Noggin
Stalker
- Joined
- Jun 20, 2005
- Posts
- 1,667
- Location
- UK
- Society
- nothing AND nowhere (nAn)
- Avatar Name
- Balthazar Noggin Fishburn
Northman said:A strong factor about the silly prizes on items i think is...
ADDICTION
I would NOT be surprised if there is alot of people putting their savings in to EU.
I don't think theese people buying are rich do you
Totally - a lot of people buy WAY over their means. I know of one particular guy who got himself into $80k of debt... just for a game! Real nasty business. Sold his home, car, moved back in with his mother, and even still he's probably got a good few more years to pay it off, suffering without a life because of it all.
The addiction to EU and the need to be 'better' is sometimes all-encompassing, and can overpower reason and logic in somebody's brain. Happens with many other things in the real world...
I still find it quite perverse how MA have allowed the economy to get so hyper-inflated. Surely it's in nobody's interest, and I still see no sign of a plan to keep it steady or reduce it.
You certainly can't blame MA for everything though - I do believe in the responsibility of the individual, and the fact that everyone has to face the consequences of their own actions at some point in their lives.
However, MA have great power over people - more than they realise I think. As they yield this power, I believe it's also their responsibility to ensure it's used wisely and with the best interests of their customers (us) at heart. This is why I find it quite disturbing quite how expensive everything seems to be these days.
Before PE, in your right mind did you ever think you would be paying out $1000 for a virtual item? I certainly didn't. But I DID end up paying that sorta cash for a virtual item, and a bunch on top. People have paid almost $20,000 for a virtual healing box too, which I'm pretty sure wasn't exactly pocket change.
As the RCE MMO market expands, and the public has more to choose from, this phenomina will die out. No longer will it seem reasonable to pay out that sort of money for a virtual fap, because in xxx other game, which yyy prefers because it has zzz content, you can get the best healing tool for pocket change.
This only seems reasonable to us right now because it's the ONLY game around which has built it's economy in such a way. People get caught up in it all, and then start to value the virtual items in the same way they would if they were real.
Real items carry a real cost. Virtual items can be picked out of the air. That's the difference I think. In a market crash, a virtual item could conceivably become exactly what it's worth: Nothing at all.