[MUD-Dev] Are eBay sales more than just a fad?

[Matthew Mihaly]

On Wed, 13 Sep 2000, John Buehler wrote:

> > Matthew Mihaly
> > Sent: Tuesday, September 12, 2000 3:02 PM
> 
> > So we do both of the above, but guess what: our primary revenue source is
> > people buying skills. Neither of your points make for very good
> > inhibitors!
> 
> I guess I didn't anticipate a game publisher SELLING skills.  If you sanction
> the purchase of stuff, I'm not surprised that players take advantage of it.
> If you were to take away that element, how many players would be buying
> characters from other players?  Add in a huge number of skills and a huge
> number of goals in the game world, and how many would be buying characters?

Well sure. Skills, items, whatever. There isn't really a difference
between the two.

As far as how many would be buying characters, it's pretty dangerous to do
that in a game the size of Achaea, because if you do it with a well-known
character, you'll be caught, and turned into a lovely little shrub,
incapable of doing anything except rustling a bit. Unfortunately for the
big boys, I don't think they really have the option of keeping tabs on all
their major players.

In the end though John, you're arguing a losing battle. The only way I can
conceive of that would stop people from selling and buying characters or
whatever is to remove all value from the characters or items, which means
you have to ensure that no one cares even the slightest bit about them (as
if even one person cares about something, it has value). Of course, in
that case, your game isn't going to make any money or have any players
anyway, so it is a moot point.
--matt




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