Board Thread:Game Discussion/@comment-11590835-20130808070152/@comment-9605025-20130809033015

SSG,

You bring up a lot of good points. Some of them are not as obvious as others and I thank you for bringing up the ones that are not obvious. However, I do have a few things to say that may be considered counter to some of your arguments.

First of all, it is "gambling" not "gamboling". I just thought I'd let you know since you misspelled it several times.

With regards to the space bridge, I agree that it stinks that all you are doing is buying a chance. Despite that opinion, Mobage has generally been fair in providing sufficient information regarding the probabilities (at least in recent events).

As for the physical value of the cards, there are plenty of other instances of products with no physical value. For example, when I was younger, I started playing an online game called Neopets. Initially, it was independantly developed and entirely free to play. Yes, there were adds but they were always on the sides of the page, out of the way. Eventually, the game was bought by Nickelodeon. After the aquisition, there was a flood of changes to the game. All of those changes were to accommodate the new paying sector of the game. Not only did about half of the game become pay, but the free section was slowly downgraded to strongly favor the paying customers. Players who had been highly successful for the free years were suddenly poor by comparison.

The point I am trying to make with the above paragraph is that virtual items are not limited to Mobage. Even large compnies that cater to young children are doing it. As a matter of fact, Nickelodeon didn't stop there. They made a companion game called Petpet Park. Although designed for an even younger age group, it still is dominated by virtual purchases. People pay real money for a little picture of a hat.

Yes, what Mobage does stinks, but it is not unique to them. Rather, it is an emerging type of business transaction.