rent posts

Are we renting our MMOs?

by Shawn Schuster Oct 27th 2008 at 1:00PM

Filed under: Business models, Culture, Economy, MMO industry, Opinion

If you think about it, we're basically renting our MMO experience anyway. This is especially true for games that offer free software, yet charge a monthly fee. So would a rental service for MMOs really work?

In a recent article over at Twenty-Sided, Shamus explores the avenues of renting your multiplayer and single-player game experience. This is highlighted in what he says he expects to see in the future: a move towards more single-player games with simple online functionalities, like a chatroom. "Certainly an MMO denies you ownership," He explains. "But I wouldn't expect to be able to 'buy' an MMO any more than I'd expect to 'buy' cable television for a one-time fee and use it forever after." Some games have successfully achieved the opposite approach (Guild Wars) while others are doing just fine maintaining what is essentially a rental of their service. So what are your thoughts?

Tags: business-models, casual, rent, rental, shamus, shamus-young, twenty-sided

EVE Evolved: Money for nothing

by Brendan Drain Sep 1st 2008 at 11:00AM

Filed under: Sci-fi, EVE Online, Economy, Forums, Game mechanics, Guides, Professions, Making money, Tips and tricks, EVE Evolved

In most MMOs, making currency without actually playing usually involves rule-breaking macro-farming which risks getting your account banned. In EVE Online, however, a number of viable options exist for making ISK with absolutely no effort. From hiring research and development agents to public investment schemes and even a player-run bank, there are plenty of ways to make ISK in EVE without even logging in.

Investment Schemes:
In the market discussion forums, players can sell shares in their company and present a business plan to potential investors. The corporation receives ISK in exchange for its shares and agrees to make regular dividend payments to all shareholders. Buyers have to trust that the company owner won't just run off with their ISK, so only the most trustworthy players have managed to successfully start very large investment schemes.

In this article, I look at the different ways you can make ISK with virtually no effort, in some cases even if your account is inactive.

Tags: bank, blueprint, ccp, eve, eve-evolved, eve-online, featured, free, invest, investment, isk, joystiqfeatures, killboard, money, rent, stock market, StockMarket