From: Takomtor
Date: 2002-03-30 05:19:11
I tried to study this topic of Virtual Worlds, to be better able to help the project majik3d. First, I read a study (VIRTUAL WORLDS: A FIRST-HAND ACCOUNT OF MARKET AND SOCIETY ON THE CYBERIAN FRONTIER) about Everquest, written by Edward Castronova (Short version http://papers.ssrn.com/abstract=294828 :Long version www.bepress.com/giwp). Now I am in the process of reading a study of Norrath (Everquest) by Nicholas Yee... I might write some ideas from that too, but I'll first see what kind of feedback this post gets.
Here I copy-paste some of Edward's ideas in a manner that I feel interesting - some comments included. I apologize the length of the post. I tried to bold my own comments, to make it more readable. My referencing doesn't qualify as scientific, but as you know the context, I feel lazy to put more effort on it.
"Their failure helps identify the source of the success of VWs, because there really
is only one major difference between these avatar spaces and VWs: Scarcity. Nothing
was scarce in the avatar space. A user could create as many avatars as desired; all avatars
had equal abilities; the user could build without limit, as long as the desire to write code
persisted. The activities of one avatar posed no real obstacle and imposed no significant
cost on any other avatar's activities." Page 16
Dynamic world with limited resources. Character development specializes players. These two features will create markets for products and services. As a result we should have something that is rather free of arbitrage, hence working markets.
Next some reasons, why Virtual Worlds are so popular:
"First, not all avatars are the same: the user faces constraints on the creation of avatars and, through leveling, on the development of their abilities. An avatar may die, and death may rob it of some or all of its powers. Second, the avatar is constrained by the physicality of the VW in that a large percentage of important goods and services can only be obtained from other avatars or from biots, always at a price or by risking death. No free lunches. Third, the avatar is constrained by society in the VW, in that social roles are not open to everyone; an avatar must compete against other avatars to fill a role. In a sentence, avatars in avatar spaces could do no work and still do anything that any other avatar could do; avatars in VWs must work to do anything interesting at all." Page 16
"And, somewhat shockingly, scarcity is what makes the VW so fun. The process of
developing avatar capital seems to invoke exactly the same risk and reward structures in
the brain that are invoked by personal development in real life. The idea is shocking
because it seems to suggest that utility and well-being are not the same thing. Utility always rises when constraints are relaxed, yet people seem to prefer a world with
constraints to a world without them. Constraints create the possibility of achievement,
and it is the drive to achieve something with the avatar that seems to create an obsessive
interest in her well-being. Moreover, since the VWs are inherently social, the
achievements are relative: it is not having powerful weapons that really makes a
difference in prestige, but in having the most powerful weapons in the world. In a post-industrial society, it is social status, more than anything else, that drives people to work so diligently all their lives." PAGE 16-17
Here I would like rise a personal experience as an example. I have been loved by some people, that I didn't respect. So, the love was there for me to take, but as it was so easily available, I didn't value it. On the other hand, if I happened to have a crush on someone, I spent lot of time in this matter, almost got obsessed by it. Strong feeling that kept on growing as I put more and more time and effort on it... So, appreciation grows from effort and from effort comes the reward of success. Heh, here love doesn't work that well... can't make it happen on my own. But in a relationship the analogy has meaning again. Work, appreciate, cherish, respect. Giving something for nothing has bad results. Look at the streets, since we give people freedom, streets are littered, give students free studymoney and they complain, it is not enough. Rules, constraints, costs... they all benefit the game, but should be originated from players actions.
"My attention was first drawn to this topic by news articles in January 2001 reporting that dollar-denominated trade in Norrathian goods had become so extensive that Sony, the owning corporation, had pressured auction sites like Ebay and Yahoo to forcibly close down any Norrath-related auctions on the site (Sandoval, 2001). My impression is that the ban has had little impact on trading. Sony, effectively the government of Norrath, is fighting a war of trade restrictions that no government has ever won." PAGE 19
I suggest that we introduce a system that allows the trade of game items and characters. If we integrate it to the game play, we will extend the game playing experience and retain the control of the game with ourselves. As stated, trade of game items will happen no matter what are the measures we try to take preventing it. Here, instead of letting instances like Ebay to take their slice we can provide players a forum where do all this for free and as part of a game. Sorry, no concrete thoughts yet...
Following is a comment that the author made about UO. I included it to give impression of UO's strengths in relation to Everquest in the field of game mechanics. My previous comment about Ebay still stands.
"Elizabeth Kolbert (2001) gives a fascinating overview of the economy of UO. That world has apparently experienced its share of hyperinflations, hoarding, land shortages, and mass protest. The in-game economy of UO seems more developed also; avatars in UO have more opportunities to simply be merchants and craftmakers, whereas in Everquest there is a much heavier emphasis on hunting. (See www.geocities.com/faramir_uo/ for some thoughts on UO's economy by Scott Salmon, a long-time player.) Avatars in UO can build and own houses, and it is possible to buy and sell these houses online at Ebay (Electronic Arts has not tried to suppress dollar-based trading of UO items). The one feature that weakens UO as a competitor to games like Everquest is its visual perspective, which is 3 rd person, not 1 st . In UO,
you see your avatar doing things; in Everquest, you see things happen thourgh the eyes of your avatar. Nonetheless, the UO economy is so rich that it is well worthy of a study of its own." PAGE 19
Since it is possible to form excange rates between Real World and Virtual World, one should built it in to a game system. Also everything in the game should be truly dynamic, so the price valuation process wouldn't be fooled by VW's resources that keep on emerging from void (no reference to the concept of void in the game). So, please, no NPCs who get money from somewhere, money should be something that a bank or individual manufactures. The namevalue of money should then emerge from the uniqueness, stability, genuinity of so created monetary unit. This would probably form a situation, where we have rather strong exchange rate between Real Currencies and Majik Currencies.
"Perhaps the most striking finding is that a significant fraction, 20 percent, view themselves as people who "live in" Norrath. A similar fraction, 22 percent, express the desire to spend all of their time there. About 40 percent indicate that if a sufficient wage (self-defined) were available in Norrath, they would quit their economic activity on Earth (work or school, as the case may be) and devote their labor hours to the Norrathian economy." PAGE 22
Very important feature would be to serve those players, who really want to turn Majik3d into their combined dayjob and hobby (admittedly hard, but possible, according this research paper). This of course is impossible to realize without the use of real money. I can understand the desire to keep majik free, so what if there would be two levels of playing, free playing and playing for a fee. Majik could still be non-profit and the payments would be recirculated among the players. Player who would acquire high status in society could take out game resources into real world as money.
How would it be done? maybe all players should be considered to be gods that come from the void (our world). Newly born gods wouldn't have any powers and only road for them to have any effect to the majik world would be to take an avatar. God would then guide this avatar in order to attract followers or just try to improve it. From followers god would actually get some extra powers to use outside the avatar, therefore increasing the powers and possible actions of this god. If the avatar dies, god has to start another - here would come the difference between free accounts and paying accounts - free accounts would start the avatar form the scratch and payed accounts would retain atleast some of the learned skills of the previous avatar.
To introduce strong sense of achievement, we would create god galleries, where is would be possible to study other gods' previous avatars and achievements. Astronomy would come to play as the location of a god in the sky. All these would give social respect that encourages the player to keep on playing the game. Gods would form similar connections as avatars in the majik. After acquiring enough followers god could start his own effective religion (something similar as Beregars Unicorn quest) He could only communicate directly with other gods from the time point when he has his own religion established. This would also be time, when more rigid connections to other gods would be established. Divine points would flow in a manner of Network Marketing, so high status gods would benefit from the low level gods. Everybody would try to get as much power as possible, in order to break free from this system or at least to reach better position in the matrix. Divine points would be the currency between Majik and Real World. This would effectively count out those people who have free account, since from free accounts it would take time to start up a religion and people would probably play them just to enjoy the world. It would be harder for them to get their hands into divine points and therefore they wouldn't unjustifyingly earn some of that money which paying accounts input to the game. However, they would also create new items and services that benefit all the other players and therefore conversion system between Majik Money - Divine Points - Real World Money would appear.
Huge changes, I know... so what about system, where we can still have some continuity, without everyone being gods? We could implement love relationships, where male and female could have an offspring. This offspring could then be taken under player control as the parent dies. This makes possible to transfer possessions for the next character. Rules about offsprings could go so that mother has the control of the first born, as the pregnancy affects her more. Second born goes to the father. Also player stats should be taken into account as some sort of average between father and mother... different races could have offspring together (kind of magic). Well, anyway this sort of dimension should add more personal aspect to the game playing as parents have the need to protect offspring and provide safe living conditions, in order to have their possession passed on for next generation and therefore for their next player character.
"The a2a (avatar2avatar) market is apparently expected to provide the price premia for special items. If special items are scarce, then the a2a market will keep the price high.
Unfortunately, another unusual feature of the economy prevents the a2a market from
sustaining a price above the biot buy price for very long, and it is this: items do not
decay. As a result, the stock of these infinitely-durable goods rises continually as more
and more people enter the world and hunt their way to the highest levels. Inevitably, the
demand for new items falls, and with it, the a2a price. Since monsters often spawn at the same place in the world over and over, an avatar can simply wait nearby and kill the monster every time it reappears. Aptly, this practice is referred to not as hunting but as
farming. The problem with merchant biot prices is that they offer only a little more money for very useful magic items than they do for useless loot items." PAGE 27
Dynamic should mean nospawning, also that items do wear out. Only magical items should be eternal and only if provided with some sort of magical maintenance, therefore giving them some kind of upkeep cost.. BPs once again would give an answer to this problem... high quality BPs would give items longer usage and well, magical items need something else than just normal BPs, possibly combined spell BPs and item BPs and even magical item BPs.
"Regressing the PP value of their holdings on hours of time input yields a coefficient of 319, meaning that the average avatar makes 319 PP per hour. At the market exchange rate of 0.01072 PP per dollar, this amounts to about $3.42 an hour. The average Earth wage for those who work in the NES is $20.74, and among the self-identified residents of Norrath it is
$17.57. If we treat the conditions of life in Norrath as a compensating differential, this
suggests that for the average Norrath resident, an hour in Norrath produces utility worth
$14.15. This figure is more than the fee of $10 per month that users pay to access
Norrath. Norrathians gain a substantial consumer surplus from the world's existence. A wage of $3.42 an hour is sufficient to sustain Earth existence for many people.
Many users spend upwards of 80 hours per week in Norrath, hours of time input that are
not unheard of in Earth professions. In 80 hours, at the average wage, the typical user
generates Norrathian cash and goods worth $273.60. In a month, that would be over
$1,000, in a year over $12,000. Economically speaking, there is little reason to question, on feasibility grounds at least, that those who claim to be living and working in Norrath, and not Earth, may actually be doing just that." PAGE 35-36
This is just to show that even a game with fee can create a flow of income that exceeds the amount of monthly fee. I hope to see that this goal is incorporated to the goals of majik. Having dynamic economy would remove the trap of farming and looting... the exploitation of NPC traders and indefinite spawning and resources. As a result, as I earlier said, we would have stronger exchange rate between Majik Wealth/Majik Divine Points and Real Currencies.
In his paper, Edward mentions Entropia that is being developed by Swedish company Mindark (www.mindark.com). They discard the game and just build a Virtual World that can be used by companies to sell their virtual and real products... they would like to introduce virtual jobs etc. I think it is viable enterprise but the division of a game and virtual world should still be clear, so that in majik there are no CocaCola etal brands and authenticity is maintained.
Bye for now.