I am not a fan of games where it is not possible to get beyond a certain point without paying real money to "buy" armor, skills, weapons, whatever advantages, and where basically who has the most money to burn wins. I don't play a lot of games -- I used to, but just don't have time for it anymore -- but the online games I preferred were the ones where everyone paid the same, say a flat monthly rate, and you could not otherwise spend real money in-game. You had to earn everything the old-fashioned way. The hard way. And if you're caught buying from "gold farmers", you're banned. That's the way to run a game. Granted, the in-game purchase method makes the developers lots and lots of money, so as a marketing/money-making tool, it's hard to argue with, but I'll wager that Blizzard makes plenty of money with World of Warcraft, too. They do seem to know what they're doing.
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