Markets. Demand. Supply.
One thing about a virtual economy is that the quick feedback and response and the immediacy and flux of the economy is very evident. In the space of a day I have gone from penniless adventurer to moderate wealth as a "clay supplier."
A bit of background: several weeks ago my son came home from school very excited about trying a game some of his friends were involved with online: Runescape. Runescape is a virtual world, a MMORPG (Massive Multiplayer Online Role Playing Game). Runescape, as MMORPG's go, is strictly at the low end. It is a java-based online game offering a fairly cheap and relatively painless entry point for people who want to try the MMOG but don't want to dive into the more intensive involved Worlds of Warcraft.
Runescape is set in yet another fantasy world peopled with the usual beasts, monsters, quests, and magic — you know the type — with a selection of easy monster and creatures on which to hone your skills, and a selection of progressively more difficult quests that help to build your skill level until you can take on the bigger creatures and beasts. (Note: Avoid the Chaos Elemental. I named it the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal after it defenestrated me in the wild.)
The biggest problem in the virtual world is the same as it is in our real world: money. How do you go about earning cash to finance your adventures? It is relatively simple to earn small amounts of gold (chopping wood, mining tin, killing goblins, etc.), but after a time such make-work becomes tedious. Through nosing about, we managed to discover a source of magical runes that we could then sell in one of the towns for 70 gold pieces each.
Aha! Easy Money! So we thought. Each trek out to the site involved a laborious and intensive hike into the wilderness, a region rife with player-killers, generally high-ranking. A direct route was out of the question as far too many homicidal maniacs waited by the main road into the wilderness for some cheap kills. Getting to the site involved a very long and meandering route to avoid the many monsters and other players. Once you finally arrived, you had to daringly dart in to collect as many of the runes as possible, wait for them to respawn, and then collect again. In short, it was a JOB — dirty, dangerous and tedious.
Article comments
— go to most recent comments1 - Bryan McKay
Very nice review, Deano! It sounds like a rather fun game.
One question though: How can one be defenestrated in the wild? I don't know of too many windows out in the wilderness!
2 - Victor Plenty
One is easily defenestrated playing a game under a Microsoft operating system.
3 - Deano
Actually technically I probably wasn't directly defenestrated. I was fiddling with a exterior window in some type of structure when the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal came up behind me...I know that it's real game name is a Chaos Elemental but it just looked so damn much like a Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal should look...I digress.
One of the nice things about Runescape is you play for free (some members areas, skills, items etc are off for free players)...so if you feel like looking for the Ravenous Bugblatter Beast of Traal, just keep going north and east. You'll know it when you find it - or it finds you.
4 - Ken Edwards
I like free online games, especially MMO's. I still don't understand the subscription model for a game you pay $50 for.
5 - Tom Vendetta
Hey, I play runescape, I have a lvl 88,85,83,72,63,44, and a few lvl 3's who only do skills, and no combat. I have been around for the release of 3 skills while I have been playing, and each time a new skill is released it totally messes up the market. Last year, Party Hats (the rarest item in the game) were around 2 to 15 million gold coins, now, one party hat can cost up to 300 million gold. The reason for this is that as a skill is released, the demand for certain items rises. Known as merchants in game, these people buy items in bulk for 100 gold, then resell those items to others for 150 gold. By most players, this is shamed upon. Another way a new skiller influenced the market was the release of the Slayer skill. This skill brought the Abyssal Whip to the game, one of the best weapons. The first people to get to 85 slayer were the first people who had whips available to them. These people sold whips for 50m-25milion. As more and more got 85 slayer, the price went down and down, however a whip still costs 2 million. This has given people more money, which means they are willing to spend more, hence the rise in party hat prices. To us lower lvls, this is ridiculous, to them, its life.
6 - Andy
Sounds like a commentary on real life to me, Tom. Exotic car prices do this -- during boom years (late 90's - early 00's), exotic prices go up as more people can afford them, hence increased demand. Lots of supercars are conceived/designed during these boom years, then the economy slows just as these cars are produced. It happened in the early 90's (Remember the Jag XJ220, Bugatti EB110?) and again the past few years (Unsold/slow selling Porsche CGT, M-B SLR).
As you said in your last sentence, "To us lower lvls (working-class), this is ridiculous, to them (upper class/ biz owners), its life."
And just like life, the goal is always class transendence -- how do I throw off my working class roots and leapfrog myself into the upper strata?
The answer is the same too -- Work smarter, work harder.
7 - Nine_of_Hearts
My grandmother was eaten by a Chaos Elemental... I didn't raise a finger to help.
8 - Stephen
Star Wars Galaxies was an excellent game to see a very active market develop and change. Any game with alot of player crafting of item with actual utility in the game will have an interesting economy.
9 - Ryokobalta
from what i understand, the construction skill came out to take some money out of the RuneScape economy
and if you noticed, it worked, rather well actually
the prices of nearly everything but construction supplies went down, some went down moreso than others
and while the way you were going about getting money before construction came out was a good idea...i would highly suggest collecting whatever runes you were getting and sell them to people, as shop prices are different from what people are willing to pay
Happy 'Scaping
-Ryokobalta (feel free to PM me if ya need some help, i may be able to help you out in some way ^_^)
10 - dan and tim
lots of this is wrong "Just in case you are wondering, the fatality rate for such expeditions as ours was probably 60%. The return for the survivors was typically about 3000 gold pieces, enough to buy some decent mid-level armour and weapons but not much else." its caled mining rune essence and then crafting runes for non members and making bow string for members. AND YOU CAN SIT AND SLEEP IN YOUR HOUSE!!! "if I can keep my son from wasting our hard-earned profits on such frivolity as mitheral swords and dragon-skin armor." weapons and armor are important and if you have money theres not much else to spend it on!!!
11 - dan and tim
folo up im a level 69 with dds( dragon super piosoned dager) 55 of the 105 quests done and have you ever heared of runehq.com!?! its the best help system in the history of rune scape help systems, and you should gain up you combat because the number at the bottom of your screene when you enter the wildy is the higher the lev a type of person can attack you example a level 3 enter area level 2 in the wildy only level 4, and 5 people can attack him.
12 - steve
I dont know who wrote this comment but it is dumb and just unethical. Runescape is a great game and no one should be dissing it. And further more it soundes as though a parent wrote the note above and no parents understand runescape!
13 - dan and tim
i hope you change this site with the new info we have provided.
14 - dan
this url is the help site i was talking about. rune scape is cool and this url helps alot!
15 - asdf
Chaos elemental is easy to kill however isnt worth it kalphite queen is alot better
16 - dan
ya kalphite queen is good yet the TzTok-Jad is the highest level apponent it is level 702!!! only select few have the fire cape wich you get from killing him.
17 - dan
you said your son buys mith swords those are realy cheap so is dragon leather
18 - mw
If you want to make lots of money, merchant. That's how I got my phat for 22 mil and now i have 150 mil.
19 - yasel16
k to do this u need easy insrument:
u need a tinderbox
and a axe a axe
firt get some logs then use it with the tinderbox and when the fire is make use the tinderbox with the logs againg but faster and the fire will be make
if u dont belive me go to the higth score and type yasel16 and ull see me in the firemaking
u will avance ur lvl woodcutting and firemaking super fast
enjoy
20 - yasel16
some1 that need some1 to do jobs for hem plz add me and ill do 1of this:
woodcutting:(i only can cutt to willow)
firemakin"(to willow to)
killing monsters:(less that lvl 38)
and some other job
if u need me just add me to ur friend list on runescape and tell me wat u need and ill help u remember i can't do all at the same time and if u r going to add me to ur friend list u got to pay me good
kk bye
21 - Zatch850
if you need someone to do your work i am your man i will do anything kill monsters that are to lvl 40 i will mine anything but not smithing i will mine up to gold and you don't have to pay me a lot of money 100 to 200gp for everything i do if you want me to work for you add me to your friend list in runescape k bye
22 - hellomynameismonkey
good review that was funny
23 - ruslan18
hah,u al lbitches,the only way to get rich is to quit playing runescape already,get a life :) im lvl 85 with 80 range and 74 mage 80 fletching 59 runescrafting 80 woodcutting i rule u ya ya ya im da best see ya all in hell!get a life.
24 - 9090
A couple of things;
1) you can sit down on the chairs in a player owned house and...
2) In RS classic we used to be able to sleep in beds as we suffered from fatigue. however, with this now gone (replaced by random events, both these things are to detur macro-ers) the beds are now, as you say, just for show, though you need at least 2 in your house to hire a servant of any kind.
25 - DonkeyKong64
Im lvl 67 my name is Mattyc033444 on rs and my wc is same as my combat lvl. RuneScape players hav no life if they play it like ruslan18 there, gay lord you don't have a level 85 account, ha your just a noob who wants to show off but is such a noob has to lie about his levels. HAHA UR ONLY LVL 16 LOL WHAT A BOOBY!