Video Game Property Sells for $335,000: Why Aren’T We Playing This Game?

November 10th, 2010 by: Lambert Varias

Tweet Pin It

If EVE Online is famous for heists and other virtual crimes worth hundreds of thousands of dollars, the players of Planet Calypso, another MMORPG, have been earning loads of money through more diplomatic means. One of Planet Calypso’s asteroids, plus a number of properties within said asteroid, was recently sold for $335,000 (USD). The seller is named Jon Jacobs aka Neverdie, who sold his “asteroid resort” Club Neverdie to John Foma Kalun aka Pesok.

Above is a partial picture of Club Neverdie. Now here’s the mind blowing thing about this sale: like most games in the genre, Planet Calypso – part of the mega MMOG Entropia Universe – lets players earn virtual currency. In Calypso, players can mine, set up shops, and own property which can be rented, thus earning the owner virtual currency. But unlike other MMORPGs, Calypso also lets players exchange their virtual currency to real world money for a fixed rate.

So we don’t know whether Pesok paid Neverdie in virtual currency or cold hard cash, but even if Pesok did pay the $335,000 using virtual currency, Neverdie can cash that out to real money, which might not be enough to buy a real asteroid, but is surely more than enough reward for playing a video game. If that’s not enough, he sold off a dozen other domed virtual complexes for a total of $300,000, bringing his total payday to $635,000. Good god.

Check out Entropia Planets for more details on the sale.

[via Edge via Geekologie]

Subscribe to Technabob