Please login or register. Did you miss your activation email? Home Help Search Login Register. Earning money for playing video games? Seattle, WA rhymes with "story".

Are there any video games that have a legitimate system for making money? I'm trying to monetize my favorite pastime, since a I like video games, b I'm bored with my beloved old games and c I feel bad about using my free time in such an unproductive financially speaking, at least way.

I know that World of Warcraft has an underground economy where you can sell high-level characters to other players, but that's against the game's official rules and you can get banned. When Diablo-3 came out, it had the Real Money Auction House RMAH , where you could sell your gold, gems and items for real money. Is there anything like that now?

Any games where there's a real, official option to get paid for getting really good at the game? Author of Buffett's Biggest Blunders and Go to college without going broke - now available on Kindle!

Zamboni Handlebar Stache Posts: I have not tried this myself, but a friend's son tried it one summer. My understanding was that he did not make very much money. Some people seem to make youtube videos that the narrate while showing a game character in action about how to solve certain things in games.

Your best bet there is probably high volume games played by kids.

How one Diablo 3 player pulled in $, from the Real Money Auction House - rehojuvuyequ.web.fc2.com

I've heard that you can earn money based upon the number of views you get in youtube if you let them show ads, but I don't know much about this. Sorry - I meant in-game systems, as in games that have an established, official and allowed system for converting your loot or whatever it is you find into money, like Diablo-3's auction house. I just want to get paid for relaxing - I don't feel like becoming a youtube entertainer haha. Cathy Handlebar Stache Posts: I know it's not quite what you are asking for, but there are various games that are played competitively in tournaments sometimes with some level of support by the game creators, but sometimes not.

If you are a top player, you can definitely earn a lot of money by consistently winning tournaments in certain popular games. This can earn you a wage comparable to a professional full-time job, if not higher. That may not satisfy your "relaxing" criterion, but it's viable. This post contains only general information on the issues raised by this topic. This post does not provide help tailored to your specific situation.

There are many facts that could be relevant to your specific situation and I am not in possession of those facts.

If you need help tailored to your specific situation, you should retain an appropriate professional and not rely on this post. Grigory on July 19, , Psychstache Pencil Stache Posts: It depends entirely on the game. In my experience, it is going to require a lot of time and energy and stops making it more of a game and more of a job.

You need to behave in specific ways to maximize your profit and it can be hard continue to enjoy yourself when you are working in that manner.

I did this with MTGO and made a good amount of money, but ultimately it killed my interest in the game since it stopped being a hobby that I enjoyed and became real work to keep my margins plus they 'updated' the UI and made my job much harder. If you want to make money playing games now, your best bet is to do streaming. I have friends that are notable Twitch personalities that are doing okay for themselves one who is killing it. Find a game you like, develop your niche and audience are you hardcore pro player who is helping people get better?

Sukotto 5 O'Clock Shadow Posts: On Steam, there are certain ways to earn badges and stuff which you can sell on the Market for cents. But that requires a lot of games and a lot of hours, certainly no way to recoup those monetary losses. Playing competitively is one option but I'm not sure if that falls within your criteria. League of Legends, Dota 2, Street Fighter and others all have huge tournaments with big prize pools. I think the closest answer to your question is Twitch. But to be successful you have to treat it like a job.

You have to cultivate and create an audience through advertising and entertainment. You have to be an entertainer. To be recognized by Twitch, and earn money, you have to have a large enough following to become a Twitch Partner. So like a lot of other things in life, there is no get rich quick scheme.

If you are very good at it and have a lot of time to put in you can fairly easily make a minimum wage in a lot of games. However you have to be the kind of exceptional mind that would be able to easily command several times minimum wage doing the exact same kind of thinking in the real world.

MMOs reward problem solving, thinking outside of the box, being able to quickly digest, understand and exploit large rulesets and often a fair bit of programming.

If you have those then you can look at a virtual economy, break it down, spreadsheet it and then come back rich in game. But at that point you're doing actual work that someone would actually pay you for and you're doing it for fun for pretend money. I wasted a childhood making a truly vast online virtual fortune because for some reason I thought that using my talents in game was fun but out of game was boring.

I'm now selling off said fortune and making four figure amounts monthly but I'm not still playing the game, as such. I couldn't work out what I make hourly etc because I'm not making the currency and then selling it, just selling the stockpile from years of casual accumulation.

I treat it as a windfall effectively. Stream games, thats about it.

I quit playing once they disabled it. I found a pair of Firewalker boots that were nearly perfect in everyway; by far the best boots in NA. I couldn't believe someone would pay that. A month later Blizzard revamped all the items and those boots became worthless, i felt bad; Blizzard is lucky they didn't get sued.

I refinanced my student loans with Sofi from 6. I can't believe someone would buy that. Video games are a past time, you consume a game development studio's work. To make money off them you have to produce something: So even if you are producing quality, you are only as good as how many people actually know about what your selling and convert.

Why no auction house? - Diablo III Forums

My view is if you want to get paid for "getting really good at a game" then the only objective way is to win tournaments - if you are not winning you are not really good. You can spin off the other money makers if and when you succeed. Pooperman Magnum Stache Posts: To make any real money with video games, you need to be an entertainer.

It takes tons of work and tons of time, but it can be done. It also takes the skill to be able to commentate about what you're doing while you are doing it. Most people cannot do this. The top 5 gaming YouTubers make several million each. The average gaming YouTuber makes a couple hundred a year. Streaming is where the money is right now, but the real money is from sponsorships. The best players at whatever videogame do not make nearly as much as the people who are mediocre but have the ability to self-commentate.

My Journal My Books. OneCoolCat on July 19, , Axecleaver Magnum Stache Posts: We played way too much, but it was addictive and fun. This was a high realm-rank Scout that was in the top ten of player kills for any given week. An underground gold economy was active on the game, but it was against TOS and as with any black market activity, people were nervous and many deals went badly. After a couple of years, Chinese gold sellers dropped the bottom out of the market and the game got a lot less popular.

My guild went on to WoW and Warhammer which was awful but we never again found player vs player that was as addictive and rewarding as DAoC. I haven't gamed seriously lately, but the model that I saw which worked was: MrMoogle Pencil Stache Posts: There are some professional gamers out there.

Auction House - Diablo Wiki

For fighting games, Justin Wong is notable: Update on my post from 2 weeks ago. It's not sustainable and I have to alarm clock to do transactions with people all around the world but there is money in this. Skalm 5 O'Clock Shadow Posts: Ricky Pencil Stache Posts: It's not nearly as bad as blackjack, but definitely still gambling. To actually mix playing games with this you'd have to wait for boxes to drop and buy the keys to open them, otherwise you'd have to buy the skins directly which would be a much higher risk.

So no, there's no easy way to make money playing video games, especially at your own leisure. To make money, you're always going to have a customer. If you're beta testing, you're going to have to report to someone since you're actually looking for broken things, not just enjoying the game. If you're streaming, you have to take into consideration your fan's needs to an extent, etc.

Diablo III Auction House Comes to a Close - Diablo III

Skalm on August 07, , If you want to convert your hobby into something more worthwhile and lucrative, surgeons now do endoscopic surgeries where your skill set would really come in handy No matter how far you've gone down the wrong road, turn back. I'm pretty sure that the space combat MMO EVE Online allows real-money transactions, though I haven't followed the ins and outs closely.

Cromacster Handlebar Stache Posts: Axecleaver on July 20, , Mustachians are not the sort of people who sit around moaning about how the government is keeping them down.

Axecleaver on August 10, , August 10, , Meowkins Handlebar Stache Posts: I think either YouTube or Twitch would be a great bet. You can build a following by being interesting and playing the games you love. I mean, in theory. I'll let you know how that goes for me. The Mr says that DOTA2 has got the ability to make real dollars - you design cosmetics for the characters and players can buy them.

Parenting 4 kids while keeping costs under control. Have you ever tried Second Life? My friends in college played it all the time and made a few hundred bucks a month.

One person was very successful and made virtual ships and set up a shop in game , which sold them all the time. I used to be an avid MMO player throughout High School and College Everquest, Anarchy Online, Final Fantasy XI, XIV ARR, World of Warcraft, Rift, Star Wars: The Old Republic, Dungeon Fighter Online, and many more I can't even remember right now Everquest and SW: TOR were the only ones I made a decent profit on, although that was never the goal.

I'd argue that professional eSports is never the way to go unless you're an extreme outlier.