How To Make Money Playing Video Games In 2021
Video games have been with us for the past five decades and have integrated into our daily lives seamlessly since the start of the 21st century. It started with Pong, Atari’s Pacman, then Tetris, World of Warcraft, the NBA 2K series, and now Fortnite.
Many of us played video games when we were kids, some may still be playing even as adults, and that’s been a big boost to the gaming industry.
According to a study in 2019, about a third of our population are regular video game players and we’re pretty sure that number only increased due to the current crisis our world faces that forces many of us to stay at home. Another surprising take on this is that nearly half of these gamers are women. This means there’s a diverse player base that video games can target and cater to.
How It All Started
Over the years, video game companies popped up in all parts of the world. It started with Atari in the 1970s, followed by Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft. Companies like Electronic Arts, Ubisoft, and Activision also helped shape the video game landscape.
Older parents were not that fond of video games when the industry began, but as our generation gets younger and younger, more and more families are playing video games themselves. Game consoles have become a go-to Christmas gift. Kids as young as 5 years old may already have their own Playstation or Wii console. When we were young, a simple Nintendo GameBoy would mean the world to us, right?
However, since the start of 2010, the gaming industry had undergone a big change due to video games being more available for everyone with the launch of more robust and powerful smartphones and tablets. You can now play your favorite game anywhere, anytime, and the device that you can use are not limited to your computer or gaming console anymore.
Both children and adults have now better access to online games with just their mobile devices.
Current Video Game Landscape
More than half of the gamers use their smartphones to play, and this has forced more and more gaming companies to launch mobile versions of their games. A good example is NBA 2K, a game started only for computer and gaming console users, but which the team decided to start offering to iOS users when they launched NBA 2k12. With its success, they’ve expanded their game to cater to Android users as well.
Even RuneScape which is famous for being a computer-only game, released mobile versions for both RuneScape 3 and Old School RuneScape to cater to their growing player population.
The introduction of “free-to-play” (F2P), or “freemium”, games has also helped the gaming economy expand even more. There are hundreds of F2P games that encourage players to make purchases for them to complete a quest or level up their character. These give an opportunity for hardcore gamers to make real money by simply being good at the games they play.
Since most video games require a good amount of game time from each of their players in order to level up, access more quest, or buy high-tier items, those people who have the money to spend are more enticed to buy from fellow players instead of spending time doing repetitive tasks.
Why do all the hard work if you can simply buy millions worth of gold from those who play for a living, right? Don’t worry, the gold I am talking about is just 1 to 2% of the value of a gram of real-world gold, maybe even less than that.
How Players Make Money Playing Video Games
With the increasing demand for certain in-game items, accounts, and currency, more and more players are making careers out of their favorite game.
Nowadays, making money from video games is not limited to being the best and participating in tournaments. If you can find something that you’re good at with the right demand, then you can use this to your advantage and make real money out of it.
One of the most sought-after games by those looking to earn money from video games is RuneScape, specifically Old School RuneScape (OSRS). The game is a popular MMORPG that started in 2013 and has gained hundreds of thousands of players worldwide, so there’s a great demand for OSRS items and in-game currency. You can also get cash selling video games here.
One can start making money by simply creating his RuneScape account and buying OSRS gold online from a trusted OSRS gold site, you can wait for the price to climb, similar to what you typically do when investing in a mutual fund or the stock market, before selling your OSRS gold. Much like investing in the stock market, you should be aware that in-game currency prices can be volatile as well, so make sure to practice due diligence before jumping to this money-making method.
Now, you also have the option to do it all yourself and engulf on a journey where your main goal is to make the most OSRS gold that you can possibly can and there should be dozens of money-making methods you can choose from.
Another great thing about this game is you’re not limited to a specific path for you to complete, even for Free-to-Play players, the game will take hundreds of hours before you fully explore everything Gielinor has to offer.
With dozens of quests to choose from, it might be wise to use an OSRS Optimal Quest Guide to better strategize and make the most out of your playing time. This way you’ll earn the most experience and gold that you can trade for real money once you have an abundance of them.
Considering this, have you tried playing Old School RuneScape before or any other video game with a goal of making some extra cash?
If you haven’t, then we highly recommend that you give it a shot! Much like any other real-life skill, with time and dedication, you should be able to learn and master any video game you want to.
Just make sure that you choose a game that has a good demand when it comes to its in-game currency or items like RuneScape, World of Warcraft, or Path of Exile.
Mark is an avid gamer and the head content writer for Probemas, an RS gold site dedicated to helping RuneScape players with their journey.
You can follow him on Twitter or read his gaming stories on Medium.