Lineage Suit

The JoongAng Daily reports today that NC Soft is being threatened with a class action suit by a group of disgruntled Korean players. More than a thousand players have signed a statement protesting, amongst other things, the high cost of subscriptions for Lineage in South Korea. More interesting perhaps are some of the other grievances which include the failure of the developer to deal with hacks and dupes, and the existence of a market for virtual assets.

Comments

[Alan Stern]

1.

Can anyone put the potential suit in the context of Korean law? I'm thinking that a similar suit in the U.S. would, on its face, appear somewhat ludicrous. For starters, what are the players' damages (injuries)? What's the cause of action? What do they hope to accomplish?

Also, if one assumes that the players' complaints do have merit then why haven't market forces dealt with this perceived injustice? Or, in the alternative, if one assumes that market forces have done what they can, then why are these players still playing a game that doesn't meet their needs, wants or desires? i.e. If the perceived problems are that bad, why are they still playing the game?

[Unggi Yoon]

2.

The name of the group is "The coalition of online game consumers" and its website is "http://www.antinc.co.kr"

The statement(in korean) they signed is as follows.

Also, call for the due process of in-game(virtual) law/policy is one of the main issues in the document.

http://kindbiz.com/test/New/bbs/view.php?id=x9&no=43

[Peter]

3.

"Since the game was launched in 1999, *520 million* accounts have been opened in Korea alone. That figure can include multiple accounts for an individual subscriber."

Can this be right? South Korea's entire population is 48 million (CIA Factbook, July 2003) - the last figure I had heard for Lineage subscriptions was in the order of 4 million...

[MM]

4.

I don't believe market forces could deal with a problem like this. If every company that offers a game denies you certain rights, you would argue that the players just won't play the game. But that's not realistic, and it doesn't mean that the players should automatically be denied those rights.

I would like to see some sort of compromise. The players should be allowed certain rights to their in game property, and the game company (who make every reasonable effort to make backups) would be relieved of certain liabilties because things happen in the real world.

I don't want to see any game company crippled by a bunch of unreasonable players. But I totally think that game companies have a certain responsibility to the players that make them rich. I think they owe us more than just leaving the lights on when everyone goes home.

Those customers pay money to play a game, and if the game company allows that game to deteriorate, then they (the game co.) are providing something other than what they initially promised. I'm sure that sort of thing is specifically disclaimed in the EULA, but there must be some limit to what can be disclaimed.

[magicback]

5.

From another perspective and given the level of organization, are looking at a different form of labor vs. capitalist?

If virtual assets were not a meanful form of output or the players have no meanful vested interest in the production of these assets, then why care?

If market forces can not adequately deal with these issues, the regulation is on the horizon.

Frank

[Luca Girardo]

6.

Peter wrote: „
"Since the game was launched in 1999, *520 million* accounts have been opened in Korea alone. That figure can include multiple accounts for an individual subscriber."
Can this be right? South Korea's entire population is 48 million (CIA Factbook, July 2003) - the last figure I had heard for Lineage subscriptions was in the order of 4 million...“

Well I suppose we need first to define what does “accounts have been opened” means. Not all are paid accounts for sure (trial accounts for example, internet cafe accounts (see below)).
We need to see it in a different way as the subscription model for Lineage is different from the US MMOG subscription model (at least about the sell of accounts to internet cafe).
If you want to have a clear picture about the number of lineage subscribers, you should check for example the Earnings Release1Q, 2004NCsoft Corp.April 27, 2004 , especially page 6.
That gives you an idea of how many concurrent users Lineage has and based on that you can relate how many players are playing the game.
About how Lineage internet cafe accounts work, there is an interesting post on Mud-Dev">http://www.kanga.nu/archives/MUD-Dev-L/2003Q3/msg00509.php”">Mud-Dev by Jason Smith:

„….The same presentation showed that, in Korea, Lineage has
approximately 220k direct subscribers (paying ~$23 USD/month I might
add). The rest of the accounts must come from net cafes and other
bulk arrangements (~2m accounts log in each month in Korea).

In the case of cafe-based subscriptions, the players themselves
aren't necessarily subscribing any more than they would be
subscribing to Counterstrike or Starcraft played via the same
means. They're paying fees to rent the PCs and software from their
local establishment, but it doesn't correlate to the 'subscriptions'
metric in the same way that most US developers and media look
at. The cafe pays ~$35-50 per PC monthly, but any number of accounts
could be based from that location….”.

So as you see it is credible that more that 500 million accounts were opened but that does not mean they were paid accounts. They are a mixture personal accounts derived from the internet café bulk accounts, trial accounts and personal accounts. There is always a trick somewhere.
An interesting figure is that Taiwan has higher concurrent users number then Korea for Lineage. But lower daily and monthly accesses.

[Peter]

7.

Thanks for the explanation...

[DivineShadow]

8.

Luca,

It seems the best way to measure competing MMOGs with diferent models would be profit per unit of time.

[Luca Girardo]

9.

DivineShadow: It seems the best way to measure competing MMOGs with diferent models would be profit per unit of time.

Could you define the "profit per unit of time" ?

[Bauq]

10.

I think players' complaints may have merits, especially the claims of failure of the developer to deal with hacks and dupes. In my view, virtual asset is an asset, and the game vendor has the responsibility to take right steps to keep the system secure.

[DivineShadow]

11.

Luca,

Since that is a definition, I'll give you examples: "1 thousand dollars of profit in the first quarter of the year 2004"; "Year-to-Year profits of 1 thousand dollars"; "Year-to-Date profits of 1 thousand dollars".

[Luca Girardo]

12.

Hmm, so seen the profit per unit of time does not seem for me to be the best unit to measure the success of a MMOG. As you would need to take in consideration the development investment needed.
So having a MMOG making a profit of 300.000$ in a year with a development investment of 2$ million would score far better then a MMOG making a profit of 1$ million in a year with a development investment of 10$ million.
Also the investment risk has to be taken in consideration.

[DivineShadow]

13.

Indeed it will vary based on how you take into consideration initial investments, depreciation and other factors. What I'm getting at is that looking at the business side is a sure-fire way of assesing the sucess of a commercial MMOG when compared to other commercial MMOGs.

[Alex Chomansky]

14.

While shareholders value more on investment return, the general public will compare a MMOG with its fellows to decide who's more successful.

[Unggi Yoon]

15.

Lineage suit began in July fifteenth.

Hundreds of Lineage players filed a civil suit against Ncsoft in Seoul district court.

Detailed information can be found in the plaintiffs' hompage(in korean)

http://www.antinc.co.kr/NEW/bbs/view.php?id=x5&no=94

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16.

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