In-game Real Money

[Heroink]

Hello..Im making a huge game with my friends and im having a bit of a problem, what im trying to do is the game wll be free but i want some stuff in that game to be like real life money so how do i do it?

the things that i though is like making a site and ppl buy like a 5 dollar card to give them a code and they put it in the game, but how do i do it? or any better ideas for this? i really need to work this out or i'll be in the worst place ever XD.

thnx in advance.

p.s: im not sure if this is the right place to post this.

 

[Engr. Adiktuzmiko]

It's better be done server side I think coz if it's just a code that is hardcoded into the game, then once they have 1 code then they can reuse it over and over again... you can disable it for that player once it's loaded but then other people can still use that code...


First, you'd need a script that will allow you to interact with a server... Then you'd need a method on how to handle the payments (credit card, paypal, etc) and so on...

 

[shiori4me]

What you can do is have it so that if they pay you money over paypal, you'll message them a code, and if they recite the code in the numeric input process then they'll "unlock" the content, be it, they'll be able to use it in the game, which is already included yet all your data is encripted.

Oh wait yeah you said it.

But perhaps it can be a one-time thing and a different version of that code will be used for a similiar unlock.

Does that sound efficient?

 

[Engr. Adiktuzmiko]

Then you'd need to have all possible codes already hardcoded into the game, and when you run out of codes, you'd need to update the game to include new codes... do you think the players will want that?


and also for it to be a one time thing, you either need to force sync all users that have that game once a code is already used (so it still needs to be connected to the internet), or provide a different version of the game per user that has different sets of codes (but then aside from needing to supply a customized version per user, we go back to the problem I stated before)...


and aside from all these things, hardcoding it is not a good idea since if they hack your game then they can unlock everything (and hacking an RM game is pretty easy)... Also, if you do it that way, then they can unlock everything and then share the unlocked version/file to the world...


This is why most if not all games that uses microtransactions uses a connection to a server... It's either you do it via an account (you save the data and transactions to the account) or you simply store data for already used codes into your server and just dish out new codes everytime someone buys...

 

[Andar]

As others said, you'll need a server-based game to make ingame payments reliable - everything else will fail sooner or later due to piracy.


However, the RM's do not have server-side functions by default - for the older versions I'ver heard that multiplayer and server scripts were made by fans, but I don't know where.


For RM Ace (which you're using according to your profile), such a script does not exists (yet?). There is a script that will allow server-connections for highscores and the like, and you might try to use that - but in that case you need to write your own server program for that, because the existing script only handles data transfer. And even then it'll be far from optimal because it won't be able to update the game with new content unless you also write scripts to handle that.


Does anyone in your group know how to program? Especially how to program for a server system?


If not, your chances of pulling this off with RM Ace are extremely low.

 

[Engr. Adiktuzmiko]

As far as networking in RM is concerned, all I know is that on VX there is this project called White Rose Online that aims to build an online multiplayer game, it's working but a bit buggy AFAIK... for Ace Hime I think has an HTTP script, IDK of any other


As Andar said, unless someone on the team knows how to do programming for this, it will be really hard to pull off in RM... You might have better chances in android for example since AFAIK google already has a built-in API in android for handling payments thru the playstore... all you'd need to worry about by then is how you would store the info per player since I do think they would want to be able to load their data from you in case they change phones...

 

[Heroink]

thank you all for replying, i think im going to take your advice, and i think im going to use another program for an android game since it needs alot of work and stuff, my team knows how to program but i even though about this code thing, its gonna be hacked and then everything is lost lol, so uhm yeah...we'll try our luck in android games and see what we need to make an android game. or just make the game and put it on steam or something for like 10 usd or something, i mean steam..everyone buy on steam xD.

thanks

 

[Tsukihime]

You are going to run into the same problems no matter what platform you use, however Android's got a lot more tools ready to use so that would make it much easier to implement.

It's better be done server side I think coz if it's just a code that is hardcoded into the game, then once they have 1 code then they can reuse it over and over again... you can disable it for that player once it's loaded but then other people can still use that code...


First, you'd need a script that will allow you to interact with a server... Then you'd need a method on how to handle the payments (credit card, paypal, etc) and so on...

Presumably the payment system is not something you'd have to script?

 

[Engr. Adiktuzmiko]

Presumably, the payment provider will already provide a code that you will just copy and paste into the code of your payment page...

 

[Kadafi]

So, if i add "In-game Purchase" Items to my "Free-to-play" games which player can buy it with real money. Does the game considered as commercial games?

 

[Shaz]

Yes. Because you are using it to make money.


Please start a new thread for your own questions. What you're asking is NOT the same as the OP's question, which I'm considering is resolved now.


This thread is being closed, due to being solved. If for some reason you would like this thread re-opened, please report this post and leave a message why. Thank you.