10 - Capitalism in World of Warcraft

     Like a lot of MMORPG’s, World of Warcraft has its own in-game economy. To make it more interesting to play, Blizzard has made it a free market, which means that the distribution and costs of goods or services are coordinated by the supply and demand. In WoW, there are many different options on obtaining items, like through completing quests, purchasing them from vendors or NPCs, negotiating or trading with other players, having a profession, or by bidding on items at the auction house. Basically, the lower an item’s drop rate is, the higher its demand. So, if a player gets his hands on a rare item, he could sell it at the auction house for a high price or trade it with something of equal value; doing this can make the game more interesting to keep playing since the items have to be earned. If the game would give away the items, it would make it seem less challenging for the players.

     I found this article entitled Virtual Capitalism which explained how capitalism was present in WoW. Here’s what the author stated in the said article,

“Now what really blows me away is when I am in game and notice on the chat channels that people are complaining about “Obama bashers.” They defend him and say things like, “So what if he is socialist? What is so bad about socialism?” All the while they are competing in a free market economy. Understand that the players in the game, not Blizzard set the prices on the vast majority of all items. This means that the in game economy is elastic and suffers the same trials and tribulations of real world economies; inflation, supply and demand, etc…

     If Blizzard tried to implement the policies that Obama is attempting to force upon the American public, then the number of subscribers would drop greatly. For, to have everything provided by a centralized authority would take away all the goals and accomplishments that make the game fun to play. An epic sword that has a low drop rate is held in high regard because it is so difficult to obtain. A player might run a certain instance dozens or even hundreds of times to get the item he or she is looking for. If Blizzard simply provided it to the players, where would the satisfaction be?”

     With that said, politicians could actually learn a thing or two from games like WoW. Since it’s becoming a world of its own already, we could compare that virtual world to the real world and apply the same tactics which helped in the game’s success in hopes that it would do the same for the real world. In fact, we could use MMORPGs as ways to experiment on economy. For example, one game could focus on socialism while the other could focus on capitalism. Then we could compare how the two will work out; see which one works better.