economy
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Guild Wars 2's new wallet helps you simplify, dude
Guild Wars 2 players who have logged in this week have a new present waiting for them: the Guild Wars 2 Unlimited Edition Wallet-o-Matic (velcro tabs optional). Maybe you thought that the old way of storing all of your loose bills, family photos, and tokens was just fine, but trust us, your inventory was a mess. All the duct tape in the world couldn't keep it organized. In a new dev blog, ArenaNet explains why it made the wallet a priority for the August release: "Inventory management can be a tedious and time consuming part of playing almost any MMO. For many of you, tokens and badges and currencies were all separated across your different characters." The new wallet has become a central depository for the game 16 or so currencies. The only catch to using it is that you have to log onto each of your characters to have all of their tokens and gold automatically transferred into the wallet.
Greed Monger video demonstrates house building [Updated]
In a game focused on building things, you'd expect housing to involve a bit more than just dropping a generic prefab on a plot of land. If you envision the builder carefully piecing elements together to create a unique dwelling instead, you've hit Greed Monger's take on housing on the head. A new video highlighting the house building tool of the crafting-centric game follows the construction of a large building piece by piece and gives an example of the possibilities. You can see the process in action in the video after the cut. And if that still isn't enough, Greed Monger also announced that the tool would be available for folks to try out sometime in the coming days has now released the tool for players to check it out for themselves -- as long as they find a way to acquire lumber, that is. [Updated to add release of the building tool.]
Make My MMO: Crowdfunding June 30 - July 13, 2013
The last two weeks haven't been quiet on the crowdfunding front. While Star Citizen takes the lead with the most news (from ever-expanding coffers to just "finding ways to make the game more awesome"), other titles had their own snippets to report as well. There's also some upheaval in our ranks: We gained a new MMORTS/MMORPG mix project but lost two others from our list when both Skara: The Blade Remains and Anthym didn't meet their goals. And yet another title makes its final appearance before moving on to Betawatch! That's right, folks; TUG is saying hasta la vista to Make My MMO in favor of alpha land. Curious as to what all else has transpired? Then check out the details after the break.
Darkfall market system coming this week
Darkfall's getting a new market system in this week's patch, according to a developer blog recently posted on the game's official website. Markets will initially be available in the four NPC capital cities, but Aventurine plans to add more in the future. Markets feature an order system, so players can place and fulfill both buy and sell orders, or even use the new system for player-created quests. "New players looking to earn gold can work to fulfill buy orders that are available," AV explains. You can browse the market from anywhere in the game world simply by using the appropriate GUI button, but placing and fulfilling orders will require a trip to one of the capital market buildings.
Star Citizen a 'remarkably detailed space combat sim with an equally in-depth economy'
You're probably aware of the fact that Star Citizen has spaceships. But did you know that space combat is just part of what the game offers? If you didn't know that -- or, heck, even if you did -- check out the latest dev blog on the game's economy, along with the accompanying video featuring Cloud Imperium founder Chris Roberts. "Star Citizen is, at its heart, a vast living world that combines a remarkably detailed space combat simulation with an equally in-depth model of the economy of a star-spanning empire," CI's blog post explains. There's quite a bit of detail about nodes, the role of players and AI, and production chains and resource flow, so settle in with your favorite caffeinated beverage. Elsewhere in the Star Citizen news universe, it was another record crowdfunding week. The $13 million barrier is the latest to fall, and Cloud Imperium will now be able to add frigates as player-flyable ships as well as the Command and Control module on larger ships that allows pilots to coordinate between multiple craft. Stretch goal unlocks for the $14 and $15 million plateaus are viewable via the announcement post. Don't forget the economy video after the break! [Thanks Robyn!]
Player-driven economy 'at the very heart' of Pathfinder's design
Need some light reading material? Skip the latest Pathfinder Online dev blog, then! The update is typically verbose, but that's to be expected when discussing a sandbox title with a mile-long feature list. GoblinWorks' Ryan Dancey writes about the player-driven economy which is "at the very heart of the game design for Pathfinder Online." Key talking points include harvesting, processing, and of course crafting, as well as the developers' role as the "central bankers" with the power to control everything from money sinks and faucets to resource injections. There's a fair number of moving parts in GoblinWorks' design, and that fact isn't lost on Dancey. "We are concerned about the complexity implied by this system when it's reduced to inventory lists and markets," he explains. "Obviously the potential exists to shock players with huge lists of similar goods with very minor variations, making buying and selling decisions difficult. Our plan currently is to tackle this problem with UI design so you can filter and sort these lists quickly and understandably."
Wizardry Online hit by duping and hacking, bans issued
Some things never presage good news. Case in point: Wizardry Online has been hit with what appears to be a round of hacking and item duping, leading to hyperinflation and a great deal of player outrage on the forums. Exact figures about how much gold was dumped into the economy are hard to come by, but most players seem to agree that it's a matter of several million gold sometimes foisted on unwitting victims. After claiming that the matter was being investigated, Sony Online Entertainment representatives locked some of the threads related to the topic while simply stating that suspensions had been issued and further discussion did not help the community. No statements have yet been issued regarding permanent bans or any potential rollbacks to the environment. What long-term effects this will have on the game's viability remain unclear, although several players are protesting SOE's apparent lack of action quite vigorously.
The Soapbox: Tokens suck!
A few weeks ago we reported on a somewhat silly article in which the author advocated that studios could and should charge players real money transaction fees to trade items. I didn't see a lot of people in favor of this idea, but I definitely agreed with one thing that he pointed out: MMOs have become increasingly anti-trade in practice. It's not something that I've thought a lot about recently, but once this article triggered some introspection, I realized that the issue of trade (particularly relating to restrictions) has become a growing frustration of mine. My veteran characters in several MMOs are absolutely loaded -- with basic currency, that is (usually gold). And yet I am sitting on this Scrooge McDuck pile of wealth with no useful things to buy because (a) everything seems to take tokens these days and (b) so much of the good stuff in games is bind-to-character (or bind-to-account). I started feeling fidgety and then I let out a grunt of frustration. Tokens, in a word, suck.
Pay-to-trade could change the landscape of MMO economies
If you've noticed that it's become more difficult to buy, sell, or trade goods in an MMO these days due to the sheer amount of player-bound items, you're not imagining things. A writer for Gamasutra penned an article in which he discusses the decrease of in-game trade and suggests that studios might be missing out on a great source of potential revenue. First, he acknowledges why studios have moved to restrict trade. It keeps the headache of managing an economy to a bearable amount, it cuts out duping and exploits, and it stems revenue losses that are caused by third-party traders. However, the author says that the hassle could be worth it if studios were smart and got in on the action by creating a pay-to-trade economy. "In the real world, we pay huge sums in the form of taxes and fees to keep transaction costs low," he writes. "So here's my question for developers: How much would your players pay you in exchange for the ability to trade?"
Canadian economy nets $2.3 billion from games industry
At the Ottawa International Game Conference last week, Entertainment Software Association of Canada president and CEO Jayson Hilchie revealed that the video game industry added around $2.3 billion to Canada's national GDP throughout 2012. Hilchie explains that the industry has seen significant growth year-on-year, and was responsible for creating thousands of jobs across multiple fields. "There are 16,500 men and women working full time in Canada's video game industry, up 5 percent from where we were in 2011," Hilchie said. "But our industry is responsible for generating employment for approximately 27,000 people across the Canadian economy. These are high paying jobs - paying on average just over $72,000 - going to young workers in creative / artistic disciplines, technical fields and business / administrative functions." Hilchie noted that 84 percent of Canadian game development studios create games for mobile platforms. Around 66 percent of Canadian studios develop for PC platforms, while 48 percent are devoted to console development.
WildStar economy post talks item decay, Raph Koster, and more
What do hyperinflation and Raph Koster's A Theory of Fun for Game Design have to do with WildStar? Well, they're both mentioned in the game's latest dev blog. As you may have guessed, it's all about the title's economy, and Senior Systems Designer Charles "Bull" Durham expends quite a bit of virtual ink talking about things like resource sinks, resource fonts, and Carbine's interpretation of "fun" as it relates to resource reallocation. Durham also mentions item decay in passing, though it's not clear whether or not the game will make use of the mechanic in some form or fashion. "We also want to make sure that when you have to make a choice, it is based on what you, the player, feels is most important. Therefore, the choices cannot be too obvious or too enmeshed in critical needs," he writes. "Item repair, for example, doesn't offer much in the way of choice, so it shouldn't be an impactful, painful thing. We will get into this particular money sink later, but it is a very handy and fair money sink to have."
Neverwinter Days: The great economic collapse of 2013
So funny story: In planning out in advance what I wanted to talk about in this biweekly Neverwinter column, I had selected something that recently caught my eye about the game and made me happy. That something was the Neverwinter Gateway, a web portal that allows out-of-game players the ability to fiddle with their character sheets, auctions, professions, guilds, and mail. I thought -- and I still do -- that this was a nifty service that deserved a day in the sun. As I was getting set to write that column, Neverwinter's economy exploded and then imploded over the course of a weekend, thanks to a nasty exploit that involved, yup, the Gateway. Suddenly my topic had to shift from "isn't this a neat tool?" to "check out what the tools are doing with this tool." Seeing the economy effectively destroyed in a matter of hours and how Cryptic Studios dealt with this PR nightmare might be old news at this point, but it's definitely worthy of reflection, analysis, and speculation as to how trust can be rebuilt in this fledgling title. Let's get cracking -- we have a lot of ground to cover!
RIFT introduces loyalty rewards program for dedicated players
RIFT is introducing an innovative new program that allows players to get items for free when they spend money or money-substitutes on other items! The new rewards program will give players Loyalty points as those players purchase or spend credits, subscribe as a Patron, or consume REX (RIFT's tradable currency that can be purchased for real-world money). Since REX is tradable between players, a particularly thrifty player could accrue loyalty points without ever spending a real-world dime in RIFT's store. Current and former subscribers will be awarded some Loyalty points based on how long they have been subscribed. Players will be able to use Loyalty to unlock exclusive costumes, the ability to change target icons, and unique dimensions. This is all part of RIFT's free-to-play initiative and will be going live on June 12th with RIFT 2.3: Empyreal Assault.
The Soapbox: Diablo III's auction house ruined the game
After his departure from the Diablo III development team, Game Director Jay Wilson released a statement that the introduction of an auction house "really hurt the game." While players predicted doom the moment the Real Money Auction House was announced, Jay argued that the gold auction house was equally to blame for the game's fall from grace following its absolutely stellar launch sales. I don't normally agree with what Jay has to say on Diablo III, but in this case he does have a very valid point. Diablo II was consistently popular for over a decade thanks to its immense replayability. At its core, D2 was a game about building new characters and gearing them up by any means necessary. Every enemy in the game was a loot pinata just waiting to be popped, and players farmed endlessly for a few sought-after unique items. You almost never found an item that was ideal for your particular class and build, but you could usually trade for what you needed via trade channels and forums. Blizzard claimed that the auction house was intended just to streamline this process, but when Diablo III launched, it was clear that the entire game had been designed to make the auction house almost necessary for progress. The fault here lies not just with the concept of an auction house but with the game designers. That's right: I'm here to argue not only that Jay Wilson was right about the auction house ruining Diablo III but also that it was his own damn fault.
ArenaNet permanently lowers Guild Wars 2's price point
ArenaNet has made the call to permanently lower the price point for Guild Wars 2. The game previously sold for $59.99 for the Digital Edition and $79.99 for the Deluxe Edition. Both of those prices are being lowered by $10. This is not a sale, but the new regular price of the game. ArenaNet expects that this change will bring in new players and make the game more accessible. Content releases in Guild Wars 2 continue apace. Since launch, we've seen a handful of special events alongside one-time content, persistent content, and added features. On the other hand, NCsoft recently reported lower sales for this quarter than the previous one, citing "the reduction in Guild Wars 2 package sales" as part of the cause. We're scheduled for a chat with ArenaNet's Colin Johanson later today; we'll be sure to update you with more information as soon as we can.
The Daily Grind: When are rollbacks and wipes absolutely necessary?
In the last few weeks, two big games we cover on Massively have been slammed with exploits that have injured their respective economies: Diablo III and Neverwinter. In Diablo III's case, a gold duping bug apparently pumped insane amounts of cash into the economy. Neverwinter's exploits run the gamut from Foundry abuses to negative auction hall bids that don't consume gold to classes that can one-shot bosses making farming trivial. According to these claims, NW exploiters are making off with thousands of real-life dollars when cashing out their ill-gotten funds. In both cases, players called for characters wipes and rollbacks, believing each exploit severe enough to merit a clean slate. But in Diablo III's case, while the studio dealt harshly with the exploiters, the developers disagreed with the need for wipes and do-overs, presumably having concluded that such drastic measures would impact the legit playerbase far more than would a dented economy. Neverwinter, on the other hand, chose to roll back the servers, causing widespread uproar. That brings us to today's question: Which studio was right? How bad does an exploit have to be before character wipes and server rollbacks are absolutely necessary? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
EVE Evolved: Fanfest 2013 video roundup
Last month saw the huge tenth anniversary EVE Online Fanfest, a three-day convention packed full of exclusive reveals, behind-the-scenes talks, and community events. This year's Fanfest was the biggest one yet, celebrating EVE's tenth anniversary with special guest speakers from the scientific community, the reveal of a new virtual reality dogfighter, DUST 514's launch, and details of the upcoming Odyssey expansion. Massively was there to bring you coverage of the big news as it happened, and CCP streamed some of the key talks and events live to viewers at home. This year's Fanfest sold out so quickly that many people who wanted to go didn't get a chance to, and only a select few talks were shown on the public livestream. With such a packed event schedule, even players in attendance couldn't be there for every interesting talk. Thankfully, CCP recorded over 30 of the most anticipated events and has now uploaded the videos to YouTube. Highlights include the Make EVE Real videos, the EVE keynote, the CCP Presents Keynote, and the talks on how DUST 514 integrates with the EVE economy. In this week's EVE Evolved, I round up all of the EVE Fanfest videos in a handy list.
Exploits plague Neverwinter economy, PWE responds [Updated]
Multiple Massively sources and forum users are reporting that a serious auction hall exploit involving negative bids has turned the fledgling economy of Neverwinter on its head. Perfect World/Cryptic appear to be locking down forum threads on the topic and have posted the following in response to the exploits: We currently are in the process of taking action against a subset of accounts that were confirmed to have utilized exploits that affected the game balance or economy. These accounts may be banned, temporarily or permanently, depending on the severity of exploit utilization. Anyone who is affected by this will receive notification via email. [...] Thank you for your patience and support while we continue to do everything in our power to ensure that Neverwinter remains a fair and balanced game experience. The post also encourages anyone banned unfairly to contact customer support for resolution. A followup post by a Cryptic moderator from last night tells players that "there are no plans for another wipe at this time." And a message on the Neverwinter's German-language Facebook page suggests that the Neverwinter Gateway has been taken offline while the issue is investigated. We'll keep you posted as the story develops. [Thanks to Dan, J, Ehra, David, Dixa, Mike, xpac, Jan, and Zaph for the tips!] [Update: Cryptic has posted a new response to the latest exploit: "The Astral Diamond Exchange and the Auction House have been temporarily taken offline to resolve a high priority bug. At this time we are still investigating the details regarding the issue and will post more information as the situation progresses. As the issue involves in-game currency, we understand that there may be questions regarding the follow up actions needed to ensure that the economy remains fair and balanced. At this time we are still in the process of collecting the data, but plan to share details regarding follow up actions once the investigation concludes. Thank you for your patience and understanding while we continually smooth out issues during open beta."]
Engadget Primed: The rise (and rise?) of Bitcoin
Ask anyone about why Bitcoin has suddenly risen to prominence and they may offer one of a number of theories. Perhaps it'll be the one about Cypriots smuggling money out of their country, or the promise of a digital gold rush, or perhaps the tale of a disruptive new economy created by a person who may not even exist. Either way, if you'd like to untangle the myths, half-truths and labored economic newspeak behind the world that is Bitcoin, why not join us after the break?
The Guild Counsel: Why broken economies hurt guilds
I have to admit, I read the recent article by Ramin Shokrizade on the pre-endgame economy of Guild Wars 2 and shrugged. He made a lot of great points, but the problems with GW2's economy are really not that unique. One of the biggest dilemmas is the fact that dropped items, like weapons and armor, really don't have any value prior to the endgame. As in many MMOs, the broker or auction house is flooded with pre-endgame armor and weapons and there's just no demand for it. There are several design flaws that play a role in why dropped items, and virtual economies in general, feel stagnant. Let's look at a few common problems in MMOs today and see why broken economies actually hurt guilds as well.
