Jun 18, 2012

[The Capitol of Gaming RMT/Bots to Ban RMT & Botting]

Seems so:
"The government official also stressed item collecting for commercial use is a serious hindrance to creating a healthy game culture.
Korea is the world’s most-wired society with the Internet penetration rate standing at above 93 percent, data from government agencies said. Korea is also the home of the world’s biggest smartphone and TV manufacturer, Samsung.

For online role-playing games, the law prohibits users from using programs that allow in-game characters to hunt and collect items without the need of a player controlling them."
I assume that the law is only affecting 'black market' RMT since there is no mention of in-game cash shops anywhere. But since botting and RMT saturates all levels in Korean online gaming to the point where the basic game mechanics are designed around them to a certain degree, it will be interesting to see how this new legislation affects both gameplay and monetization in current and future MMOs there. Perhaps the cliche 'Korean grind' so many games there have will become less tolerated by players when it's no longer a simple matter for them to buy their way around it. I'm curious to see how the MMO market adjusts there, if the government can truly enforce this law.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I hope the agency bans ALL RMT :D Take that blizzard!

But seriously, I think the governments statements are great. Just not sure I'd want governments taking such actions. It'd be cool of more conscious games would just take a stand on this kind of thing. It's not like this is going to improve with Corporate backed RMAHs. This is going to get really ugly.

Pai said...

I'll be interested in seeing if the Korean government ends up expecting games like D3 to police their bots and goldfarmers more aggressively now, and if there will be any penalties for games that appear to not be doing enough to combat it.