It's a double blog post day for me, and this time it's about something I see on a lot of internet games. For those who don't know: micro-transactions (mic-roh-trans-act-shuns) are real life money trades for in-game items that can provide the player with a specific advantage in the game. While items that give advantages are rarely seen in MMO's are rare, they do exist and are often frowned upon by players of the game, as this makes the game in-balanced. Most micro-transaction items however, share stats with low-tiered items or maybe have no stats at all. (looking at mmo's like runescape and WoW for instance) Most items are just simple reskins that are designed to be more visually appealing to the player, for example:

<Generic MMO> has released new DLC: WARMASTER KIT! Reskin any armor and weapons you have into the warmaster set, including steampunk themed helmet, chestplate, gauntlets, boots, leggings, sheild, and weapons! *these items in no way give you advantages over other players and do not shift the game's balance.

Those kinds of Micro-Transactions are OK to me, but if you look at a game like Team Fortress 2, which has the "Mann co. weapons store" where players can spend (give or take) a couple dollars for new class weapons that can (if used correctly) give an advantage over others. However, Valve balances this out by giving the chance to find weapons and items randomly, and random item drops are given every week. These micro-transactions are also just fine, only because they give it a sense of balance.

Then you have the Imbalances, usually seen in unsuccessful MMO games with companies that are by the point of release "desperate for money" that they release a weapon/armour/item that makes said buyer massively overpowered. Example:

<unsuccessful MMO> Has realeased new DLC: UB3R1337AX30F43WS0M3! This new axe will deal 7 million points of damage to the target enemy and INSTANTLY DESTROY things far above your current level! Get it now for only 49.99!

This is the game-killer DLC, that absolutely ruins MMO games that eventually go F2P because of lack of sales: mainly due to the imbalance.

Thank you for reading my Half-Rant. Expect another blog by Friday (oct 12, 2012).