Most of the virtual items for sale in Blizzard’s überpopular massively multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG) World of Warcraft bind directly to users’ accounts—meaning that once bought they cannot be traded to other players. Recently, Blizzard announced a new vanity pet that players can purchase that can be traded between accounts: the Guardian Cub companion.
If players are capable of purchasing this virtual item for money they will then be able to turn around and trade it or sell it to other players for in-game gold. As a result, players who farm a great deal of in-game currency but have little other disposable income can receive the pet and players who have a lot of money but little time to farm gold can receive gold for money.
The MMO colossus makes no secret that it understands the implications of a for-money pet that can be traded between players and sold on the in-game auction house. In fact, one of the FAQ questions presented in the sneak peek blog post addresses this outcome:
“While our goal is to offer players alternative ways to add a Pet Store pet to their collection, we’re ok with it if some players choose to use the Guardian Cub as a safe and secure way to try to acquire a little extra in-game gold without turning to third-party gold-selling services,” writes Blizzard. “However, please keep in mind that there’s never any guarantee that someone will purchase what you put up for sale in the auction house, or how much they’ll pay for it. Also, it’s important to note that we take a firm stance against buying gold from outside sources because in most cases, the gold these companies offer has been stolen from compromised accounts.”
However, unlike how Blizzard is approaching the real money auction house for Diablo III, the vanity pet trade cannot exchange gold into real money.
Players can only purchase virtual item vanity pets from Blizzard, sending the dollars into the MMO company’s coffers. This move may initially put a dent in the business operations of gold farmers; but after a while the market may become saturated after the hype wears off. Unlike other alternative cash-to-gold schemes offered by MMO companies, such as the PLEX from CCP’s EVE Online, vanity pets have no in-game consumption mechanic they function on and they’re not useful except for as a collectable item.
Blizzard stands to make a lot of money from this venture.
As a corporation, Blizzard has a nose for where they can leverage the disposable income of their players and this one takes the reigns two-fold. Unlike other non-tradable virtual items, such as the $25 Celestial Steed (the first in-game vanity mount)–which netted the MMO giant more than $2 million in the first four hours—the Guardian Cub stands to net Blizzard not just players with enough disposable income for one for each character, but also players who buy extra to sell to those flush with in-game gold.
[...] Link: Blizzard to Experiment with Real-Money for Gold Scheme in WoW … [...]
[...] At this year’s BlizzCon 2011, I hope to see more news covering the release of Diablo II; especially Blizzard’s intent with the real money Auction House feature they’re planning. The ability to legitimately make money from a Blizzard product may have strange appeal to some of the more hardcore players who live their lives in the games—and could net the semi-casual players a little bit of a discount from their subscription costs. I am also looking forward to further news on the real-money-for-gold tradable pet introduced into World of Warcraft. [...]
[...] make a lot of bank with the Celestial Steed that made $2 million in just four hours of sales and they continue to seek revenue from virtual items with the Winged Guardian Cub companion [...]
[...] Blizzard toying with other forms of revenue that tap into this gold market in their own games with the production of the Winged Guardian Cub: a $10 in-game companion pet—a virtual item—that can be sold for gold on the auction house. [...]
[...] Banking off this popularity and interest from their population, the MMO giant has also introduced a tradable in-game pet that can be bought for real world money and sold for in-game virtual [...]
[...] gold market in their own games with the production of the Winged Guardian Cub: a $10 in-game companion pet—a virtual item—that can be sold [...]