At the beginning of the year, the epidemic reared up, the pace of life suddenly slowed down, Ge You lay on the sofa, brushing short videos and news time more, colleagues and classmates sent small various groups of friends to call friends to play mahjong to play the glory of the king to eat chicken, etc. The proportion of information is also a sudden increase, and I accidentally learned that a small brother of Fa Xiaocheng ran a game studio, mainly in various games to "move bricks", in most of the friends complained that the business caused by the epidemic was not easy to do, the work was not easy to handle, only he still maintained a foreign sprinkle, Chat learned that his experience is very legendary, in the DNF to eat a wave of meat, in 2010 "Diablo 3" international service almost achieved wealth freedom, and then because of the domestic major manufacturers on the economic system of the strict restrictions and plug-in blows, fiercely lost a sum, and then speculated in stocks, dug bitcoin, around, claiming that "I still have precipitation in the game industry, there are advantages", and returned to the field of "moving bricks".
He said: "When the epidemic situation is not very good, my business is better, you look at you, you can't go to work, play games to pass the time." ”
I asked Brother Cheng, "Do you have any old games, I want to play MU, Rejiang or Warcraft, you cover me." ”
He replied to me after about half an hour: "Play Warcraft, nostalgic clothes, if you are free, you can still make some money." ”
I laughed and said, "Are you trying to recruit me as a part-time job?" ”
He said: "You can see it if you look at it, here with money can get everything done, here is a perfect platform for part-time work, the players themselves built the economic system, the official can not interfere." ”
I said, "Then will you be officially engaged as a studio?" ”
He replied to me with some disdain: "Now if this game is not played by us, no one should play it." ”
I was very surprised, "use money to get everything done" I understand, the players themselves to build a working platform and economic system beyond my cognition, no studio is no one to play is even more subverted my three views. After idleness, I began this nostalgic journey of almost 2 months, the game is not good or not, I am surprised by the completeness of the economic system in this small world of the game, all classes of people in this system to perform their own duties, and each has its own fun.
I can't put forward the flow account of my game playing experience in this article, only to summarize the flow of "money" in the game. First of all, we are well-known local tycoon players, they are the source of the entire system, a large proportion of my age, with a decent job and enough income to play games, the lack of time, so the most direct purpose of spending money in Warcraft is to exchange money for time, to accelerate the game that everyone thinks is "very slow"; secondly, there is a certain amount of spending power in the middle class, they will not expect to make money from the game, nor will they spend a lot of money to buy the hottest props and services at the highest price; and secondly, It is the brick-moving retail investors who want to make a small profit on a computer, using this economic system to subsidize real income; and finally the pure "brick-moving party", collectively known as the studio, they may be the most proficient in the game, earning gold coins everywhere and monetizing in the best way.
The first thing I understand here is the premise that game currency = money. Usually the game currency because the output is completely wild, so the late inevitable into the terrible inflation period, resulting in players often through cash transactions instead of game currency transactions, but warcraft nostalgia service in the four years of unexpectedly did not appear uncontrollable inflation, which means that the game currency has become a cash equivalent, you hit 1 gold coin, in a long period of time can maintain its value, so the gold coin has become a reputable currency circulating in the above four kinds of people.
Due to the existence of local tycoons and middle-class people, the demand for gold coins in the game is very large, and this demand has also become the basis for the survival of the game user's own economic system.
The circulation of money here simply covers all the gameplay, "use money to get everything done" is not a lie, for example, the Warcraft map is incomparably huge, the function provided in the game can only rely on running or flying point flying, and many games "teleportation" concept is different, here flying is really need to watch their character ride on a bird to fly the full distance, very time-consuming, so came into being called "airline" pull service, the studio uses the skills of warlock class summoning, In the entire game map of the various popular points placed a number of warlock groups, in the plug-in and button wizards and other automation equipment assistance, the formation of a set of automatic transmission system, greatly saving the time of running, the current charge is almost 6 gold coins each time, the value of about two cents and six cents, Cheng Brother told me: "60 level when a server airline, if the monopoly is not competitors, you can earn 2W-3W gold per day, at that time it is almost worth 1500 yuan, a server, every day Oh." ”
Another example is also very typical, in the last 10 levels of my training, you can go to a five-person copy, led by two mage classes, using a large number of A monsters who slow down and group attack skills, quickly gain experience, I only need to crouch at the door of the copy and wait, every hour in and out of the copy, the whole process of completing the level I spent about 6,000 gold coins, about 240 yuan, to my daily time that can be used to play the game, my own normal leveling will take about a week to ten days, Between 240 easy squatting and ten days, I decided to choose the former.
In addition to these two simple examples, the most typical ecology of the current player is "buy equipment", this buy equipment is completely different from the traditional concept of hand-to-hand delivery, is that you need to participate in a team copy of 10 people -25 people, during which all the output of equipment members of the entire team bid to obtain, the price of equipment varies according to the heat of the game, ordinary equipment from thousands of gold coins to hundreds of gold coins, individual high-quality equipment and mounts, such as the current Illidan "egg knife" and "phoenix" mounts, You can get a sky-high price without an upper limit. All auction proceeds will be divided equally among the participating members, of course, your performance must meet the passing line. Under this ecology, players will have another expectation when spending money to buy equipment, that is, the money I spent today, tomorrow I can "work" to earn back, and even I can practice some scarce professional trumpets, very cheap to buy part-time equipment to increase an income, for most players above the passing line, 2 times the current version of the top copy of the "part-time work" can be exchanged for a monthly card, taking about 4-6 hours. Here you can explain why inflation is better restricted, because to step into the threshold of "migrant workers", your performance must pass, which requires you to invest some costs, such as increasing damage and avoiding death of potions and props, these things are gone, can also be considered that money is eaten, recycled, the previous version is said that the price of a bottle of medicine is equivalent to 20-30 yuan, is ridiculed drinking Starbucks to play copies, even so can also be recovered through part-time work and have profits.
What I am particularly touched by is a kind of player who does not have a high proportion, they believe in "where there is an economy, where you can speculate", they are like the futures speculators in the real financial society, upside down gold coins. Due to the iteration of the version of the game, changes in functions, will cause fluctuations in the exchange rate of gold coins in some periods, because the operator provides the service of exchanging a monthly card for gold coins, and the price is determined by the official algorithm, giving an "official guide price", so the gold coin transaction circulating between players will also fluctuate according to the fluctuation of this official guide price. In the warcraft group I belong to, there is a girl (maybe the big sister), the ID is called "fat fish", we call her fat sister, she is not a master of operation, nor is she a brick-moving coolie, she is good at dancing with long sleeves, exquisite eight sides, get acquainted with a lot of brick-moving retail investors, professional leaders, local tycoons and middle-class people on this server, what they do is to collect gold coins that are eager to cash out at a low price, and sell them to local tycoons and middle-class people who are eager to use money at a slightly higher price, especially in some teams, when the BOSS drops high-value props, When the two local tycoons were red in the face of the auction, she would appear in the group, providing sufficient monetary protection, "Big brother, although you shoot, the P key is cut off, I have gold." (P stands for PASS, playing P in the auction when more gold coins can't be produced means giving up), being such a middleman, so that fat sister in the 2019 epidemic period, the monthly income exceeded 10W yuan, which is staggering.
Other about the flow of money can be described as a variety of, to economics students to do a solid thesis material should be enough, and all the means of making money does not have a deep threshold and technical barriers, almost learn and practice can be started, Brother Cheng once sighed to me: "You go to the vibrato casual search, now teach people to move bricks is a trend, warcraft to move brick companies and anchors a lot, apprentices and franchisees can make some money, engaged in fierce competition now, business is not as good as 60 levels, Some employees learned to go home and do it themselves, and also pulled away some familiar local tycoons. ”
In my more than 2 months of games, I spent a total of nearly 3,000 yuan, of which the official earned is a season card priced at 198 yuan, worth 258 yuan of character promotion services (in the case of full level 70, buy this direct upgrade to level 58 can go to the latest version of the content of the foreign map), accounting for less than 16%, I was surprised to ask Brother Cheng: "The money has been earned by you, the official does not hit you?" He showed disdain again: "First of all, you have to understand the law, the only thing he can seal in the game is the person who uses the plug-in, and the evidence is conclusive, for example, you see a person in the wild who has been fixing the line there, I also know that he must be a plug-in, do you think the GM can't see it, but the official did not really use data and testing to confirm that he is a plug-in, it cannot be sealed, and people protect their rights. Secondly, now the revenue output is stable, it is our kind of manpower in exchange, a machine for a person, five open game brush copy brush gold coin brush material, a day income of 400-500, from play to sell are game play, you can not seal me. Besides, without these services we provide, can people now run the map to fight gold coins and fight monsters to level up, don't be funny, within three months people will run away. "Then on March 24, because of the game version update, the previously mentioned airlines needed to be upgraded because of plug-ins and tools, resulting in almost all of the paralysis that day, players complained, urging them to quickly resume business, I understood where my friends' disdain came from.
Unconsciously, I as a latecomer nostalgic, and full of interest, in a dozen years of old games to feel the new content under the influence of the times, it is true that the reason for all this has been more and more faster pace of life, more and more new consumption habits and auxiliary tools, more and more simple and direct interest relations, but I think the base is huge and stable social environment is also a big factor, according to the statistics of users with plug-ins and queues, Warcraft nostalgia service has stabilized more than 1 million daily active users, A little more lively server, and more than 10,000 online at the same time, so many people include local tycoons, middle-class, brick-moving retail and studios, whatever their purpose, form an integral part of this small society.
Once I was unable to participate in the group because of the conference call, to fat sister to help open the number to play, she gladly agreed, because the network is strong, she joined a big anchor group, all the way smoothly, and bought a few good equipment I needed at a low price (because after she showed her identity, no one maliciously raised the price), afterwards I thanked, she said: "This is all a small matter, I am not good at operation, and I did not play a high DPS (damage amount). I said, "That's still your face." She said: "It's 2022, and Warcraft is still playing fights and kills, and it's all about human nature." ”
A few thousand words, it feels less than a few words of fat sister.
Maybe when I have time to talk about the human world I see, I'm going to talk about the sophistication of people in the virtual world I see.