MMORPG's ???

[12AX7]

Hi Everyone,
What's the deal with these MMORPG things? I first saw them mentioned in a POTD herein.

So I did a little Google-ing and found this article...

http://www.1up.com/do/feature?cId=3141815

The money sounds outrageous. Seems to me one could possibly earn living at this as a one man operation? Or small shop? Why bother with creating a sweatshop, right?

Here's some quotes.



"typical 12-hour sessions can earn his employers as much as $60,000 per month while he walks away with a measly $150."

"Smooth Criminal's game cartel made $1.5 million from Star Wars Galaxies alone last year, and individually, he's made as much as $700,000 in a single year. "[SWG] built my new house, which I paid for in cash," he says. "So when you ring my doorbell, it plays the Star Wars music.""

One poster in another thread said, in effect... "Give a player a chart and he'll be bored with poker in a day, teach him to think like a poker player and he'll decide this isn't a fast enough way to make money."

The above quotes have me wondering.

What do you all know?

[jman220]

I used to play Asheron's Call (back when it was very popular). There are some people who do make an obscene amount of money ebaying. But the vast majority do not, and if you devote the same amount of time to either playing poker online, or tryign to ebay MMORPG's, you'll make a lot more from poker, IMO.

[bb88]

I used to play Diablo 2 and sold a sweet charm to my buddy for ten bucks on the expansion pack.

There's money to be made, but it wouldn't be anywhere near the money you could make playing poker unless you plan on running some sort of sweatshop.

[Photoc]

Back when Diablo 2 was the rage, myself and 4 or 5 friends would go online and just "farm" the bosses over and over, then sell the items on ebay. We'd get $2 - $25/item. We made a couple grand then the game started to die off. Nowadays there are what is called "chinese farmers" which ironicly, doesn't have anything to do with being chinese. It's just teams of people who go farm items/cash or individuals whom have discovered glitches in games and exploit them.

[BradleyT]

I've made over $40,000 from Diablo 2, SWG, Sims Online, and UO.

The key to money (if you do it yourself) is to have a Macroing program. Unlike poker, it's easy to write a bot to beat video games.

[12AX7]

What really amazes me, is that people will actually buy these "virtual assets". I knew video gamers were serious, but this topic was a real eye opener! LOL!

[siccjay]

I used to know someone who farmed gold on UO and sold it on eBay. Me and a friend rented a house from him and one day he decided to tell us we had to move out. When I asked why he said Ebay #4893749 or whatever the # was.

I had a few items that I could have sold and my account was decent but I was too lazy to do it. Probably cost me $500 or so.

[billyb]

I played EverQuest and I sold My account for $600 when i
was done playing. Guy bought it for his son so they could play together.

peace
wwonka

[Shoe]

There are very few people who can make a lot of money at these games by playing them straight up. If you have 24/7 to devote to the game so you can give yourself the best character possible, and don't get extremely bored by running around farming the same exact things day after day after day, then this might be for you. Otherwise, to make a lot of money you need to find an exploit or a very well guarded secret that you can take advantage of to make any decent money.

EDIT: In most of these games (by this I mean the most popular MMORPG's -- check selling prices on ebay or playerauctions), you probably could make $5-$10 per hour once you get a good enough character. But making more than that becomes a struggle unless you really know what your doing. And if your playing to have fun, you'll probably spend all of your profits. You also need to be able to find multiple ways to make good money/items in the game, as what works today, could get nerfed tomorrow!

[IggyWH]

[ QUOTE ]
I've made over $40,000 from Diablo 2, SWG, Sims Online, and UO.

The key to money (if you do it yourself) is to have a Macroing program. Unlike poker, it's easy to write a bot to beat video games.

[/ QUOTE ]

Those stores where you could buy items for games are pimp. If only I knew how to read those packets...