Real money trade as a convenience to players

RMT may indeed have a place in AAA MMO titles, but for me, and I'd guess alot of the North American and European users equate RMT games with shoddy Chinese games designed to part users with their money at a rate faster than a typical subscription model would. Searching for Item Mall Scams on google will yield a healthy dose of scary stories.

I'm not worried about that, let the buyer beware. What I'm worried about is how RMT will effect existing western MMO models. Most games out there are themepark games where grinding for gear is the only real progression (after grinding for XP). Already every major MMO publisher out there releases periodic updates to their game which makes the previous "best-in-game" gear obsolete and adds a new "best-in-game" set of gear to grind for, keeping the user paying and playing.

With RMT, what's to stop SOE, EA, or Blizzard from charging 50 dollars for Sword of Pwn, and then the week after releasing Sword of Uber Pwn for 50 dollars, and now Sword of Pwn is on sale for 25 dollars.

What's the point? The scam that most MMOs are today would be even more bald-faced and more users would opt-out than in.

It's a sad day in MMO-land when the only real innovation going on is in the billing department. Publishers should be concentrating on making their games fun to play.

I will not play a RMT game. I simply will not.
I can accept paying $15 a month for "play time", but I can't bring myself to spend cash on virtual swords.

I'll pay for time on the golf course, but I won't pay for a handicap.

A 15 dollar a month fee IS RMT. How is it not? You are trading real life money for virtual items, period.

What about the player that pays for multiple accounts? How is that not the same thing as a player that pays for a virtual horse?

And for the love of logic, and looking at the history of cash shop MMO's (if you don't know, you haven't played any): they will not sell the uberest of uber items in a cash shop. There will always be that "grind" for people that feel that there is some kind of rule that says grinding is the only way to go. Those people are hopeless, anyway.
Right now, EVE sells the "uberest" of items: the best ships and the best pilots (you can buy both)..but those items were created BY players.
Even with that, there are thousands playing the "normal" way and no company will ever ONLY leave you the option of only buying your way out. None. If you think that, either you have not paid attention to the last 10 years of gaming or you think that if someone else buys something in a cash shop that it somehow stops you from having fun.

I welcome the cash shops! Let them come! I'm sick of keeping up with 5 or 6 subs every month, when I skip around games as it is.

Beau Turkey
www.spouseaggro.com

I personally detest the idea of RMT, as one of the posters above said, because I wouldn't spend money on a fake sword. Yes, I spend money for 'play time' - but I can get 13,000 fake swords in that time if I want.

I think a lot of it depends on how much time people put into the games and how they value their time. In a perfect world, maybe games would offer both models and not piss off the people who spend 40 hours a week getting fake swords by giving fake swords for $5 to the people who only sign on 1 hour a week to clutter the trade channel.

I played eq2 for two+ years. I ran two accounts on the station exchange server "the bazaar." Sony set up the station exchange to allow people on that server and one other (pvp) server to sell items, characters and money for real money.

It was the best time I've ever had in a game. I made around $6k in real U.S. cash. People had a choice they could play on the bazaar or they could play on one of the many many servers that didn't allow the station exchange.

I really believe that allowing some servers to be like that is just a really welcome change for some people. I can't understand why certain games such as WOW and others won't even consider relaxing the rules on just ONE server.

I think it's because there are a tremendous amount of really dumb people who think that a: there isn't already a ton of gold/plat farming/selling going on as it is and b: it will ruin the game. Eq2 may not be the best game but the station exchange did NOT make it worse in any way as far as I could see. I was in a raiding guild for a while back then and nobody complained about it. Nobody thought it was unfair. Nobody even bothered to talk about it except when they made a really nice sale.

Let the gamers play the game they want, stop telling game companies that you won't play just because you don't want anyone else to have any fun.

Like Yahree said, more choices is ALWAYS better for the consumer. And all I've read so far here are people who don't know how it works and are making some sort of distinction between the real money they already pay in a sub, sometimes for content you will never even see. What is more insane than that??

I have no problem with subscriptions. If I wanted to save money I'd stop buying MMO games and paying subscriptions. What I am done with is the flagrant disregard for my time which IS MONEY, so they can stretch content and force me to grind past cock-blocks that add no value to my gaming experience. I'm just done with having my time spent in that manner.

And oh my god, I'm in agreement with Beau Turkey on something. My sky is truly falling. :-)

I won't play an RMT MMO simply because I don't want to spend my leisure time feeling like a sheep about to be fleeced. Currently, I pay my subscription, and anything in the game is available to me provided I want to put in the time and effort for it.

I also enjoy things more if I've acquired them than if I bought it from the auction house with in-game money. It would be even less enjoyable if things were just a matter of putting in my credit card number.

Reading some of the comments here it seems people are confusing what is provided in the item shops in a number of games with what can be traded in facilities like Station Exchange.
Or perhaps confusing the term "item" with "gear/equipment". Or perhaps think that "gear" is the only thing that is worth playing for and hence that must be in the item shops.

What I prefer here is that there is a correlation between what I pay for and what I get and/or that that I have some options in terms of payment that suits how I play.

With more games that provide alternative payment models to the subscription-based games I think the market may be on the right path to perhaps provide options that apply to a larger customer segment. Which is good for the MMOs in general.

Wow, I hadn't checked this post in a long time. I just noticed that guys stupid remark:

"
Uh, no.
I'm trading money for timed access to the virtual world. What I choose to do with that time is up to me. Paying for time is not like paying for a horse."

As though that time he is paying for is somehow different than that character Bob bought or that horsey Sally paid for from a cash shop.

1) You pay them 15 dollars. They give you access.

2) You pay them 15 dollars. They give you a sword.

Both are virtual things, can be measured, and can be taken away from you according to the EULA. Do you mean to tell me that the newbie character you have when you log in, and his newbie clothes and newbie UI, as well as his newbie existence, are NOT tools, or NOT something above access?

What if they charged you 15 bucks for plain access..in other words, they said "...you are in, now find a way to look around and to kill things."

But WAIT, you want a certain FREE set of tools/items/NPC's/missions as well as a FREE character to come with the 15 dollars?

But you just said it was access only. I got access, as well. You say it's up to you to choose how you spend that time, well I choose to spend it on a virtual horse, that I paid real money for. You paid money for your virtual legs and virtual dagger you get upon logging in.

You are no different, when you pay 50 bucks for a BOX and a virtual character, than a player that is paying nothing for game and 15 dollars for a horse.

Of course, you don't count the "free" mounts you get in game at level ____ as well as the "uber" items you get from that dungeon as NOT included in the 15 dollars a month. Or is it INCLUDED?

Beau

One thing that a lot of people have missed in this recent economic down turn is the fact that in-game money for all of the massive mutliplayer online role playing games has not been effected. I guess it just shows how strong and stable the computer game industry really is.
Virtual Currency