I was reading about some drama over on the forums with regards to a twitch.tv streamer who goes by the name Zillianop. The drama entailed him getting his account banned over botting but more so how he had been conning viewers into donating gold and money for him. Many of the comments on the forums were quite scathing towards him, many feeling betrayed and saying the guy got what he deserved.
However, the overall tone of the forums and how someone like this took advantage of a system made me ponder about Blizzard’s so-called design of their game. First, I’ve stated in the past that the introduction of the auction house and especially the Real Money Auction House has been a highly unethical decision on Blizzard’s behalf. I can see how they viewed taking advantage of Diablo 2’s situation in the past and wanting a cut in the auction (similar to how Ticketmaster designed Ticket Exchange to combat or rather get their hands in the secondary market for tickets i.e. scalping).
The thing is the game currently is designed to encourage competitive farming for money. Although Blizzard will outwardly lie in stating that they believe no one should use this as a permanent replacement for a job (come on, gold farming companies in China? You can’t be that ignorant Blizzard!), people have been using it to make some cash. The thing for Blizzard is that they ultimately control the rules on the cash flow, which makes the system entirely arbitrary.
So here’s the pain point for me: should a system like this be encouraged? Should we continue to put a company like Blizzard on a high pedestal for having a good reputation in the past? Or should we as a gaming community start to dismantle them for creating this monstrous platform?
The thing is that guys like Zillianop might have been created through a system like this, discovering that he could make an easy living. We can never truly know the extent of Zillianop’s nature as a conartist. Was it the system that encouraged him to take advantage of it? Or was he by nature already like this and just finding loopholes in the system to sneak inside?
For me, games should be focused around a single purpose: entertainment. Companies like Zynga introduced models that I believe are too short term focused but gave them a lot of praise from the financial community. However, the core products still lack substance which is why you’re seeing Zynga slowly die off. Then when you see a situation like a Zillianop where people are taking an idea that’s supposed to be centered around entertainment and manipulating to financial gain and duping the masses, you know that the idea in itself has become corrupted and must be re-examined thoroughly.
Truthfully, I’m surprises Blizzard/Activision/Viviendi has not been shut down or accused by the US government over the Real Money Auction House because of the gambling implications. Everyone knows that Diablo 3 is essentially premised around the slot machine mentality. However, connecting the slot machine mentality to real money implies gambling. Considering that Blizzard is located in California, I really have no idea how they managed to skirt around the rules (except through some sort of bribery). By the way, this is another example of why the Real Money Auction House is unethical.
Regardless, Blizzard/Activision/Viviendi are walking on thin ice right now. In the short term, they’ll win out due to the amount of money they’re making. However, from a product point of view, I feel strongly in saying that they no longer have the edge. Any good game designers can come in and create a better product that can wipe their franchises away. And it’s not really a matter of the product, but the mentality behind the company. As long as Viviendi and Bobby Kotick continue to dictate how Blizzard is run, the company will be constantly threatened by themselves once the gaming community revolts against them and begin to support upcoming studios and franchises who do not have as ruthless of a capitalistic mentality as Bobby Kotick and Viviendi.