Elements for designing economic system in Online games

2. Elements for designing economic system in Online games • Creator Mode——The collapse of the economic system is due to the infinite human input. • Value Impact——An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. • Combination of production and control——Common control mode of economic system. • Diversity——The future trend of economic system in Online games.

3. Elements for designing economic system in Online games Online games are similar to boats Economic system is similar to water The water that bears the boat is the same that swallows it up.

4. Glossary • Virtual Currency——Distributed by game operators for in-game consumption. This currency in the game does not circulate between players, with a fixed ratio to real currency. • Game Coin——Produced by game system, which can circulate in games like items. Its value has no relationship with real currency. • The above definition is limited to this article.

5. Creator Mode——The collapse of the economic system is due to the infinite human input. • Dating back to PC game times, economic system has existed as a method for value accumulation and goal achievements in each stage. • Its core is to continuously create, accumulate and consume the different resources in games, including game coins and other items, in order to help players achieve their goals in each stage. • Economic system in early Online games inherited design concept of those in PC games, so players experienced an economic times from “scarcity" to “Richness" and even to “inflation”.

6. Creator Mode——The collapse of the economic system is due to the infinite human input. Single Player Mode Game System (Creator Mode) Time length control Probability Control Consumption regulations Production of scarce resources Production of Game Coins Player Goal for this stage

7. Creator Mode——The collapse of the economic system is due to the infinite human input. Multi-player interaction mode Game System（Production of Game Coin） Game Coin buyer Game Coin seller Non-trading players Bid failure Competing for scarce resources Common resources increased in value Dominance(Monopoly Advantages) Players dropped out

8. Creator Mode——The collapse of the economic system is due to the infinite human input. • Problems caused by Creator Mode: • 1、Obvious trend of inflation – rapid devaluation of game coin while fast increase in value of scarce resources • 2、Common resources are tend to be monopolized, which makes difficult for non-trading players to stay in the game. • 3、Those players who monopolized resources leveled up so fast that speed growths of overall players, with overdraft of game contents.

9. Creator Mode——The collapse of the economic system is due to the infinite human input. • The devaluation of game coin forces players to find a relatively steady equivalency to game coin trade. Then the economic system in Online games stepped into the 2nd stage.

10. Creator Mode——The collapse of the economic system is due to the infinite human input. • Generally, the equivalency is not defined by game designers as circulation tool, instead, it is founded by players which is relatively steady and scarce resource in current economic environment. Similar to oil resources and mineral resources in real world, equivalency will change with the process of the game.

11. Creator Mode——The collapse of the economic system is due to the infinite human input. • Although equivalency has a relatively steady value, after becoming the core of a economic system, any modifications (relating to production and consumption) made by game designers will cause unpredicted consequences. • Equivalency produced by any game system will be faced with the impact of cheating tools and trades in secondary and tertiary markets. That will eventually lead to an unfavorable situation with game coin devaluated and resources highly concentrated.

12. In a highly interacted Online game, this will cause inflation which leads to the end of the game.

13. Value Impact————An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. • In the CSP mode (Come-Stay-Pay), to mortgage virtual currency by real currency (in real world, real currency comes by mortgaging the gold, similarly, in game world, virtual currency comes by mortgaging real currency.) makes the equivalency of less necessary, further devaluing the game coin.

14. Value Impact————An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. • In the CSP mode (Come-Stay-Pay), virtual currency mortgaging by real currency has replaced game coin as control of scarce resources. So the game coin became a symbol of numerical accumulation. • Virtual currency existed as means of non-circulated payment, so it doesn’t influenced production and consumption of the economic system. Therefore, virtual currency can not meet the supply and need balance produced by game coin interaction.

15. Value Impact————An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. Real currency game coin buyer Non-trading players Virtual currency Game coin items Game coin items Pay items Superiority Players dropped out

16. Value Impact————An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. • The design concept of economic system is not to let those with enough real currency to become the privileged class, instead, it is focused on the long-term prosperity of the game.

17. Value Impact————An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. • Some products of CSP mode not only changed the habits of players, but also provided a high-level entertainment by shortening the game process through introducing virtual currency.

18. Value Impact————An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. • The direct competition of virtual currency will commercialize and concentrate the core fun of game. From a long-term view, it is brought by a stage or a detailed segmented user group.

19. Value Impact————An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. • In summary, the difficulties in designing economic system is to balance “Human Resource Mortgage" and “Currency Mortgage”.

20. Value Impact————An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. • 1、the conflict between production, consumption of game coin and imbalances in player interaction System production balance Excessive human resource mortgage

21. Value Impact————An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. • Conflict between Virtual currency and pay items, as well as between player growth and core fun.

22. Value Impact————An economic system whose core is to buy virtual currency in cash will lead to economic balance collapse. • 3、Conflict between function of virtual currency and game coin and changes in the game's various value systems.

23. Those game completely relied on “Currency mortgage”(casual games is not discussed) will be faced with a serious dilemma of polarization, until the complete loss of the non-paying players.

24. Combination of production and control——Common control mode of economic system. • Combination of production and control is to classify the different needs of game coin, which will appear in different forms in the game.

25. Combination of production and control——Common control mode of economic system. • The production regulation of bind game coin is stricter than that of game coin in circulation.

26. Combination of production and control——Common control mode of economic system. • The main modification of game coin in circulation is the purposes of consumption.

27. Combination of production and control——Common control mode of economic system. • The ultimate goal of combing production and control is to maintain the uniformity and controllability of game experience by refining the circulation of game coin and strengthen the function of bind game coin.

28. Virtual currency mortgaging by real currency is still the main support for value-added services in game design, and is gradually transformed from result-oriented to process-oriented.

29. Diversity——The future trend of economic system in Online games. • After experiencing the changes of online game market, online game players has become mature than before. So in the future, the life-span and long-term profit of a game will depends on whether it has a mature, steady and reasonable economic system.

30. Diversity——The future trend of economic system in Online games. • Although every player put different time length and money, they all expected to have the same fun in the game. That’s why economic system is so complicated in online games.

31. Diversity——The future trend of economic system in Online games. • Expectation 1: design features of extremely rigorous economic system • Reduce the value of game coin produced by human resources to the lowest. • Each value system has a corresponding kind of bind game coin. • Consumption of virtual currency is focused on adding value and convenience. • Restrict the trading possibility and profit margin of the 3rd party.

32. Diversity——The future trend of economic system in Online games. • Expectation 2: design features of extremely loose economic system • Link the value of game coin produced by human resource and experience of growing in games • Balance the value system in the game by interaction and transaction among players. • Consumption of virtual currency is focused on the contents for players to experience. • Encourage 3rd party transaction to balance the input of human resource and currency.

33. Diversity——The future trend of economic system in Online games. • Economic system design in most online game products will be hovering between strict and loose. To well distinguish the relationship between currencies and systems will be the key factor for designing a successful economic system.

34. Diversity——The future trend of economic system in Online games. • The design of online game is no longer a design of virtual world. The commercialization of online game is developing each passing day, therefore, to design a balanced and reasonable economic system is a game designer’s important job for player services.！

35. Special Thanks • 厦门吉比特网络技术有限公司 • 卢竑岩 • 盛大游戏 • 毕振华 • 悠乐网络 • 沈凝

36. The end Thanks