Can World of Warcraft Teach Us to Save?
Unless we are cynical market-driven fools who believe that we should spend more than we earn in order to feed the fat cats on Wall Street, it should worry us that the American savings rate is the lowest it has ever been since the Great Depression — it was at zero for a number of years until the recent financial crisis scared some into spending less & saving more.
Is there a less catastrophic way to inspire savings in people? Of course — we have to be taught the importance of saving money at an early age, so that we grow up with the concept of saving as a way of life.
What better tool for teaching the importance of saving money than a computer game — specifically, one so immersive as the #1 massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), World of Warcraft?
The need to save is built into the game.
World of Warcraft (hereinafter referred to as WoW) gives players many reasons to save. One of the most important milestones of an online character’s growth in WoW is the attainment of level 40 at which point one can purchase a riding mount. With the exception of Paladins and Warlocks, who receive their mounts free of charge at this level, level 40 represents the first milestone in the game where the player must dish out close to 100 gold pieces, which can take some time to gather at such low levels due to recurring per-level expenses such as day-to-day repair costs, training costs and new equipment costs.
[Please Note: Since the original publication of this article, riding mounts have been made available to all players at level 20 rather than level 40 — at dramatically reduced rates — though the need to save for the milestone still exists.]
Even if one is of the privileged Paladin or Warlock classes, other reasons to save within the game include the purchase of rare weapons, armor, crafting recipes or other rare materials from the game’s player-driven auction house, which at times lists items priced in the high hundreds to even thousands of gold. Another milestone in the game — at level 60 — requires players to spend around 500 gold to ride an epic (very fast) mount, with Paladins and Warlocks not totally off the hook at this point. At level 70, another opportunity arises for a massive cash layout of around 1,000 gold to ride a standard flying mount — and a much more demanding 5,000 gold to ride an epic flying mount.
Therefore, World of Warcraft presents a unique opportunity to teach basic saving skills to its millions of subscribers — many of whom are children or young adults.
In fact, the need to save is inherently built into the game and can even be touted as one of its selling points to parents interested in teaching their kids the importance of saving.
Of haves and have nots.
Something interesting happens to players close to level 40. They will either have the 100 gold they will need for their mount, or they will not. Those who do not have the money sometimes resort to begging others for money in the general or trade chat channels. Others put off the purchase of their level 40 mount until later levels, when they’ve finally managed to save the required amount.
In either case, the need to save arises, but interestingly, the game doesn’t provide any tools to help individual players save.
Personal banking in WoW.
In the above two screenshots, the first represents what a player sees upon interacting with an in-game banker. Upon speaking with an in-game banker, the character is presented with a window representing his/her items in storage. Interestingly, a money amount (in this case 9 gold, 98 silver and 94 copper) is also presented at the bottom of the interface. However, this amount simply reflects the amount of money a player has on his/her person. The game does not offer any way for the player to store or save money in his/her bank by means of transfer.
So the personal in-game bank only serves as a storage space for items, and does not offer the ability for players to store their money — a service one would expect from a typical bank.
We know from basic concepts in saving that if we are to keep all of our money in one place (in this case in our bag or on our person), it makes it much more difficult to save since an important part of saving is to literally put money away so that it remains out of sight.
The second of the two screenshots above represents a proposed modification of the banking window whereby the player has a chance to deposit cash in a savings account (by means of a Manage Savings tab that would allow the player to make deposits and/or withdrawals) and to see how much they have saved in addition to being able to earn compound interest (in this case 5%).
Such a modification to WoW would:
- Enrich the overall WoW experience.
- Simplify personal financial management in-game.
- Promote in-game savings by offering incentives such as interest (or even something as cool as the option to choose 1 honor point per week for every 100 gold saved instead of interest).
- Reduce the number of in-game beggars.
- Teach the importance of saving by demonstrating its positive aspects in the context of a virtual world which can potentially translate to behavior modification in the real world.
Guild banking gets close.
With the introduction of guild banks, WoW has taken one step closer to promoting savings by allowing members of a guild to make deposits into a pooled account, with the amount at the bottom of the window reflecting the collective savings, but it comes with limitations:
- It is limited to players who are members of a guild.
- It represents a collective amount of money deposited by guild members for the benefit of the guild, and ultimately under the control of the guild master.
- The Money Log only provides a list of those who have deposited or withdrawn money. It serves no other purpose.
- It does not offer a way for members to maintain a personal savings amount.
Guild banking can be modified to allow members of a guild to save (by means of a Manage Savings tab that would allow the player to make deposits and/or withdrawals limited to what they have deposited in the past) and to see how much the guild has saved in addition to being able to earn compound interest (in this case 5%):
Such a modification to guild banking in WoW would:
- Promote in-game savings by offering incentives such as interest (or even something as cool as the option to choose 1 honor point per week for every 100 gold saved instead of interest).
- Teach the importance of saving by demonstrating its positive aspects in the context of a virtual world which can potentially translate to behavior modification in the real world.
Games do teach.
It is naive to think that games don’t teach us anything. In fact, games teach us a lot. However, the lessons being taught in games don’t often translate literally to the real world because games are often designed to take us away.
This said, WoW does a wonderful job of taking us away. However, those in the far away fictional world of Azeroth use money as a medium of exchange just like we do on Earth, and anything we can learn about money in Azeroth can have an impact on how we deal with it on Earth.
Virtual worlds can impact the real world.
This is an excellent example of how experiences in a virtual world can shape our perceptions of the real world. If kids carelessly spend all of their money while leveling a character from 1-40 only to discover that they are short 100 gold at level 40, the regret of not having saved along the way offers a lesson that they can take with them into the real world. In fact, I have found my personal views of money and saving influenced by the game.
An in-game opportunity for players to experience the art of saving — and the rewards that can come with it — can greatly enhance the overall in-game experience while quite possibly impacting perceptions of the real world in a positive and constructive manner.
A challenge to game developers.
It is my feeling that game developers can do more than just entertain within the context of the gaming experiences they create.
The fact that these games do teach us many lessons makes it incumbent on developers to provide appropriate, contextually relevant in-game tools to ensure that some of the things they teach can leave practical and positive impressions on the lives of those they touch.
