New updates are being added at the bottom of this story…….

Original story (published on June 14, 2022) follows:

In the MMO segment, Lost Ark is currently one of the most popular games.

Unfortunately, the Lost Ark servers are experiencing some severe issues that threaten the stability and viability of the game. For instance, they are currently full of bots that overload their capacity.

But, there is another problem related to the practice of the RMT. Apparently, the Lost Ark RMT is breaking the game economy for all players (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7).

Lost Ark RMT issue is breaking game economy

‘RMT’ is the practice of trading in-game currency and items for real money. Players dedicated to RMT are there solely for the money and not for the game, so they use all kinds of hacks or exploits to get as much loot as possible (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10).

RMT practice is currently illegal in Lost Ark. While RMT is present in other similar games as well, it seems that the lack of really harsh penalties causes Lost Ark to be especially affected (1, 2, 3, 4, 5).

According to multiple reports, RMT practice is breaking the economy of the game. Due to the large amount of in-game currency being farmed by RMT practitioners, item prices are increasing for everyone.

Steam charts indicate that around half the player base is bots and they aren’t going anywhere. We’re being told they’re working on it. However, I can’t help but feel that there’s something underhanded going on with this game’s management in relation to the botting issue. Source

In most of the RMT post I see that the economie is “in shambles”, and the reality is that the prices of lets say relic accessories being over priced is not the result of people who buy RMT gold, no it’s the result of people who wants to capitalize on the fact that people buy RMT gold. Source

Current sanctions are not enough

Some players believe that the rise of RMT in Lost Ark is because the cost of practice is too low compared to the economic benefit. Basically, the sanctions are not severe enough and many are seeing it profitable to do RTM.

SmileGate team working on the issue

The SmileGate team is aware of the issue and is actively working on a fix for both the RTM and the bots issue (which we covered in another story recently). But, there are no details yet on an ETA for a definitive fix.

We will update this story as events unfold.

Editing for clarity: Cheating is wrong. Cheats should be punished. Cheaters are punished. Source

Update 1 (June 15)

01:07 pm (IST): In order to reduce the RMT practices, Lost Ark has announced that they will be rolling out a massive wave of bot bans over course of next week. You can check the full statement here.

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