by David Piner on May 02, 2007
For many years now there has been a system in place with many Asian MMORPGs that allow gamers to enjoy a game without having to pay a single dime. The system is called “micropayments” and it works exactly like buying that new horse for Oblivion on XBOX Live. Simply put, you pay a small fee with real life cash for an item in a game. Usually it’s between a dollar and ten dollars but some may go further.
The reason for this is that in many Asian countries (South Korea especially) gamers generally play at cyber cafes. At cyber cafes they have access to multiple games and will generally play several MMORPGs at the same time. Holding a subscription to them all would limit where they’d put their money. So, instead, they get to play as many as they want. The ones they like the most get a share of their video game cash.
For instance, there is a game with a North American translation called Pangya. Now, Pangya isn’t an MMORPG but it’s very similar. It’s basically a MMO golf simulator that you can play for free. There are no limits, no XP cap, nothing at all to keep you from playing. However, if you want to be the best (gear wise) you have to buy “cookies”. These cookies are bought with real life cash and can be exchanged for special items in the game. That isn’t the only way to get items, of course, but it’s the outright easiest.
You may be asking yourself how does this apply to World of Warcraft? Let’s imagine for an instance that instead of gold selling being against the rules and highly immoral it was a legitimate practice and handled through Blizzard. Let’s say for two USD you could buy a new jewel or for five USD get a special scroll that grants you double XP for several hours. For simplicities sake we’ll assume the subscription fee remains.
The benefits are very obvious. Anyone with less time then others would be able to compete against anyone who has the time to raid. We’ll assume that the various bought items are inferior to whatever is obtained from raiding. Casual players would then be able to PvP on the same level as someone who has been raiding for awhile.
The downside depends all on your point of view. For some, there is no down side. A respectable opinion. However, for me, why take away the challenge? Why would we even bother playing a game where you can turn real money into advancement?
I ask this question because there is an answer. Many people already buy gold and items with real life cash and seem very satisfied. Some people even buy full accounts with the absolute best gear and enjoy every second of it. So why not let Blizzard take a cut?
My opinion is pretty simple. I don’t want to see the game become “who has the most real life cash” or see people bragging about how they spent forty dollars to get the best sword enchantment in the game. Speaking of large amounts of money, I’d hate to imagine what some of the obsessive types would do when they could exchange their savings for the Sword of One Thousand Truths.
MMORPGs are about the journey as one Blizzard employee said during an interview. Leveling up with friends, watching each other advance, and facing the same trials and tribulations is what playing an MMORPG is about, especially a fantasy one like WoW. I mean, say if you loaded up Super Castlevania on the Super NES and turned on Game Genie then walked through the entire game. What was the purpose of that? Where was the fun? Challenge is everything.
If WoW were to switch from some kind of subscription based platform or if were just to open its own gold store then I’d probably be very upset. Not upset in that zealous fanatic way, but upset that a perfectly good game had its challenged removed so that people could get what they wanted as fast as they wanted it. To me WoW would be nowhere near as fun as it is.
So you’ve heard my opinion, what’s yours? Head to our forums and share with us today!