Gamasutra - Economics of MMORPGS

Gamasutra is hosting a new article that gives a quick overview about the research done on the topic of Economics for MMORPGS.

In the past few years university-based researchers have published a substantial amount of explorative work on MMORPG economies – the most complex virtual economic system that exists in games. In this post we take a quick look at some of the interesting research papers from the hallowed halls of academia and beyond. We will not be going into substantial depth, but provide a number of links for further self-exploration. It is well worth it.

Virtual economies are an important feature for games. This is true not only for MMOGs, but a key component of the design and management of freemium and other types of games, as well. In essence, games have had in-game economies since the first NPC merchant, or purchasable power-up at the dawn of game-time. The importance of virtual economies to games means that this is a topic of intense scrutiny both in the industry and in the university-based game research environment, notably in recent years.

In the game analytics domain we often talk about virtual economies in the multitude of different freemium games, but the most complex virtual economies are found in MMORPGs, where for almost two decades, things have just gotten more and more complex.