7 video game currencies stronger than the U.S. Dollar

so funny

I've never been so glad to have comprised my investment portfolio entirely on armor, swords, and powerful gemstones that, when combined by evil forces, could threaten to destroy life as we know it.

What about stars? I have over 800 stars in Super Mario Galaxy.

omg this is soooo funny.

It would be cool if we could really create shadow currencies that are not regulated by the Federal Reserve.

I wonder what Gaia Online's gold/USD ratio is

although unnecessary, this was cool and a solid way to pass a few minutes, thank you

hahahahahaha!

I think the old gil in Final Fantasy games got left out here...
Sure, a tent will set you back 100 gil... depending on where you buy it... have you seen the costs a good camping tent goes for nowadays?
The cottages you can buy in FF4, that beats anything you can do in real estate anywhere...

Rigel -
When the population of just one MMORPG rivals that of countries like New Zealand, their economies provide a unique opportunity for study. More children get their economic training (money management, shopping and saving, etc) from video games than the real world - coming from a mother of two who sees her kids spend more time with Club Penguin than their bank account website, this should say something. These games are teaching the next generation, and we should be watchful of what they are learning as good spending and saving habits. This article, imo, just points out the relationship between the fantasy and real world economies that kids are coming up against almost daily.

Hilarious.

This article is a waste of time in my opinion, what do video games matter?

This is from story I read in January but it still goes with this story:

"On January 24, Tokyo Metropolitan Police officers from the “Hi-Tech Crimes Control Center” arrested the high school student from Fukui, Japan and charged him with illegally accessing the website of Tokyo-based game company NEXON and stealing over 36 million yen ($325,000) worth of virtual currency used in the Mabinogi online role-playing game. The money can be used to purchase virtual items in the game, and it can be converted into real-world cash."

Economists love these online games, b/c in the real world you're stuck with one macro-economy -- but now suddenly we have several (virtual) macro-economies to compare/contrast.

Of course in these other macro-economies there are dragons.

But still.

great post there :) actually the MMORPG's with their currency backed by US dollars should deserve the same post aswell... so i did a little research on gold buying sites:

Eve online: 1 ISK = $ 0.00000007
Anarchy online: 1 credit = $ 0.000000449
Ultima online: 1 gold = $ 0.0000023
Runescape: 1 gold = $ 0.00000563
Guild Wars: 1 gold = $ 0.0001993
World of Warcraft: 1 gold = $ 0.03
Everquest: 1 gold = $ 0.7412

*runs to nearest currency exchange to get some EQ gold*

The article should have really did a piece on on Second Life or Entropia Universe! In EU inflation has hit such a high note that there are items that easily cost way more the $1k and some even as much as $30k. Second Life also has a system that can result in real cash gains. Now those would truly show that the dollar is weak.

Love it. And there's actual money to be made in computer games through selling virtual land to real life people.

A baffling, hilarious and slightly worrying concept...