Full Time Game Playing Career

FlopsyPrince

I read a number of Japanese/Chinese/Korean translated webnovels and some talk about someone making game playing a career.

I wonder if we will ever get over the "selling stuff for real money is bad" idea making this a potentially valid career option for some. I don't like sweatshops, but I am sure some players could make a job of it if the controls on that were loosened in reasonable ways.

Will we ever see that in ESO or other MMOs in the near future?

Jeremy

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

I read a number of Japanese/Chinese/Korean translated webnovels and some talk about someone making game playing a career.

I wonder if we will ever get over the "selling stuff for real money is bad" idea making this a potentially valid career option for some. I don't like sweatshops, but I am sure some players could make a job of it if the controls on that were loosened in reasonable ways.

Will we ever see that in ESO or other MMOs in the near future?

People are already making careers out of playing games. That's basically what a "streamer" is.

In respect to RMT, as you pointed out that's been going on in sweatshops since the dawn of MMORPGs. Will games start to encourage it into the future? I doubt it, not unless the company who made the game could somehow get a piece of the action.

LalMirchi

I've actually helped a couple of friends with streaming, not this game but another with a wider audience,

One thing, you do need a good PC so the graphics lags don't get in the way.

There are very good apps to record gameplay but as always your personality will the salient ingredient.

Jinxxy85

There's some very amazing streamers out there which do exactly what you've just described and many of them make a living off streaming almost exclusively ESO. There is mixed feelings about this being a valid career path or a proper form of entertainment, but I've enjoyed watching streams for years. If nothing more, they can be a very direct route to answering any questions you may have about the game.

If you're ever interested then look into Twitch under the ESO section.

FlopsyPrince

Streaming is not what I was referring to. Twitch (for example) has its own challenges today where the streamers that make money often do it without respect to the game they are playing and for other reasons.

These novels have the characters (now or most likely in the past) finding rare items and reselling them to make their income. That would not be good for a sweatshop either.

The problem with waiting for "a cut" is that it ignores the value of making things more available in the game for those with more money than time. People pay for lots of entertainment now. Tablet games are a good example. Getting more players/subscribers would make the game company money.

I expect it has too many mental blocks and the "we must squeeze the maximum profit" problem so will not happen, but I wonder if it could.

Danikat

As far as I know the two ways you can reasonably make a career out of playing games is either streaming or being a professional player for 'esports' games where tournaments have cash prizes and/or tournament players get sponsorship deals.

About 20 years ago when MMOs and therefore gold selling were first taking off there were actually attempts to legitimise it, with some of the companies set up to facilliate it trying to get deals with the developers of some major MMOs. But it fell through, from what I've heard partially because of the legal issues, partially because public opinion among players started turning against the sellers, and partially because it really needs a lot of people spending a lot of time doing some pretty tedious activities to make it work.

Here's one article on it, it's pretty long but it's a crazy story: https://www.wired.com/2008/11/ff-ige/

This book sounds like it's a bit behind the times, like various TV shows and movies which seem to think Second Life is what everyone wants from MMOs and one day when we all realise that it's going to take over the world.

Kwoung

FlopsyPrince wrote: »

Streaming is not what I was referring to. Twitch (for example) has its own challenges today where the streamers that make money often do it without respect to the game they are playing and for other reasons.

These novels have the characters (now or most likely in the past) finding rare items and reselling them to make their income. That would not be good for a sweatshop either.

The problem with waiting for "a cut" is that it ignores the value of making things more available in the game for those with more money than time. People pay for lots of entertainment now. Tablet games are a good example. Getting more players/subscribers would make the game company money.

I expect it has too many mental blocks and the "we must squeeze the maximum profit" problem so will not happen, but I wonder if it could.

Probably not. For one selling game items for cash is against the TOS of pretty much every game, if the game company wanted to make a PTW game, they would sell the items themselves, except most people wouldn't play it and it would fail, so there is that. Basically it ruins the game for anyone that actually wants to play it, with farmers camping every desirable item that could be sold 24x7, never giving you a shot at actually earning it in game.

Sergykid

i am playing eso daily for a few hours, and i really cared for the game over time. But i have no talent to be a streamer (i tried) and also eso is not balanced (nor anyone from management interested in balance enough) to be an esport. Even tho i would like to play for pay, it is not and i don't even see how it can be possible.

Scardan

Legally, in ESO - no, it will probably never happen.

ArchMikem

The Chinese version of "Game Playing Career" usually ends up being a hole in the wall "Office" with dozens of PCs and/or Consoles running Bot Accounts that exploit the in-game Economy in order to make real world money. No doubt advertising packages of millions of Gold in exchange for cash. Once a character the Bots used levels to 50, they sell that Account for cash as well so lazy players can get an Account with a pre-leveled max character. I've actually seen someone like this. They play like a normal person but they didn't bother changing the character name from something like "aaa13221".

rpa

Problem weith making money playing a mmo or any AAA gaem is that the publisher wants all the money in world. Sure, people will mine game economy for gold to sell for real money. But its only happens because publisher does not find cost of stopping it profitable. They rather sell Crown Crates than tradeable Crown Vouchers.

eovogtb16_ESO

Jinxxy85 wrote: »

There's some very amazing streamers out there which do exactly what you've just described and many of them make a living off streaming almost exclusively ESO. There is mixed feelings about this being a valid career path or a proper form of entertainment, but I've enjoyed watching streams for years. If nothing more, they can be a very direct route to answering any questions you may have about the game.

If you're ever interested then look into Twitch under the ESO section.

Nobody makes a living streaming ESO. Even the highest watched streamers like Fengrush, who im pretty sure doesnt make a living playing ESO only average ~200 people actually watching them, the rest are imbeds. /chatters next time you're in a stream you will see the actual number of people watching them.

GreenhaloX

Yes.. they make websites of themselves, how-to-videos and stream watch me live videos. Some actually make a lot of money doing it. Alas, I would go crazy staring at a computer or TV screen all day or night. Hey, hats off to those that can, and they are getting rich off it.

Then, there are the full-timers like so many in ESO. You can easily spot them. Just look at their titles.. i.e. Flawless Conqueror, Godslayer, Dromathra Destroyer, Master Angler, Grand Master Crafter, etc.. ha ha

WySoSirius

Entropia universe is the only RCE mmo where it is possible to make a living from or was. There is plenty of information in regards to the buying and selling of items in that game. I think that game is the basic idea OP is referring to