AfterWorld Survival Forum

I don't think I got any official replies to my question I posted earlier, so I'd like to ask again here hoping to get one.

Do you have any official plans / strategy regarding RCE?

Is this game going to be a RCE one or not?

I'm not going to "speak for 99% of EU players here" or whatever but I personally have been watching the progress of this game for about 5 years now and the only reason for that was the small note on the front page of your web site saying it's "a real cash economy game".

Many people I know donated thousands of dollars not just to get another MORPG but a RCE game where they could start getting their investments back at some point.

After seven years all I know is that your team decided they don't want this game to be "an EU clone" and they want it to be "something different". Honestly, seven years is a lot of "thinking time", is that all you got so far?

I understand that now you are busy implementing some important programming solutions that any modern game is normally based on just to catch up with reality in technical term and that's great. Kickstart and PR is also great, still exactly what kind of game are you going to advertise?

How is the game economy going to work?

Is it going to be a "donation" base game as it is now?

Are you going just to wait how things will work themselves out in the process and then maybe implement RCE at some uncertain point in the future?

This game is not an RCE one at the moment and you can't advertise it as such.

The promise of RCE was the strongest pivotal point of this game, it's uniqueness, are you just going to compete with hundreds of other not-RCE MORPGs on the market?

I think now it's the proper time to at least make a definite statement about this, the statement that would go a little farther than "we're thinking about it" or "we're aware of it" or "we're too busy to think what kind of game we're actually trying to build".

Thank you!

Is RCE the right term for what Dedicate Logic is planning?
Dedicated Logic have resisted using that term for many years.

I disagree about  RCE being the strongest pivotal point of the game as it has never been a feature of the game.
The strongest pivotal point is is unique game play.

Until Jun 2008, Afterworld was officially described as:

“AfterWorld” is an MMOG with some elements of RPG, first and third person shooters. It will take you to Earth’s apocalyptic future (AD 2060++); Mostly in the Far East - to be more exact in location.

There is no race separation in AfterWorld. In the very beginning all of the players are just humans, and with a minimal skill set. Whether you choose a male or female avatar, it will not give you any advantages or weaknesses. Of course, we want you to gain some individuality and be distinguished, so go ahead and choose your haircut, height, eye color, etc. Pick a stylish look.

In AfterWorld there are a wide range of occupations to choose from. You may become a noble merchant, clever fingered craftsman, famous cartographer, or even a hacker. Additionally you may spend a day (or even a week) exploring the severe lands inhabited by wolves and bears, hunting or digging for precious stones. Freedom of choice is the key feature of this world. There are no necessary quests to increase your professional skills, as you can improve your avatar as YOU see fit. Do not hesitate, and make your choice.

Internal currency brings the real economy into the virtual universe of “AfterWorld”. Sell hunted loot and buy ammo or use it to repair your weapon. Mined some rare ore or crafted a unique item? Sell it at a higher price or trade for it for valuable items. Commerce is an integral part of the gameplay.

You are welcome to participate in “AfterWorld” absolutely free. You will not be charged for client software or account registration, and there is no monthly fee. It is up to you to decide how much to spend. If you like to travel and explore the world it will be inexpensive. From another aspect, you may invest into your own business. Yes, you may start a real business in the virtual universe of “AfterWorld”! Made a profit? You can convert this internal virtual currency into real cash.

By Dec 2008, this had changed to:

AfterWorld is the first "free market economy" virtual world. Set in a post-apocalyptic future Earth, you will be asked to rebuild society from the ground up. There are many ways of doing this: trading, hunting fierce creatures, mining for rare ores, crafting a huge variety of items, and much more.

Freedom of choice is the main feature of AfterWorld. Every occupation will allow you to build skills and grow in experience. Real estate barons and currency traders are invited to help set prices and create a dynamic economy. Sell your hunting and mining loot to buy ammunition or repairs. Create a gas station and buy transport vehicles. Trade your prized crafting item for a unique item and make a profit. Convert your profit into real cash. The sky is the limit.

Participation is free with no monthly fee.

By Feb 2009, this had evolved to:

AfterWorld is a "free market economy" persistent-world massively multiplayer online game set in a science fiction setting of post-apocalyptic Siberia. The game currently features:

• A complex and unusual skills based role-paying system that involves more than a hundred different skills with each of them developing using unique game mechanics.

• An advanced craft system with branchy production chains currently containing thousands different items.

• A real-money trade in-game economic system designed in such a way that the resources farming does not ruin the balance but is a part of the gameplay for high-level characters.

Is it  Dedicated Logic's intent that "real-money trade in-game economic system" which represents "the first free market economy" is matches EU players concept of RCE?

I had taken the Economy bit of the description as being the internal game  Economy (buying / selling / crafting for AWD) rather that exchanges with  the real world economy.

Quote from: ali "alikim" kim on February 27, 2014, 06:57:56 am

I don't think I got any official replies to my question I posted earlier, so I'd like to ask again here hoping to get one.

Do you have any official plans / strategy regarding RCE?
Is this game going to be a RCE one or not?

AWR will always remain RCE: it was the main idea from beginning and it always will be.

Furthermore, yesterday I finished concept document of the corporations that will take a very significant and important part in the global game economy and politics. There will be changes in gameplay, but very little in economy - and even then, they would be improvement, designed to extend the existing RCE.

We plan to work on corporations as soon as we finish our fundametnal tasks. I don't know when exactly, though, but on the paper, it's already in process.

About donations: donation always been a wrong word. honestly, you always been simply buying AWD. And it will be this way, because from the legal point of view, it's not a donations at all (and it may cause us a lot of troubles when it comes down to paying taxes from income).

You can send me a PM, describing your vision concerning RCE and what's wrong in the game with it, what would you like to see and what is a 'real RCE game' is. I'm listening and anaylising every message, and if you have a point and prove it - there are a very high chances that your idea will get into the game.

I think the confusion and the reason us players have been disagreeing with each other over the past six years is that most people don't consider a game to be an RCE until they can convert their game currency back into real-world currency. We've never been able to do that in AW and the rest of the AW Team have taken steps to make the wording more vague over the years. So we've convinced ourselves that the word "donation" means that we won't get back any of the money we've used to buy AWD, but that one day we'll be able to sell skills, items, and other resources.

I'm really curious to read what the proposed plans say, but I understand that it's not ready for public posting. Just knowing that this is still being worked on is good news though!


Hultaan's suggestion about adjusting the way that FoW clears is something a lot of us would love to see. It doesn't have to clear out in wide paths while running at full speed, but even making it clear a little wider would be nice.

More frustrating is that it sometimes doesn't clear correctly even with multiple passes over the same area. For some reason the partially-cleared fog is the hardest to clear rather than the all black, totally uncleared fog. There are lots of times when I've run (not sprinted) through an area to try to clear the fog and end up having to run through the partially-cleared fog from multiple directions to get to go away fully. Why does this happen?

if you can prove that you have donated more than you got back, it would stop being "profit". That would be case for most players or game would be unable to sustain itself.

And since DL is located in Russian Federation, only Russian laws apply.

if you can prove that you have donated more than you got back, it would stop being "profit". That would be case for most players or game would be unable to sustain itself.

And since DL is located in Russian Federation, only Russian laws apply.

If you are a US citizen - the IRS will not care where you got you money, they will tax you for any income made anywhere in the world and penalize you if you do not declare everything. For example, US is forcing the NZ government to handover US citizen NZ bank accounts (http://www.stuff.co.nz/dominion-post/news/politics/9681588/Move-to-alter-privacy-laws-to-help-US).
Most other countries have the same 'what is yours anywhere in the world is mine' attitude.


Russian Federation Tax Laws are very similar to other countries in their attitude to Donations. However, I doubt if DL is a registered charity    So the term 'donation' can only be loosely attached to the action of giving DL money. And given that DL only recently because a corporate entity, that may mean that 'donation' is meaningless altogether.

Hello, Alikim!

AWR will always remain RCE: it was the main idea from beginning and it always will be.

Thank you for your reply, my vision of RCE is simple:

it's a concept that allows players to make real money while playing the game.

Most commonly that means the ability to convert ingame money into real currency and withdraw it from the game.

Withdrawal is the crucial part here, also the ability to withdraw essentially makes your deposits to be investments into the game's economy.

In other words RCE means real money can flow not only in (which is common for any paid game) but also out.

In this terms AWR has never been an RCE game (although this was the initial idea behind it when it branched off of EU) and I doubt it will ever be, that's why I'm asking the question.

I spent a lot of time in Russia and I seriously doubt considering Russian laws that you can actually built a functioning system of international withdrawals that will comply with the Russian bank "currency control" system.

It's not really a question about how and what you implement inside the game, it's about your ability to legally have such system in place.

As a suggestion, I believe that if you can, you need to implement withdrawals right away rather than getting the game's economy off the ground without RCE and then slapping it up later.

Adding withdrawals gives all ingame items and activities real value and you will have to completely rebalance the game and change many game mechanics after adding RCE.

Problem of PA is that they allow everyone to cash out. They even allow players to sell things that are made from the air. It's funny: game creates an item, gives it to a player and then player selling it back to the game. As a result, game is losing money.

As i see it, in PE (or any other RCE game for that matter) you can't avoid items eventually being created "out of the thin air". In PE people are sweating mobs (using unlimited tool with no decay, to generate sweat), in AW ppl are using iron picks (taken from the trash cans for free, to pick the rocks). In both cases something that has a value is generated out of the thin air.


Those are just the most obvious and straightforward examples. In the big picture their effect on the economy is trifling. Those activities are tolerated as a form of "ingame advertising" (see, you can make profit in this game? now make a deposit and start earning even more!). And indeed, there's other, a little more complex methods (in both games) to generate money even more effectively. Suppose the point was that in the big picture those processes have to be kept under control? As opposed to "remove the trash cans in starter towns"?




Lastly, my ceterum censeo, here it comes, again.
For experiments sake, let's take a closer look on what exactly happens when something is generated out of the hin air?


First aspect: PE has this "TT value system". In other words, all items there have a certain "start bid", made by the game company. If there is no higher bidder you can always sell it for this minimum value.
In AW we don't have this system, so this part does not apply - the game company has absolutely no obligations whatsoever to pay anything to the owner of this item.


Second aspect: Suppose you declare the price of that item is 1000 PED's (or AWD's). Suppose there is some other player who decides to pay that price. For clarity's sake, suppose he has no ingame currency at the moment. So, in order to buy this item he has to deposit $100 into the game. Now he has 1000 PED's/AWD's. Then he gives this money to the owner of this new item (that was created out of the thin air), who in turn withraws this amount from the game, receiving $100 onto his bank account.
It's hard to tell if "the game" lost anything in the process? Probably, if "the game" = "total playerbase with all their ingame assets", if the added new item devalued some existing items, if ... etc etc
However, what is perfectly clear from this example - the game company definitely did not lose anything. On the contrary, with every transaction the company earned maoney by applying appropriate transaction fees.

... it will take some time for the newly incorporated company to gain sufficient assets to contemplate allowing cash-outs.

There is several different ways how to "start off" the RCE. One example was posted even in this very thread (look at the Hultaan's idea about implementing additional, withdrawable currency). As opposed to the primitive "DL has to pay for everything that is ingame at this very moment, from their pocket, period".




Duh... why i have this déjà vu feeling again?