Diablo III Real-Money Market Detailed In Full
It's time to get serious about Blizzard Entertainment's new auction house for market goods in the virtual world of evil that is Diablo III in a full-on guide presented pre-release for the game later this month. This auction house will have players spending fake (and real) money on goods which they'll then be able to use in the game. You'll have the choice between entering the Gold Auction House of the Real-Money Auction House come halfway through this month, and only in certain regions of the world will you be able to trade real cash for warhammers, circlets, wands, cracked boots, and more.
This real-cash auction house will be giving Blizzard Entertainment "up to" a 15 percent cut of all sales between users, Battle.net (the servers for the game) transferring money in and out then of your PayPal account (or other similar online money services.) Additional fees may apply then as well from PayPal. These fees then, ironically enough, can be used by you to purchase Blizzard products online if you like – a World of Warcraft subscription, for example. So when it comes down to it, Blizzard doesn't charge you anything, just so long as they get to keep the money.
There are three real-money auction houses you'll be able to access, The Americas, Europe, and Asia, with the first two working in regional money depending on where you live, the third (Asia) not having a real-money auction house at launch. Asia will have a real-money auction house launch at a time not yet announced by Blizzard, but they have assured us that it is in the future. Users across each of these regions will be able to work with a Battle.Net authenticator as well, this coming in the form of a small keychain device, dial-in authentication (in the USA online) and mobile authentication via a Battle.net application set to be updated for this release soon.
Buying and selling will be extremely similar to what you may have experience on eBay, with you listing an item for auction with an optional time limit and reserve bid. Cash will be sent to you automatically once an auction is over, however, rather than having to track down the bidder each time an auction has completed as it is in real life.
Sound alright to you thus far? We'll see how it all pans out later this month!
[via Battle.net]