EVE!

[TheVrolok]

I dunno, they're faster than not having a mount, or one of the actual vanity mounts that don't increase your speed at all. That's what counts, they're functional, and you pay real life cash to get one, instead of in game gold. If CCP offered a ship, say a Rifter or a Machariel with a different skin for sale in Noble Exchange, would you call that an non-functional vanity item?

I think it's slightly different. I looked at the Blizzard store page for the purchasable mount and it states "... and it will travel at 310% speed if you have at least one other 310% mount." I take that to mean, "you can use this mount if you already have the normal in game 310% mount." So if that is the case, it is purely a vanity item as it requires a prerequisite item with the same stats that is acquired in game (my assumption). It isn't the same as a ship in EVE because ships in EVE can be lost, WoW mounts cannot. So basically you're simply buying a skin for a mount, and not actually getting anything "new." Now, if my assumption regarding needing an only in-game obtainable 310% mount as a prerequisite is wrong, then yeah, it's far more similar.

 

[lupi]

I gave an example of a non-vantity item for sale for real cash in World of Warcraft.



EverQuest II is still mainly a pay to play game, the free servers are seperate. The XP potions, which are not vanity items, are available to buy for real cash on the subscription only servers.

As I said, EVE would be far from the first subscription MMO to offer functional non-vanity items for sale with real cash. Althoug you could use rationalizations like yours to say it's actually a free to play game, or that things SP potions or a faster ship wouldn't really "qualify".

wow paid mounts are nothing but different skins, the definition of vanity. XP boost still doesn't give you a play advantage over another player.

 

[Ross Ridge]

Now, if my assumption regarding needing an only in-game obtainable 310% mount as a prerequisite is wrong, then yeah, it's far more similar.

From what I can tell, it'll scale up to 280% speed depending on skill without needing to own any other mount. I don't play World of Warcraft, but as functional items go I'm assuming these mounts aren't that big of deal. I doubt many people are paying $25 to avoid paying 100 gold or whatever it would cost to buy a functionaly equivilent mount in game. I still wouldn't call it a vanity item.

 

[KaOTiK]

http://www.evenews24.com/2011/06/25...-shows-the-reasoning-behind-ccp-zulu-devblog/

Wow, if this is legit, wow......

We also know there are 52 idiots, I'd bet half of them are on the market too.

EDIT.

If the link is down or whatever (they are getting slammed) then here is what it says.

Hilmar is the CCP CEO

sent by hilmar to ccp global list-

(strt)

We live in interesting times; in fact CCP is the kind of company that if things get repetitive we instinctively crank it up a notch. That, we certainly have done this week. First of we have Incarna, an amazing technological and artistic achievement. A vision from years ago realized to a point that no one could have imaged but a few months ago. It rolls out without a hitch, is in some cases faster than what we had before, this is the pinnacle of professional achievement. For all the noise in the channel we should all stand proud, years from now this is what people will remember.

But we have done more, not only have we redefined the production quality one can apply to virtual worlds with the beautiful Incarna but we have also defined what it really means to make virtual reality more meaningful than real life when it comes to launching our new virtual goods currency, Aurum.

Naturally, we have caught the attention of the world. Only a few weeks ago we revealed more information about DUST 514 and now we have done it again by committing to our core purpose as a company by redefining assumptions. After 40 hours we have already sold 52 monocles, generating more revenue than any of the other items in the store.

This we have done after months of research by a group of highly competent professionals, soliciting input and perspective from thought leaders and experts in and around our industry. We have communicated our intention here internally in very wide circles through the Virtual Economy Summit
presentation at the GSM, our Fearless newsletter, sprint reviews, email lists and multiple other channels. This should not come as a surprise to anyone.

Currently we are seeing _very predictable feedback_ on what we are doing. Having the perspective of having done this for a decade, I can tell you that this is one of the moments where we look at what our players do and less of what they say. Innovation takes time to set in and the predictable reaction is always to resist change.

We went out with a decisive strategy on pricing and we will stay the course and not flip flop around or knee jerk react to the predictable. That is not saying nothing will change, on the contrary, in fact we know that success in this space is through learning and adapting to _what is actually happening_ and new knowledge gained in addition to what we knew before and expected.

All that said, I couldn’t be prouder of what we have accomplished as a company, changing the world is hard and we are doing it as so many times before! Stay the course, we have done this many times before.

(end)

 

[TheVrolok]

Hilmar is the CCP CEO

Dude is fucking insane. Changing the world? Incarna is some kind of masterpiece of epic proportions? The fuck..?

I'm not surprised by the "see what the players do, not what they say" comment. It'll be interesting to see how many of the people who claimed they were going to unsub, actually will.

 

[Kadarin]

I have no problem with people buying ridiculously overpriced monocles or whatever else from an ingame virtual store for what amounts to real cash, so long as they're strictly vanity items. I *do* have a problem if they're going to sell faction standing or functional items that affect gameplay. From the leaked internal memo, it sounds like they plan to do just this, and they're being evasive on answering direct questions from the community.

 

[Ross Ridge]

Dude is fucking insane. Changing the world? Incarna is some kind of masterpiece of epic proportions? The fuck..?

That stuff just comes off as bravado, but what really struck me was this bit about their new virutal currency: "we have also defined what it really means to make virtual reality more meaningful than real life". That's downright delusional.

I'm not surprised by the "see what the players do, not what they say" comment. It'll be interesting to see how many of the people who claimed they were going to unsub, actually will.

Yah. I belive history is on their side here at least. When other games went down this road a lot more people said they'd quit than actually did.

I think the really problem facing CCP here is that this isn't the Incarna we were promised. It's not going to do much to bring in new players and doesn't really offer anything to current or former players. If the actual "walking-in-stations" gets implement where you can interact with other people and show off your $70 monocle than that would be something. Right now all Incarna is a tech demo and some user-interface tweaks.

 

[TheVrolok]

That stuff just comes off as bravado, but what really struck me was this bit about their new virutal currency: "we have also defined what it really means to make virtual reality more meaningful than real life". That's downright delusional.

Yep, the most delusional statement of the entire mail. Perhaps CCP has finally decided that they no longer want a smaller, tighter, more hardcore playerbase and are moving in a direction to acquire a much larger, more generic MMO playerbase. It seems that with "walking in stations," microtransactions, vanity items, etc. they are trying to appeal to "SecondLife" type players who merely want a large social world. I suppose it may be a better business decision for them, as they may gain 2 "casual" subscribers for every 1 "hardcore" subscriber, but it would really ruin the game.

 

[KaOTiK]

They are still protesting in Jita, attacking that statue/monument thing outside of 4/4

 

[Kadarin]

I'm coming to think that my general feeling is this: If a significant game advantage can be purchased from the NeX store, bypassing the game economy, then EVE will have essentially turned into "Farmville in Space" and it will be time to leave. Until that point, I'm not going to go off the deep end or make any rash decisions.

I couldn't care less about vanity items or their cost.

Regarding CQ: My preference is that it be optional, as right now it's a lot of overhead with little real usability. I multibox, so resource usage is definitely a concern.

 

[TheVrolok]

I'm coming to think that my general feeling is this: If a significant game advantage can be purchased from the NeX store, bypassing the game economy, then EVE will have essentially turned into "Farmville in Space" and it will be time to leave. Until that point, I'm not going to go off the deep end or make any rash decisions.

I couldn't care less about vanity items or their cost.

Regarding CQ: My preference is that it be optional, as right now it's a lot of overhead with little real usability. I multibox, so resource usage is definitely a concern.

I've got a similar position. Same goes for CQ, as well. My GPU is also running 6ish degrees warmer than it did with the old station environment. That doesn't make me happy either. It doesn't even run that hot in Crysis (not that it's running super hot).

 

[KaOTiK]

I'm in the same boat as you two. I'm fine till they add non vanity stuff into the NEX. Soon as that happens, I'm done.

I disabled the CQ on all 3 of my accounts, it just runs the gpu hotter and adds nothing else. I am pretty pissed that took away the old station environment and having to switch around ships/cargo and stuff is more of a pain in the ass now as I would normally right click on my ship to open corp cargohold/ship maintenance bays while dealing with other stuff in the inventory.

It is just sloppy and piss poor implementation on CCP's part. No one in my corp has CQ on, and in the alliance I think only a few do. First thing most did was after looking at it when Incarana went live was turned station environments off lol.

 

[JSt0rm]

I dont care about vanity items either but they are going to add non vanity items per their responses to the question. I just dont want to waste money. I was on 6 month intervals I MAY continue to play but it would be on 1 month timings so if they did add non vanity Items i can quit easier.

 

[KaOTiK]

I dont care about vanity items either but they are going to add non vanity items per their responses to the question. I just dont want to waste money. I was on 6 month intervals I MAY continue to play but it would be on 1 month timings so if they did add non vanity Items i can quit easier.

I pay with plex since I have a very healthy income established now. So I go in 2 month blocks for each account. Cheaper to buy directly from people on the Timecode Bazaar on the forums then by the actual plexs

 

[hrbngr2]

I do have some concerns w/MTs. I always liked the fact that I could continue to train up, only logging in to update queues, when real life needed more attention. Eve never really changed that much, but if CCP introduces truly radical changes in the way the game is played, I might look back and wonder if I should have gotten more serious about EVE a lot sooner...

 

[J-Money]

So let me get this straight:

They added this NEX thing that you buy PLEX and exchange them for new currency to buy vanity items.

The concern is that you will be able to buy PLEX and exchange them for new currency to buy in game items (ships etc.)?

Isn't that pretty much exactly what you can already do by buying PLEX with real money and selling it for isk and then buying in game items? Which is legal. If they don't add SP purchase or faction standings, then it seems like EVE players are getting worked up about something that has existed for years.

 

[Ross Ridge]

Isn't that pretty much exactly what you can already do by buying PLEX with real money and selling it for isk and then buying in game items? Which is legal. If they don't add SP purchase or faction standings, then it seems like EVE players are getting worked up about something that has existed for years.

It would actually be a fairly significant change to the economy, which is one of the fundamental things that makes EVE unique among MMORPGs. The current PLEX system is actually neutral to the overall in-game economy, it just shifts ISK around. It doesn't create or destroy ISK, and more relevently it doesn't create ships, modules, ammo or anything else. These have to be supplied by player actions in game, whether by manufacturing them or looting them.

If CCP starts selling ships or anyting else player supplied then this puts CCP in competition with the players in the in-game economy, except unlike the players CCP has a direct real-life profit motive. CCP could restrict itself to functional items that are in effect like World of Warcraft's purchasable mounts, over priced items who's worth is much more as a vanity item than the underlying functional item, and no better than what you could otherwise fairly easily get in game. This would, hopefully at least, only have a minor impact on the economy, but it would also serverely limit how much money CCP could make from the scheme.

With a real-life profit motive, and a fundamentaly unfair and massive advantage over its "competitors", there's going to be a strong temptation to try make more money. The obvious way to do that is to providing more value for the money, real-life money, in what CCP selling to players in order to increase sales. Lower the cost so buying a ship from them so it becomes more attractive in relation to buying a ship from a player, or make the ship better than what players can provide. The more money CCP tries to make from these items, the more it will distort the in-game economy. Overall CCP will presumably try to maximize its profits from all sources, and hopefully not go too far down this road and completely kill EVE as we know it today, but the temptation will always be there to do just that.

While it causes other issues with game balance in EVE, selling faction standing or SP for cash would in fact have much less of an impact on the EVE economy. While there are ways to in effect get these things from other players, through standing inprovement services and buying characters from character bazaar, it wouldn't affect the core EVE economy.

 

[TheVrolok]

... snip ...

Good write up that pretty much sums it up for people who don't see the shift. Also http://www.eve-radio.com/podcast-download is a good podcast discussing the issue with CSMs

 

[J-Money]

It would actually be a fairly significant change to the economy, which is one of the fundamental things that makes EVE unique among MMORPGs. The current PLEX system is actually neutral to the overall in-game economy, it just shifts ISK around. It doesn't create or destroy ISK, and more relevently it doesn't create ships, modules, ammo or anything else. These have to be supplied by player actions in game, whether by manufacturing them or looting them.

If CCP starts selling ships or anyting else player supplied then this puts CCP in competition with the players in the in-game economy, except unlike the players CCP has a direct real-life profit motive. CCP could restrict itself to functional items that are in effect like World of Warcraft's purchasable mounts, over priced items who's worth is much more as a vanity item than the underlying functional item, and no better than what you could otherwise fairly easily get in game. This would, hopefully at least, only have a minor impact on the economy, but it would also serverely limit how much money CCP could make from the scheme.

With a real-life profit motive, and a fundamentaly unfair and massive advantage over its "competitors", there's going to be a strong temptation to try make more money. The obvious way to do that is to providing more value for the money, real-life money, in what CCP selling to players in order to increase sales. Lower the cost so buying a ship from them so it becomes more attractive in relation to buying a ship from a player, or make the ship better than what players can provide. The more money CCP tries to make from these items, the more it will distort the in-game economy. Overall CCP will presumably try to maximize its profits from all sources, and hopefully not go too far down this road and completely kill EVE as we know it today, but the temptation will always be there to do just that.

While it causes other issues with game balance in EVE, selling faction standing or SP for cash would in fact have much less of an impact on the EVE economy. While there are ways to in effect get these things from other players, through standing inprovement services and buying characters from character bazaar, it wouldn't affect the core EVE economy.

Ahh yeah that makes sense.

 

[JSt0rm]

http://www.eveonline.com/devblog.asp?a=blog&bid=934

New blog up

the realities of eve
reported by CCP Zulu | 2011.06.26 08:56:45 | NEW | Comments
The tone and demeanor of my blog on Friday did not correctly portray my emotions towards the community and player base at large. I love and respect EVE and its community on a level that's hard to really do justice in words. However I let my frustration take charge of me, fueled by emotions that had built up due to a breach of trust we at CCP have been experiencing over the past few days. I know that sounds ironic considering those are the exact same feelings you have been having towards CCP.
For that I am sorry.
Having cooled off a bit and taken a solemn look at the situation, I see it's clear we need to strengthen the deep mutual trust and respect that's been so unique and descriptive of our relationship. There are certain questions you want answered and there isn't room for more error in our communication on those topics or our perception of the root causes.
Therefore we have asked the CSM to join us in Iceland for an extraordinary meeting June 30th and July 1st to discuss the events of past week, to help us define and address the real underlying concerns, and to assist us in defining and iterating on our virtual goods strategy.
The result of this meeting should be mutual agreement of how virtual goods and services will evolve in EVE. Other issues may be brought up and we urge you to contact the CSM with your comments and concerns so that they may be addressed at this session.
However, just to prove the point of the Fearless newsletter and give you a further understanding of what it is then there are no and never have been plans to sell "gold ammo" for Aurum. In Fearless people are arguing a point, which doesn't even have to be their view, they are debating an issue. This is another example of how information out of context is no information at all.
Due to the volatility of the topic we want to refrain from any further comments on this matter until after meeting with the CSM.
Thank you for your patience,
Arnar Hrafn Gylfason
Senior Producer of EVE Online

 

[KaOTiK]

Major damage control there. Bringing the CSM's out to Iceland for a two day meeting. At least we know the CSM's feel exactly as the player base does on this stuff from various statements and interviews they have since then. So I know our side of things will be brought up and addressed correctly and immediately.

The only way CCP is going to walk away from this and not be in a bad light is if they flat out say they will not sell anything outside of vanity items for money. Every other issue is mute next to that single one.

 

[power_hour]

RIP EVE kidding... Plexes were the test market for MTs. They tried to spin it but that's what it was. Buy Plex for RL cash, sell for Isk buy items. This is just a faster way to do this. eve will survive and this game will be a cash cow for CCP. This game is just like RL. Cash is king. Personally I think its a wickedly interesting development. Time to see who blinks first....

 

[novasatori]

I don't mind vanity micro transaction, but if the prices stay high or higher I am out..

I already give them $60/mo for my accounts why should I need to pay $70 on top if I want some piece of clothing. Should have come with regular prices like $3.99 no matter what CCP says designer virtual clothing cannot be compared to real life.

 

[Lonbjerg]

This "golden goose" just unsubbed..along with most of my corporation.

We might come back...if CCP stops treating us like console-kiddies and stop fucking with the sandox.

Untill then we won't pay for Avatars in space, Dust 514 and WoD.

 

[J-Money]

This "golden goose" just unsubbed..along with most of my corporation.

We might come back...if CCP stops treating us like console-kiddies and stop fucking with the sandox.

Untill then we won't pay for Avatars in space, Dust 514 and WoD.

How come whenever anyone announces they have unsubbed from a game it's always them and all their friends, families, guild mates, corp mates, alliance and anyone they've ever spoken too?