Editorial: Real Money, In Game Items

MMORPG.COM has an editorial on the first month of the Station Exchange, the controversial SOE service of buying and selling in-game items for real world dollars. While of the people hanging out at MMORPG.COM forums a large majority was against real money trade (RMT), the Station Exchange traded virtual items for $180,000 in its first month. Not too shabby.

Just shows that polls aren't representative, because game forums are mainly populated by hardcore players, people with too much time. And it is pretty obvious that the time-rich are the ones fearing for their status when you introduced RMT. You can see that from typical arguments, where the hardcore players claim that the buyers of virtual goods are just doing it to cheat their way to some status they were unable to earn. In reality I don't think the buyers are interested at all in status. Most of the things bought simply open up the way to new content, which the time-poor would otherwise been unable to reach. Or to speak in a World of Warcraft example: People spend real world dollars on WoW gold to buy a horse *not* because the horse looks nice, but because you can move faster with a horse. If the horse was just for show, and riding was not faster than running, few people would spend dollars on them.
- posted by Tobold @ 9:26 AM Permanent Link