For those who have been waiting for what seems to be an eternity (although that certainly pales in comparison to waiting for Diablo 3 to be released over the years), you would be pleased to hear that Diablo 3’s Real Money Auction House is now available in the Americas game region for the U.S. dollar, Australian dollar, and Mexican peso. The introduction of the real-money auction house will enable gamers to make purchases as well as sell the kind of loot that they find in the game – using real world currency that has been approved by third-party payment services, or through the use of their Battle.net Balance.
This is clearly a case of time being money – the amount of time you “invest” in playing Diablo 3 in an attempt to obtain certain rare items can then be traded for real world money, legitimizing gold farming so to speak in previous games where people are paid real world money just to level up a character. Who says that money cannot buy happiness? It does in this case, albeit I would say that such happiness is fleeting. Is it safe to say that Blizzard has stumbled upon the way to print money now, as they control just the kind of rarity of select items in the virtual market?
Filed in . Read more about Diablo 3.