As many of you may know, the currency of Venezuela had tanked and left many people in desperate situations to make money. One creative method that is becoming popular is farming in-game currency in large MMORPGs like Runescape or World of Warcraft. The Chinese have been involved in game currency trading for years, but the average Venezuelan is in a more desperate situation since the minimum wage is now roughly $16 per month.
Since the vast majority of this game's player base is English speaking, players are starting to notice random new players that are speaking Spanish and have no idea how to play the game.These are presumably Venezuelan gold farmers. Since it is against the rules to sell gold for IRL money, many of these players risk getting their accounts banned and their source of income ruined.
How Much Money Can They Really Make?
People from first world countries who have excess income and don't want to put in the time will simply purchase in game currency to buy whatever items they desire. Spending an extra few bucks on gold may seem like nothing to some of us, but that can amount to several hours of work for a gold farmer.
One of the most common ways gold farmers make gold in Runescape is by killing Green Dragons to collect their bones and hides. One hour of doing this can earn a player 500,000 in game gold, which sells for $0.50 on the black market (daily prices may vary). $0.50 per hour is not much even by South American standards, but it is still a lot more than a typical job in the country. This just happened to be a method promoted by a large Venezuelan newspaper:
More advanced players will know that repetitively killing the boss Zulrah can earn around 3 million gold per hour, which is about $2-3 an hour. At $2-3 an hour, this would allow a teenager or young adult to make more money by playing a video game than the majority of college educated professionals in the country.
The Stability Of Runescape Gold
Unlike Bitcoin or Steem, Runescape gold is completely controlled by a centralized entity. Jagex may simply pump as much gold as they want into the economy and the price of the gold is simply based on player demand in the black market. What is amazing is the fact that this digital currency still has much more stability than currencies of socialist third-world governments. For the past few years, Runescape currency has steadily remained at a little over $1 per 1 million gold, while Venezuelan currency is depreciating significantly by the day.
If there are any Venezuelans reading this post, please share how you are coping with the current economic disaster.
PS: This article is quite dated yet still gets quite a bit of traffic from Glink's Youtube video, Polygon and Google. The situation in Venezuela seems pretty similar today, if not worse, and Runescape's currency is going even stronger in 2018.
If you are interested in content writing, marketing, or research, get in touch with me here.
If anyone is still interested in this topic, check out this Spanish language interview with a Venezuelan gold farmer.
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Good post fiserman. Runescaspe was the best. :)
I feel for you dear vensuelans... in Li bya (the west of it like Tripoli) all the prices become higher, like 3x of what they were 4 years ago... and we might be going to the same direction as you. (Hopefully not)
I wish I could say something to make you feel better, but know this... Living in this type of situation makes you stronger!! keep fighting until the situation becomes better. and if you know how to make it better work at it!! even by only talking.
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Soy de Venezuela, y sí los Venezolanos nos la estamos ingeniando para sobrevivir y escapar de este desastre. I am from Venezuela, and yes, we are managing to survive and escape this disaster.
y asi sera! mira todo los creadores de contenido que esta crisis esta generando , Animo , paciencia y amor!
this is totally true because members of my family have done it to find some extra money, we are in a bad situation right now and people prefer to do this than going out and do worst stuff
conozco muchos amigos que se ganan la vida de esta manera , es triste que la moneda de mi país se haya devaluado tanto incluso al nivel de monedas ficticias en videojuegos , pero también me resulta increíble como los venezolanos buscan la forma de salir adelante en cualquier situación
es cómico encontrar esto, jugue RuneScape gran parte de mi infancia y me he visto en la necesidad de volver al juego en modo de "trabajo" ya que da mas dinero que ejerciendo la mayoría de las profesiones...
Sad but true :'(
Este articulo es de hace ya un año, y hoy la realidad no es muy distinta
Whatever works, as long as it can be of help to them. I recently did my first Steemit article on equity release. It's a great platform and I'm enjoying the diversity of content.
Interesting article. Thanks.