This is usually why item mall games are forced to sell real power, because it is hard to keep enough people interested in fluff and experience potions long term.
In most games the designers focus on 'what can we give the players to do'.
Virtual sales encourage designers to think 'what can we take away from the players'.
As for the marketing, sure it all makes sense when looked at from a classroom perspective. This is how marketing works, but at the same time, this is not a can of soda. The can of soda is a one time purchase that doesn't taste like crap unless you purchase multiple additions to make it an enjoyable experience. The can of soda is designed to be the best product it possibly can, because they want to make it an enjoyable experience to get make the customer a repeat customer.
I won't play a game where RMT gives any advantage what so ever. Fluff, so what? I've long lost the need to mindlessly grind for any sort of item. I only play MMOs for adventure, lore, exploration and fun whether its solo, grouping, PvP and PvE. If I feel for a second I'm mindlessly doing anything to advance, I'm wasting my time. Giving me an option to BUY that time doesn't help. It just cheapens the experience even further.
Clipping highlights from Daffid's first response:
“The entire focus is about how to alter a game so that people have to spend more money.
This design mentality overshadows the core concept of making games, which is to provide entertainment. For example, in subscription based games the incentive for game developers is to create engaging and entertaining content. The more content they offer, the longer people will play and thus pay money. It is a somewhat symbiotic relationship where both company and customer benefit.
In virtual sales games, the motivation for a game designer is to push people towards virtual items sales, possibly at the expense of everything else. That could directly contrast the design of making a game fun and often does.
The design doesn't encourage creating better and more challenging content. Instead it encourages the designer to create bigger and greater desire to spend money in the cash shop.”
This summarizes my thoughts exactly. Well said Daffid. It's a question of focus. Are the devs focused on creating enjoyable content that will keep me playing for entertainment, or are they focused on creating demand for their virtual items? Imo, this training encourages the latter, and I don't see that as a good thing for gamers.
Also, don't forget that this weeks premium RMT loot can be intentionally made obsolete next week, or deleted altogether if the MMO company thinks that these moves will increase demand for the new pixels.
This is just plain capitalism being applied to virtual goods, otherwise people would see this as the most pathethic and ridiculous way of scamming possible that is the purchase of virtual goods if you think of what you are truly purchasing - nothing, vulnerable to anything the developers come up with:
- New, better items;
- Value reduction of the item you purchased in the past;
- Termination of the game server or your account.
It's the same as a religion fanatic purchasing something like a piece of wood because it was mentioned to be from Christ's cross and you believe it. Or, purchasing you believe to be a signature that comes from someone you admire. Specific conditions give value to what may be zero to someone else (these conditions are purely subjective), and in the case of virtual goods it's even less valuable because the "ownership" of virtual items in itself is too fragile for the value of the item, which can be sometimes more expensive than $20, or can go as high as over $1000 in the case of virtual gambling.
This is the reason I am against the purchase of virtual goods and prefer to contract a service for a fixed fee, which is what P2P games do.
Not to mention the fact that in this Free to Pay game people get advantages according to how much they spend, which can result in very extreme situations of a victory or achievement being only possible because of these virtual goods. Are you playing to enjoy or paying to enjoy?
No human is immune to this subjective valuation of things, there is no stupidity involved - just being subjectively involved or not to believe in the value of the virtual goods.
There's some real insight in the above post I think. I also want to highlight a difference between seeing this kind of marketting applied to the real world as opposed to a virtual one.
Do soft drink companies try to link their beverage to feelings of self-esteem? Yeah, sure they do. Here's the difference though; they can't make the weather hotter outside, and they can't make you thirsty. They also can't make their beverage the only thing that will quench your thirst.
In a virtual world, the service provider can make it hotter outside, can make you thirsty, can make their drink the only thing available that can quench your thirst. They can also make your avatar plain looking or ugly as hell, unless you head on down to the item shop to make yourself look presentable. In essence, they create demand for the virtual goods simply by coding it into the game.
I saw something similar to this once when I was travelling internationally by train. It was the middle of August, and it was probably about 100 degrees outside. The train company turned the air conditioning so high that you could see your breath in the train. When asked to turn it down, they refused. Instead they offered to sell each customer a blanket at a cost of about 15 dollars. They were surprisingly well stocked with blankets for a heat wave in mid-August. They created demand for goods by controlling the environment. The control they had was, fortunately, limited only to the thermostat. On the other hand, a dev's control of the environment in an MMO is virtually unlimited. The opportunities for this sort of manipulation and exploitation are extraordinary.
Oh I am sooo scared of change, Owwwwwwhhhhhhhh, scary!
Axehilt then goes on to say it might have something to do with the numerous bad F2P games on the market. Err yes you have it in two, I don’t fear change, I do look at MMO’s called F2P, see their reputation and conclude what a disaster it would be if all MMO’s were F2P.
As I said, many start out with decent cash shops, but they don’t stay that way.
Prediction time: In a recent staff article of Mr Aioshi, it seems clear to me that there will be more F2P competition in the coming years. He thinks there will be new players, I don’t, the player base cannot magic people out of thin air. So F2P will have to get more out of the fewer players they have. That means F2P games with decent cash shops will go the cash cow route quicker than they have in the past.
If you want to play the F2P MMO lottery and hope your game still has a decent cash shop in a year’s time, that’s your look out.
ArcAngel3 sums up the postion you are putting yourself in when you play a cash shop MMO:
“In a virtual world, the service provider can make it hotter outside, can make you thirsty, can make their drink the only thing available that can quench your thirst. They can also make your avatar plain looking or ugly as hell, unless you head on down to the item shop to make yourself look presentable. In essence, they create demand for the virtual goods simply by coding it into the game.”
I really don't see this a problem unless they use deception.
If i am impatient, and the price is right, what is the problem of buying something to speed up my process? It is a fair trade in the classical economics sense. I got value (less wait), and they got my money.
If i think it is too expensive, i won't pay .. and so if i pay, the price is always right.
The same principle applies to status, and other emotional needs. I mean they are not the only one trying to make money of out emotions. Shrinks charge people hundreds of dollars per hour to make them feel better.
It is a free world. You can always choose NOT to buy whatever they are offering.
There's such an arbitrary gamer bias* towards P2P, it's amazing. It's part fear of Change, and partly the numerous bad F2P games (which causes most gamers to think F2P can never be done well, rather than muse at the potentially good ways it can be implemented - some of which already exist.)
It's simple: don't play (or pay) bad games. Pay for good ones, and don't get caught up on some arbitrary belief that P2P is somehow inherently better than F2P -- actually consider the benefits of each.
(*speaking of grognard gamers mostly; the true gamer bias favors F2P. Especially well-designed F2P systems.)
After reading this I was reminded of why my mother-in-law is on medication. Delusional people should be looked after so I can not hold this against you or laugh. People dislike f2p because most of them have no support, end game, tons of grind, and pay to win features.