Economic Problem, Blizzard Worry? No.

[reposted from Kotaku]

Have you heard? The economy is cratering! Imploding! Total meltdown! And World of Warcraft developer Blizzard Entertainment is impervious. As Blizzard exec Rob Pardo explains, the game industry isn't historically affected by economic troubles like other industries. Here's Pardo's full quote:

Historically for us, the game industry hasn't been affected by recessions like a lot of other businesses. I think the reason for that is [that] games really offer some of the best entertainment value on the market. People might not want to go out to the movies and spend $100 for a couple of hours and then go to a restaurant. You can go home and pay $15 a month for 100 hours of entertainment if you're staying at home more — and I think that's one of the reasons why you don't see games really go in the same recession as the rest of the economy a lot of times.

What about you? Will the economic pinch curb your game spending?

http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/kotaku/full/~3/423338131/what-economic-problem-blizzard-worry-no

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Global Agenda - The Georgia-Grown Action MMO [Hands On]

[reposted from Kotaku]

Living in Georgia, getting some hands-on time with a game still at a relatively early point in development generally means packing my bags, finding someone to watch the cats, assigning a backup person to check on that person, and plenty of time eating bad airport food. Not so for Global Agenda, a fast-paced action MMO being developed by the Atlanta-based Hi-Rez Studios (http://www.hirezstudios.com/). All that took was a quick shower, an application of some mostly clean clothing, and a fifteen-minute drive north. That kind of convenience is addictive. We need more developers in Georgia if only to keep me from running down the street every afternoon to stare into Hi-Rez's windows to see what they're doing - most likely testing out the gameplay in Global Agenda, which is exactly what they were doing when I showed up at their offices last week. See? Convenient.

So what is Global Agenda? Let's quote the official press information: "GLOBAL AGENDA is a fast-paced action MMO using Unreal® Engine 3 set in Earth's near future, a spy-fi world of advanced technology and player-driven conflict." The game is set in the 22nd century following a severe global disaster. Players created factions fight and scheme against each other while going up against totalitarian world government hell-bent on completely dominating the populace. Full scale wars have been replaced with covert operations taking place all over the planet between rival factions.

It's important to note that the game is at an extremely early state. Hi-Rez has been focusing completely on nailing the combat portion of the game above all else, and through the use of both random focus groups and a regular team of weekly testers are continuing to hone the experience. Factors such as world economy, social gathering spots, and the more persistent side of a persistent world game are still in the works.

http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/kotaku/full/~3/403109136/global-agenda-+-the-georgia+grown-action-mmo

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Video Games Equal Comfort In Troubled Economic TImes [Gaming Saves Society]

[Reposted from Kotaku]

In an article wittily titled, "In Tough Economic Times, Video Games Console", NPR writer Laura Sydell explores the similarities between the growing popularity of video games in mainstream culture with the movie boom that occurred during The Great Depression in the 1930's, at time when a weary nation turned to nickel theaters to escape the grim realities of the economic climate. She compares the relatively steady sales of movie tickets to the ever-expanding gaming market, with software sales up 43 percent from this time last year.

David Riley of the NPD Group says part of the reason video game sales are rising and movie ticket sales aren't is that a movie only lasts a couple of hours — it gives you less "bang for your buck. The difference, obviously, between a movie and a video game is the amount of time that you get," he says.

With gas prices rising and some of the nation's largest financial institutions in dire straits, more and more non-gamers are finding that video games are an excellent way to distract themselves from real-life issues. Anyone else find this slightly ironic? We're they just making fun of us for doing the same thing a couple years back?

http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=94884967&ft=1&f=1006

Virtual Worlds for Fun and Research

[reposted from Kotaku]

We mentioned Arden, the university-design MMO, a few times; a working paper has just been released that looks at economic behavior in MMOs using the game. The interesting thing here isn't so much the fact that people replicate real-world behaviors online (in this case, they purchased less of an item when it was more expensive), but that it's yet another piece of a growing literature explaining the utility of virtual worlds in actual research:

... We tested whether fantasy gamers conform to the Law of Demand, which states that increasing the price of a good, all else equal, will reduce the quantity demanded. We created two exactly equivalent worlds, and randomly assigned players to one or the other. The only difference in the two worlds was that the price of a single good, a health potion, was twice as high in the experimental world than in the control. We allowed players (N = 43) to enter and play the environment for a month. We found that players in the experimental condition purchased 43.1 percent fewer of the potions, implying a demand elasticity of -0.431. This finding is well within the range one expects for normal economic agents. We take this as evidence that the Law of Demand holds in fantasy environments, which suggests in turn that fantasy gamers may well be economically normal. If so, it may be worthwhile to conduct controlled economic and social experiments in virtual worlds at greater scales of both population (thousands of users) and time (many months).

This is kind of a less cool version of the WoW plague research, still my favorite example of academic research utilizing MMOs. As noted by the WoW researchers, virtual worlds may offer the potential to conduct research that would be impossible using real people (like, say, unleashing a plague upon the world).

http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/kotaku/full/~3/346763323/virtual-worlds-for-fun-and-research

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PlaySpan CEO to Address the Global Economic Impact of Virtual World Economies

[reposted from ign.com]

PlaySpan, the gaming industry's first publisher sponsored in game commerce network, is proud to announce that CEO Karl Mehta will address the esteemed participants of the Edinburgh Interactive Festival on Monday, August 11 at the Edinburgh International Conference Centre, UK. Speaking before industry academics, developers, publishers, educators and public servants, Mehta will discuss the many ways virtual world economies impact real-world economies through real money transactions.

"Speaking at the Edinburgh Interactive Festival is a monumental privilege and a chance to educate a broad segment of gaming professionals on a new and important gaming sector," said PlaySpan CEO Karl Mehta, "As the gaming industry's leading microtransaction solution, PlaySpan represents the cutting edge of virtual world monetization. We believe that this opportunity to convey our insight to the prestigious leaders at EIF represents a major step for the understanding of virtual world economies."

Now celebrating its sixth year, the Edinburgh Interactive Festival is powered up to showcase the continued popularity, growth, and influence of video games. This year's Interactive Festival will be more influential than ever, drawing a wide array of press, public and professionals from the world-renown, three-week Edinburgh International Festival. The Edinburgh Interactive Festival offers more events than ever for delegates, with an expanded consumer focus on television, film, and interactive media – creating an engaging spectacle for all.

New to Interactive Festival 2008 will be Features, Exhibition, and Recruitment areas specifically designed to give the public access to the latest games and interactive entertainment job opportunities. Tickets can be obtained from any Gamestation store in Scotland or at the EICC on the day of the event.

Registration for the Edinburgh Interactive Festival is open now at: www.edinburghinteractivefestival.com

http://feeds.ign.com/~r/ignfeeds/games/~3/324213365/885500p1.html

War for Profit in Metal Gear Solid 4

(from Kotaku)

Plenty of high praise has flowed to Metal Gear Solid 4, but N'Gai Croal offers a different take in his latest posting over on Level Up. The game, like others, makes timely use of Private Military Corporations (read: mercenaries) to create an environment players want to explore and a story they want to advance. But MGS4's true point lies in its "war economy," which governs or responds to the choices made by players.

Any game must "radically simplify complex systems," and MGS4's gun-launderer character, and fluctuating price of unlockable weapons and equipment does just that as a representation of a mercenary economy. And that, N'Gai reasons, makes a statement about the inherent amorality of war fought for profit just as much as cutscene dialogue, no matter how well written, where gamers are most conditioned to look for what was on the game creator's mind.

That's not to say MGS4 now goes into a pantheon of great allegorical commentaries on war and greed. It's a video game, so whatever message comes out is necessarily refracted through your experience of playing it. And it is a hell of a lot of fun. But N'Gai's point is that the "war economy" with which you, as Snake, must do business make it thought provoking, in addition to being an entertaining game at the top of its genre.

http://feeds.gawker.com/~r/kotaku/full/~3/307426069/war-for-profit-in-mgs4

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Hey mister, have you gotta dime?

This topic in our series of discussing a GTA-like game economy is receiving money as payment for services.

Not being a gangsta myself, I'm definitely imagining this from the stereotypes and media hype that gets fed to the general public, but I think there are reasonable assumptions about what would be in this sort of game based on previous GTA exploits.

In our previous installment, we described the potential ability to fence goods for cash. The player in the role of the fence is in some way receiving money for the service of converting the goods into cash because I expect they would pay less than the "list price" of the item. Likewise for players who act as loan sharks when they receive interest payments.

Another lucrative service could be taking a job as a hit man or trying to collect on a bounty for another player (cop or bad guy). I doubt "snitch" would be a player class but maybe information about rivals would be valued enough that players would be willing to pay others for special information that's useful to their cause.

To tread lightly I'll use the term "companionship" a another form of employment or temporary service that could earn a player some cash. Gangs and police forces could even have specific job roles like collecting protection money from businesses in their territory or subservient gangs.

Given the role that entertainment plays in hip-hop culture, would gang bosses pay DJs and dancers to be at their parties? Maybe if the game supports these functions through streaming audio feeds, graphic assets (audio gear, dance outfits, etc.) and gestures for playing records and executing dance moves.

Get the idea? Okay - next up - the gang giveth and the gang taketh away...

Gangstaconomy

Continuing our thought experiment about an economic system fit for a GTA-like MMORPG, I'd like first to explore one of the possible sources of money in the game.

1. Selling Items
Rather than a medieval-like town/store/craftsmen approach to turning in items for cash, I expect pawn shops, fences and players to be involved in the exchange of items for cash.
The pawn shop can mirror the real-world model by giving a claim ticket for the player to use later when they are at more of a cash advantage in order to recover their item. This would be especially useful if the use of some items are skill or level-based so that a newbie can get some working capital until they're ready to use the item. Pawn shops will pay the "street" price for the item which may be higher or lower than it's "listed" value subject to variables like which town you are in or even which game world you are in - tied to the supply and demand of the item in that specific environment.
Fences could be NPCs or maybe even a player class. They would try to give the least possible amount for your item - maybe with some "negotiating" taking place during the sale transaction - and you wouldn't be able to get it back like from the pawn shop. But maybe, as opposed to the pawn shop, selling to the fence makes the item untraceable back to you,which is convenient if you are cashing in a stolen item that is marked with the original owner's ID. Keeping rival gangs off your trail should have some value in this kind of gaming environment.
Player-to-player selling would probably take place through the usual item exchange window. Maybe there are player skills that allow you to remove identification from objects so they don't trace back to you. If you are familiar with Second Life you will recall that in-game objects there have properties related to creator, ownership and the ability to give the item to someone so this would be relevant here as well.

Next topic - Payment for services