- This Week In MMO 49: GTA Online?

Schpamonkey

Mikeb aka phony
jaz
and gary
you can add guests… but let me have my hosts!

Rob

did mikeb get the herp or something? where he at, where he at?

Steve

I believe Mike is looking after his sick fiancée.
- Jasmine
  
  Steve’s right! Mike was taking care of his fiance. And also he had just had a tooth pulled. D:
  - SlayerExops
    
    I know that this is random, but are you going to grow your hair out or keep it shorter like that?

Rigo

I for the most part have no problem with someone buying gold. I actually dont mind if prisoners are used to farm it. I am opposed to beatings and torture. I can think worse things to do then play an MMO for 12-hours a day.

What I am against is when they hack accounts and steal gold to fund their sale. I wouldn’t be completely against blizzard or any other company selling their currency for extra money. The only problem is how to they regulate it so it doesn’t completely destroy the economy. I dont know if a daily or weekly cap would be enough.

lyck

Love the Full Vide Screen

http://kajidic.com Cyphen

GTA MMO, APB: Reloaded, bam!

Nice episode guys

Dave

Are you kidding about APB Reloaded? Type APB Reloaded Hacks into google and the first result is selling aimbots

Jasmine

Definitely not saying the aim bots aren’t there, I just personally haven’t dealt with them up close yet!
- Taylor
  
  Ok, I got it. Make gold Bind on pick up! done. next problem.
  - John
    
    @Taylor – that’s really a good idea
  - MMO_Doubter
    
    It sounds good at first, but it would stop AHs from working. Also – gold-farmers when then just sell blues and purples to players.
    
    Gold-selling CAN be stopped, but most players would consider the cure to be worse than the disease.
    
    Tinfoil hat time: Why doesn’t Blizzard stop the gold sellers? Special gold-sellers accounts?
  - Jasmine
    
    Awww I would still like to be able to give a few gold to my friends who start games with me when I’ve already been playing for a while! XS
    - MMO_Doubter
      
      Which would you prefer though? Being able to gift a few gold to friends, or cutting severely the amount of gold farming?
      Anything that can be given – can be sold.
      
      I personally think gold farming does little harm to MMOs directly (not talking about account theft – that is a separate and serious issue). The greater earning potential of high level characters adds far more to AH inflation. Buying gear for lowbie alts or overpaying for crafting mats is easy when you have even one high level character to farm dailies for a an hour. New PLAYERS are really at a disadvantage in a mature economy like WoW’s. This hurts MMOs in retaining new players, so should be looked at as a problem to be solved?
      
      WoW has more than enough servers to try a few new rulesets to see how they work. Gold that binds is certainly worth a try, but new MMOs can’t afford to start with such a radically different way of doing things.
      
      What I would really like to see is a fixed gold supply for each server – loot drops/gathered materials can’t be vendored and cash drops are based on the amount of money not held by players. the supply would be increased by the players payments to NPCs for goods and services. The danger here is that a few players (or gold sellers) could control a significant portion of the money supply. There is a potential downside there, but the inflation caused by an infinite money supply is such a problem in older games that I would like to see this tried.
- TarL
  
  BORDERWORLDS ANYONE? please let it be so!

ric

Are u kidding me farming for gold a punishment beatings and torture plastic pipes sounds like a Friday night at my house “China doesn’t have the best human rights policy” that is the stupidest thing I have ever heard someone say its CHINA that is their bread and butter I love your show but sometime you guys say some stupid stuff…the outrage being forced to play WoW for 12 hours COMEON!!!

manOman

I do not believe this story. I have been to China and have friends there that play Wow. There are Uni students that work for people and offices that have people working for them and not paying them very much at all but for a prison to do this is not correct. Do not be dragged in by these English tabloids. They sensationalise this type of thing. If you stop buying gold young people that cant afford to eat because they are at Uni will have to do something else like dance for men or leave Uni to do menial jobs. Its up to you!

Prophet

The Guardian is not a tabloid by any stretch. Whether their source is accurate is a good question, the Guardian does not have a reputation for making things up.

Klarum

MMOs that sell ingame gold have a system where that gold is used to buy stuff from NPCs or their ingame store. An MMO like WOW where there is a player based economy via Auction House cannot sell ingame gold. That would insanely inflate prices and create a competitve gap between players with real cash vs. the ones that cant aford it. That situation would destroy the player base.

As for the China story, I believe it is an exageration from western media. At the same time, if it is happening, remember there are chinese gold farmers that are doing the 12 hours of play, sleep deprivation and all else on their own will…

Jasmine

I really, really hope you’re correct and it’s an exaggeration.

Zerosear

I agree that blizzard should sell their own gold, hopefully less torture in china, and it would also follow blizzards “milk-the-costumers” way of making their game.

ric

Gary worry about your soft “t’s” and less about a questionable gold farming I’m about to disconnect from this site and find a new one

Titansgrip

I feel that those gamers who scoff at the $25 sparkle pony and $65 APB gun have very narrow or conditioned MMO experiences. As $65 is a trivial amount compared to many F2P games with sizable populations and many endgamers in those games who spend upwards of $100 weekly in cash shop items.

To wit~ Runes of Magic is one of the more popular F2P MMOs, and gear upgrades only possible through the cash shop can be about $40 per piece of gear (out of 14 total wearable pieces) to remain competitive in that game’s endgame. More over hundreds of players in Runes of Magic spend 3-4x that amount cosmetics and personal housing with the average “brown horse” mount carrying a non sale price of $20. Among many, many mounts that cost even more (a special $120 mount was on ale once).

And that’s just a relatively minor cost. Other games such as Megaten, Rapplez, Allods, Exsteel, DDO and Perfect World allow numerous and costly cash shop items. Which players of those games are quite happy to pay for.

So I do understand why those MMO players who “l2p’d” on the EQs and WOWs of old seem to go slack jawed at a $25 sparkle pony. But I think in the modern MMO environment, the shock over a pricey F2P MMO’s cash shop is a rather antiqued and out of date reaction.

As is the whole, “you shouldn’t be able to buy gear and level with IRL cash”.

It just seems so out of date of a POV. Or at best, a narrow one.

http://epix.blueinkalchemy.com Verdandi

And you think this is a good thing?

Just because it’s common doesn’t mean people shouldn’t say something when it happens. $65 for a virtual gun is ridiculous regardless of what other companies are charging for their pretend items.
- Titansgrip
  
  It’s mostly up to the person paying for them, I say. There is nothing wrong with Cash Shop based gamed or pricey virtual items. Some are willing to pay for them and that is their choice.
  
  $65 doesn’t at all seem ridiculous to me. And might not to many folks.
  
  I spent about $400 bucks over 4 months in a F2P. But it was a hobby I enjoyed for those 4 months. No better or worse than if I had spend that same $400 on other entertainments over 4 months.
  
  After having played with a lot of hardcore cash shop users in two previous MMOs over the last 3 1/2 years; a lot of users attracted to the F2P cash shop options have such a perspective.
  
  To wit~ Our guild leader in Runes of Magic spent upwards of $1k in 1 year in the game. Which was not too uncommon among that game’s population.
  
  So what some might deem “too expensive” is not always the case or POV of those that look at the convenience and ease CS items offer for their entertainment dollar.
Jasmine

I don’t disagree. I really want to reiterate here that I’m not against cash shops or being able to buy gear, I just personally don’t enjoy playing games where that’s an option. It’s not a gaming environment I enjoy but if other people are loving the model then more power to them.

John

Activision’s a company that’s well-known for being litigious. I never understood why Blizzard/Activision doesn’t sue the companies that sell gold (like SusanExpress) out of existence. They’ve done it with private servers (that were making real life cash) and succeeded in shutting them down. Gold buying has definitely had an impact on the economy of the servers I play on. Things that should cost 2-5k gold are being posted for 30-100k gold. There’s no way most people are going to have 30k gold, ever. It’s because gold buying is so pervasive that our server economies are so horrendously inflated.

I wish I knew how to stop gold buying. Seeing people/companies sell gold or in-game items for cash is infuriating. If I want to go tinfoil hat about it, I’d say that Bobby Kotick is known for being a greedy prick who only cares about money, maybe he’s looking the other way for a cut of the cash from chinese prisons. Wouldn’t be the first time an American company made cash off prison labour *cough microsoft cough nike cough*.

BillMcD

The reason why they cannot sue is it is the Chinese government. If they tried to sue, the government would laugh, Ban blizzard from selling products in china, then have a state run corporation copy all Activision games and sell them for its own profit. The only reason China doesn’t do it right now is that a trade embargo from America would kill off their business(its not like they aren’t already stealing things from us. Their new stealth plane is stolen from the US Military’s suppliers for its own production. I believe this makes me a conspiracy theorist -.-)

MMO_Doubter

Well, I can understand being upset about the reports about Chinese prisoners, BUT China is known as a slave state and they are no doubt using all sorts of unethical labour practices there. Why do you think so much merchandise is flooding western markets?

The western ‘democracies’ should refuse to do business with China, but there are too many importers making money dealing with them.

Gigi

I like that AoC is free to play but I don’t like how limited they are being with it. I think they should just follow what Guild Wars does. Make the entire game free and then have vanity type items, extra storage and character slots be purchased. All the free classes are the ones that people don’t really enjoy as much. I do agree with Gary that it is a better game now then it was at launch. I just wish they would do the free to play thing differently.

Jasmine

I agree here – the way AoC did their F2P model was just strange. It REALLY looks like they want us to sub up to AoC and not actually play for free. IMO this kind of defeats the Free to Play thing. It seems more like Fee To Test Out.

Andrew

It would be nice to experience the “pay for gameplay” option if it was implanted in any MMO.
Like you have to pay for time that you actually in-game, rather than classic monthly fee.
Does it even exist in any game? And what you guys think about this idea?

http://epix.blueinkalchemy.com Verdandi

In Korea, Aion subs are paid for by the hour. They went to a more traditional monthly fee when they released in North America and Europe though. I think it has something to do with the internet cafe culture over in east Asia versus over here.
- Jasmine
  
  Definitely what Verdandi said here.
  
  Personally I wouldn’t enjoy a “pay for gameplay” option but I do a lot of idling and leaving the game up and waiting for queues and alt-tabbing out to check my email etc. It would be a lot different if I was at an internet cafe and being charged per hour of computer use. Instead of just hanging out in my living room. XD
  - MMO_Doubter
    
    I can’t think of an MMO I would pay per hour to play. There is simply too much downtime and boredom in MMOs to make that an acceptable option to me.
    
    Can I IMAGINE an MMO I would be willing to pay for this way? Yes, but I doubt a game like this would be made. The first feature that would have to be available is PvP on demand. Not a queue of minutes or hours to run a BG. 30-second pops with groups based on who is queued at that time. That means sometimes it would be 15v15, and sometimes it would be 1v1. THAT I would pay for.

Jared Ryan

This is the first video i’ve watched of the “This week in MMO” and i have to say that Legendary, and the republic are way better. Gary always good but your two other host…. Not so much.

Waananii

If WAR went free – I’d be DLing that straight away! I enjoyed the game, it’s just that there weren’t enough people I knew that played…

Jeddite

Having spent more than 120 hours in the APB:R open beta so far I can say that I haven’t seen any hackers. It is, as you often say, a very loud minority of players that think they see hackers whenever they get shot at the last split second before going into cover. However, this minority is almost a majority, partly because, (and this is something you didn’t mention), there is quite a bit of lag/rubberbanding issues on the EU servers, at least during peak hours. I think it is also partly because the hitbox is a lot larger than your character to balance out the fact that you can make your character very slim/buff/tall/short. Either way hackers have not been an issue for me.

Anyway, about the 65 dollar weapons, I realise that these premium users are paying for the game for the rest of us in a way. I’ve not looked at the weapons in the store itself but there are only a few “real-money” weapons I’ve seen in-game, a scoped N-tec (AK-47) and a scoped ACT 44 (Desert Eagle). The point is, it’s not really a problem, not only because you only encounter people with them every once in a while, but because every upgrade, in this case the scope, has a downside, making them no better than regular weapons in some situations.
For instance, this scoped N-tec which is the most common (of the real-money weapons you see) has a much smaller crosshair when aiming down the sights in marksmanship mode, as well as increased zoom, but it has substantially reduced accuracy while moving and hipfiring, making the regular N-tec which you unlock from a tier 0 contact (very quickly) better in close combat.

Anyway, great show this week

Jasmine

Thanks for this info! I didn’t know about the downsides to the purchased items. This is good to know! Thank you for posting.

Lakshata

EVE online is a greifers dream. my corp has been wardecced for the last month or so by greifers and mercenaries

Exxor

I’m not really sure why Americans are pointing at other countries as far as human rights goes. These days America is regarded as a bottom of the barrel country as far as human rights goes. It’s a country that has torture camps all over the world and not only their politicians defend it, but their voters do as well. It’s as if Americans utterly and completely feel it’s OK to violate other people’s human rights, but when a country that they view as a threat does the same it is somehow completely disgusting. Wtf?

Jasmine

I don’t disagree with your points, but America’s human rights wasn’t part of the story. The story centered around China and the way they’re treating their people.

I want to make clear that I, personally, am not trying to say that America has flawless human rights simply by commenting on how disgusting the Chinese prison gold farming story was. For me these are two separate topics. We could have debated human rights but it’s This Week in MMO and the story centered around China, not America.

I don’t want to get into it here since I feel like this is entirely the wrong place for a political debate but I feel the need the clarify that omitting another party’s errors isn’t the same as condoning them.

Arkade

Love the “Legendary Lore” poster in Brian’s background.

MMO_Doubter

ABOUT CASH SHOPS:

I can understand the live and let live attitude from people who don’t personally use RMTs, but are fine with other s doing it, BUT – be aware that the MMO exists to make money. If the devs can make more money from cash shop items than content like new dungeons/classes/features, then that is what they will concentrate on. Game content will suffer for it.

Personally, I want to play a game – not go to the mall. I want to play a game where everyone has equal opportunity to have fun. RMTs make players unequal. Real life has enough inequality in it, already.

If you are opposed to RMTs in sub-based MMOs, it is not enough to just not use them. We have to send a message to companies that they will hear, and they only care about their profits. Cancel your sub if your MMO starts with RMTs. That’s what I did with WoW. I will never start a new MMO which combines subs and RMTs.

gauryo

Even if they could scream for help.. in WoW… you would be a complete stranger or random person, that saying to people “Hello im being tortured in a chinese prison”, please help. I would probably respond with “Trolol:F”

MrBuzzLightBeer

SAMP!!! (San Andreas Multiplayer- mod)

The market already exists. There are a load of servers and even rp and stuff going on! Mind you I haven’t been there in a while, but I know for a fact that people would be very interested in a GTA mmo… maybe they know this.

nexfalx

Bioshock mmo would be amazing

http://archeage-online.com/ JumperVII

I’ve been following ArcheAge for a while and from what I’ve seen with progress they made with it gives me high hopes for GTA/Red dead/Borderlands MMO made by this developer. For those who don’t know what ArcheAge, it could be considered the EVE of fantasy MMO. Built on the Cry3 engine, the game invites you to build a society from the ground up living off the land, harvesting materials, growing crops all while having the feel of adventure WoW has to offer. Build ships and wage war, piracy and even a hint of giant sea monsters. Set to be in a world larger than that of WoW will have 3 continents, 2 PVE controlled for adventure and 1 that the players can take over and by take over i mean build a house -> town -> castle -> siege -> destroy = profit. Game mechanics that most MMOs haven’t even thought of. If Mike B thought jump was important then lets throw in climb. Funny video showed people chopping down trees when another player comes out of no where being chased by a giant ant, climbs one of the trees to avoid danger while the others kill it, blew my mind. Physics and destruction, destroy walls, collapse a bridge an enemy on it. Just youtube “Archeage 3rd Generation Online Games” and see it for your selves. I would like to see TWIMMO look more in to ArcheAge. Its defiantly the game fro Gary that Mike and Jaz wouldn’t be bored with.

idiotank

HA I’m The_ID10T

Nuadris

Omg, plz not Borderlands!

sicissis

Having lived in China all my life, I am not surprised that human rights are not always followed, BUT I think that the gold farming prisons is a bit of an exaggeration. Lets say this was actually happening: Say 100 people are farming gold non stop from the same IP and the same location and everything, would that not be something that Blizzard would detect. Besides the account being constantly active, would such a large influx of gold to the servers not be detected. EVE Online has a system were most of the time it is detected, it surprises me that blizz has not found a similar solution if this is such a big problem.

Caz

It’s been a while since a GTA title has been heard on the wind. So it’s either going to be a GTA mmo or GTA5 is gonna be mind blowing. My money is on GTA Online.

Cotytto

PWI just had an offer that if you bought $150 worth of zen (that is used in their Cash Shop) and transferred it to your sever during a time period of a week, you would get an exclusive ground mount (not a flying mount) called a Shadow Fox. You would be shocked just how many of those things I see around on my server. And everyone that sees you knows you just blew $150 on a ground mount that is a recolored version of an existing mount.

The capacity of gamers to spend ridiculous amounts of cash on utterly useless crap is mind boggling.

Steve-O

On China
Definitely not surprised that this goes on but compared to some of the horrendous things they do to their prisoners there (plenty of awful videos out there that are easy to find.. specifically at overcrowded prisons..). Being forced to endure 12 hours of repetitive activity can most definitely be mentally exhausting but its better than being dead..

GTA Online
I played the first few and thats enough to say that I absolutely would try it. Jas I nearly choked with “can i?.. can I help my friends kill hookers?!” lmfao! Jokes aside they definitely have a really interesting almost niche spot in the MMO genre that they could tap..

Borderlands Online
Holy shit this would be amazing, I absolutely LOVED that game. It also translates a bit better then GTA might (familiar loot runs, great loot system already created.. boss encounters etc etc). It also had/has a ravenous following and its a game that I’d be all over if they do it right. My god that was a great game

Jasmine

Ooooh wow that’s a lot of money. I guess if they have the money then go for it but damn! Expensive!

gauryo

BTW! GTA Online… Theres SAMP you know, San Andreas Multiplayer, which is really popular, I think its by cleaver hackers and GTA Fans that wanted to play SA online. Theres several hundreds of servers online as we speak. its basicly SA free for all, Role Playing servers, Fun servers etc, You have currency, you have two factions, Cops & Robbers, Robbers can make gangs, which becomes several Factions within a faction, kind of like guilds that can go kill other guilds. You gain currency by robbing banks, ATMs, robbing the stores from the single player games, other players, steal cars, its basicly amazing, the only thing that hits you when you play it, is that you have to press tab and check the scoreboard for ID to do commands either /rob id xx or /cuff xx etc, But tbh the game is really fun:p

But if rockstar made GTA an MMORPG, it would be awesome.

This Week In MMO 49: GTA Online? - Gamebreaker.tv

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