Newer Post | Older Post


Gaming for a Living?
by Steve Watters on 10/03/2006 at 8:35 AM

Motte's post about orienting the workplace to videogamers reminded me of an item I came across a couple of years ago regarding the game Ultima Online. The game's creator, Richard Garriott, found out that people were playing Ultima and then selling their levels and characters on eBay for $2,000 and more.  That led him to come up with a way for players to sell virtual goods and services within future versions of the game (so that he could get the transaction fees he was losing to eBay).

"One of my primary design philosophies," said Garriott, "is to create a game mechanic so people can earn an income in the game, quit their real jobs and live in the virtual world forever." Now that's crazy.

Career | Mail This | Share on Facebook

Comments

Feed You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

Post a comment*

*Comments are moderated, and will not appear on The Line until we've approved them. Usually you'll see your comment published in under an hour, but it may take up to a day or so during evenings or over the weekend. While we are eager to facilitate civil conversation by publishing most comments, we're inclined not to publish those that strike us as offensive, vulgar, overly personal, cynical, snarky, deceptive, disrespectful, irrelevant, redundant or unnecessarily contentious.

External Links

Note: Links to external sites do not constitute blanket endorsement or complete agreement by Boundless or Focus on the Family with information or resources offered at or through those sites.




Whether you live in Singapore or Seattle, all you need to provide now to receive our free weekly e-newsletter is your e-mail address. It's that easy!

 

Recent Posts

Recent Comments

Archives

Contributors

About Us

Relevant Boundless Articles

GOOGLE THIS BLOG

SUBSCRIBE VIA EMAIL


Be friends with Boundless
Follow Boundless
The Boundless Show




    Copyright 2009 Focus on the Family. All rights reserved. International copyright secured. The Line and Boundless Line are trademarks of Focus on the Family.
Home
ArticlesBlogsBest OfGuys GuideFull Homepage
 

Newer Post | Older Post


Gaming for a Living?
by Steve Watters on 10/03/2006 at 8:35 AM

Motte's post about orienting the workplace to videogamers reminded me of an item I came across a couple of years ago regarding the game Ultima Online. The game's creator, Richard Garriott, found out that people were playing Ultima and then selling their levels and characters on eBay for $2,000 and more.  That led him to come up with a way for players to sell virtual goods and services within future versions of the game (so that he could get the transaction fees he was losing to eBay).

"One of my primary design philosophies," said Garriott, "is to create a game mechanic so people can earn an income in the game, quit their real jobs and live in the virtual world forever." Now that's crazy.

Career | Mail This | Share on Facebook

Comments

Feed You can follow this conversation by subscribing to the comment feed for this post.

If you'd like to leave a comment, we're afraid you'll have to use a non-mobile device to do so. I just couldn't get the mobile comment entry form to work right. Alas. ~Ted.