More and more games are now using micro transactions to support development costs, increase profit, or to offset costs normaly covered by subscription fees. Whether you are in support or not, micro transactions are not only here to stay, but they will become increasingly prevalent in online gaming. In this article I want to share my experiences with a game that is 100% micro (and many macro) transactions. I hope this sheds some light on what to expect in our future endeavors as a community. Anytime microtransactions are introduced into a game the overwhelming response is negative usually leading to petitions and rage quit threads. I wanted to share my experiences with the ultimate model of a MT based game. So let me take you on a brief history of my life inside Entropia Universe.
A free to play MMO formerly known as Project Entropia, Entropia Universe was once a single planet but is now a series of individually owned planets. Planets are large. How large? Large enough to be their own game world. In fact Planet Calypso, the original planet and focus of this article, has enough game world to feel much larger than WoW’s. A planet is owned by a company or group of investors. The economy is universal so interplanetary trade is possible as long as you move your goods to the planet you wish to sell on. Within each world there are 2 types of land: public and player owned. Player owned land can be anything from a personal apartment to the million dollar (yes someone paid $1,000,000 US dollars for it) space station in orbit around Planet Calypso. Game mechanics vary slightly from planet to planet but all include the popular MMO trifecta of combat, resource collection, and crafting. I would also add that is in my opinion the most beautiful MMO to date using CryEngine 2 graphics.
Planet Arkadia, on of several planets with Entropia Universe
Now that you know the basics, let’s jump into the most controversial topic about EU, it’s Real Cash Economy. Like many other MMOs you can put money into the game but EU lets you take it back out as well. Therefore when you are done with the game you can sell your items and cash out. If you want to do anything in the game you must have currency called Project Entropia Dollars (PED). PED are set at a fixed rat of 10 PED to 1 US dollar. There are 2 ways to acquire ped: 1. deposit money into the game from your credit card. 2. Go ‘sweat’ creatures. Sweating is the mundane task of targeting a mob and clicking on it over and over until you extract sweat off it. The sweat can then be sold to someone (who has deposited) and you have some PED. Sweating takes alot of time and gives very litte (atm about 2 hours of work will net you 2.5 PED or 25 cents) so if you don’t want to deposit you will have your work cut out for you.
Once you have some cash you go do your thing whether that be killing mobs, mining, or crafting. Every bullet that you fire, every piece of armor and equipment, and even repairs cost PED. So one cannot simply go out with the biggest gun and start blasting away hoping to make a profit. Loot drops are random so you may end up with items worth more than the cost of ammo spent or more than likely you will have netted a loss. Once you have acquired loot from one of the aforementioned activities, you can sell your items on the open market through trade chat in one of Calypso’s trade hubs or sell on the auction house. This is where you try to get top dollar for your goods so that way you recoup as much as you can. Selling on the open market helps you avoid transaction fees associated with listing items on the ah but limits your audience. AH taxes you for a percentage of the sell price so if you are selling a $350 helmet, you will be assessed a fee of up to $10.
This fossil sold for over $12,700 U.S. Dollars
That is the most common way to try and make money: get loot, sell loot, profit(?). Other ways include trading, and activity I have partaken in. This requires only patience, a good knowlage of the market, and an intitial investment. Buy low and sell high. Seems simple enough right? Not when you have people all over the world trying to do the same thing. Sometimes I made bad investments (bought a spaceship for $90 thinking supply was dwindling and BAM some crafter floods the market. Alas I sold it for $82). Another method of generating income is provinding services such as vehicle repair, raid healing, and cosmetic changes to avatars. Finally you can become a land owner. Land areas cost anywhere from several thousand to over 1 million in the case of the NEVERDIE asteroid/space station. These areas are then seeded so folks can hunt/mine on them. The owner sets a tax rate and reaps the benefits of everyone using that land. Most folks play the game to play. There are some who use it as supplemental income to their regular job. Then there are the few risk takers that actually make a living off of playing. In the case of John ‘NEVERDIE’ Jacobs, he made an inital investment of $10k dollars to purchase the station he later sold for over 1mil. There are countless other stories of folks making it big on Calypso but that is the guy you will always here about.
Selling at item on Diablo 3's Real Money Auction House
So there you have it. My not so short description of a game that embraces microtransactions to the extreme and allows you to maybe profit off of playing. Now how can this info be useful to us? I want to start by com parring EU to Blizzard’s upcoming RPG Diablo 3. The big news about D3 (other than fans have been waiting 10 years for it) is the announcement of the Real Money Auction House. The RMAH will allow you to do just what Entropia’s does which is deposit and withdraw real cash. Let’s compare the two sytems and see how they are similar:
1. Both allow players to create the economy. Blizzard has stated they do not intend to sell items and beyond starter and special event gear, EU does not influence the market beyond controlling loot drop frequency/quality.
2. They both enact a transaction fee [1 for listing an item and another if you should chose to cash out]. Fees are a good thing. They keep people from clogging the market with junk.
3. Can be monetized. So if you grind long and hard enough, you can theoretically make your $60 back or more. Once your are done with the game, sell your items.
Now the differences:
1. totally different business models. Where Entropia is free to play and downliad, they base their income for an entire MMO dev team. Diablo will be using funds from software sales and expansions to fund a multi sharded non masive gaming world.
2. Both have listing fees but D3’s will be a flat one. Remember that EU has a higher fee depending on the amount you are selling for. This will mean that people can list items for crazy amounts of money and only have to pay a nominal fee allowing little risk to put your common sword up for $100 and hope someone has been drinking when they click the buy button.
3. Gold. Because D3 will have a ‘gold only’ auction house as well, people can still play for free. EU’s PEDS cannot easily be acquired and generally recquire an intial investment of money or lots of time. This is one difference I am happy about. I love the fact that I can play without having to worry about losing money.
4. Audience. I can tell you that I were to compare the player communities from every online game I have played, Entropia’s would have to be the best I have ever had the chance to interact with. It is very international meaning that you are playing with people outside of the US/Canada/Europe/Australia demographic we are used to playing with. Also, because real money is involved, being polite and helpful to others gets you a long way. If you are rude or selfish, people remember and you may have trouble finding people to trade with. Diablo will be seperated into the typical geographical regeons. Blizzard also have a massive following. Expect to see a couple million folks world wide where Entropia is somewhere in the tens of thousands. In the end, D3 will have a larger player base which means a larger economy.
How does this affect games The Black Watch plays? For one I fully intend to play Diablo 3. Understanding the economy and how to use it to your advantage will help you have more fun (playing games and making money are fun when done together). If you are thinking about playing, get your theory crafting and market analysis hats on because we are going to be doing more than just idly playing this game. In regards to our current portfolio, I touched on several examples including WoW’s Golden Cub, to STO’s C-Store, and speculation on SWTOR. Going forward I think it’s safe to say that these games will get a healthy dose of microtransactions during their lifespan. We may see more games in the future entriely funded by MTs. I’m glad to have been able to share my knowlage and hope that you now understand the world of spending beyond your monthly subscription fee. Please post any questions or comments below.
Blizzard press conference about the RMAH
