[MUD-Dev] Game Economies

[Matthew Mihaly]

On Fri, 4 Jun 1999, Timothy O'Neill Dang wrote:

> 
> So - I'm looking to converse with any and all about game economies. To
> start with, I figure I'll address one thing which I noticed in the
> archives. My feeling right now is that in-game economic behavior does
> not vary too much from real-world economic behavior *given the
> circumstances*. All of this is still tentative, of course.

<many intelligent things snipped about the MUD parallels of luxury items>

You know, I think that the biggest potential factor that makes a mud
economy different from a real-life one is the sense that nothing that
happens to you really matters THAT much. Going broke in a mud is not a big
deal. You can just quit the mud. Going broke in real life is significantly
more serious, insofar as it's harder to make yourself commit suicide
("quit life") then quitting a mud. Further, getting rich in a mud is
usually perceived as being a goal attainable by anyone willing to put the
hours in (this isn't the case everywhere of course. I'm generalizing.),
whereas in real life, most people's perception of things is that they are
incapable of getting rich (usually becuase they are too lazy or not
willing to take risks or invest time in education, but they will blame it
on external factors usually).

I think the difference in psychologies here is very important. I've seen
players spend themselves into poverty to get that one cool item, when I've
never heard of a billionaire buying that ONE cool item (aircraft carrier
maybe?) and leaving himself with barely enough money to eat. I'm not
really sure what this difference illustrates, but I suspect small
differences like this are crucially important.
--matt




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