Gamepal

GamePal is an online platform for players of massively multiplayer online (MMO) games to buy, sell and trade digital assets such as in-game currency, items, accounts, and power leveling services. The site is a neutral marketplace that supports player-to-player as well as direct selling for popular MMOs.

History

GamePal emerged in June 2004 as a multi-feature platform for MMORPG players interested in digital asset trading. The buying and selling of in-game assets such as virtual currency is also a practice known as "real money trading" or RMT.

In June 2005, GamePal launched virtual account rental services for gamers who can now rent a high-level character and play as long as they like, then return the character for a different one or for a character in another game.^[1]

GamePal worked closely with companies such as IGE expanding their options to virtual account trading allowing the buying, trading and selling of accounts.^[2] In 2007, IGE received numerous disputes and sold their company^[3]

Controversy over secondary markets for MMOGs

The RMT or secondary market for in-game MMOG assets has been controversial for a number of years, with many games such as Eve Online^[4] and World of Warcraft^[5] forbidding trading that violates their End User License Agreements (EULA). Other publishers such as Sony Online Entertainment previously forbid the sale of virtual goods until 2005 when it opened a new service called Station Exchange^[6] allowing the sale of virtual goods. In 2010, the Supreme Court of South Korea ruled that virtual currency is the equivalent of real money and legalized real money trading.^[7] In 2011, Blizzard Entertainment changed their decision to outlaw the sale of virtual goods and implemented real money trading (RMT) to their game Diablo 3 allowing users to sell items at an official auction house in exchange for real money.^[8]

Current research estimates that approximately $3 billion (US) dollars^[9] of virtual goods are bought and sold by players around the world every year. Other research estimates that approximately 30% of all gamers purchase virtual goods.^[10]

References

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