How Nexon "Stole" $471 Million From Their Players And Got Away With It

What if we told you that Nexon had been scamming their players for over a decade?
In Jan 2024, Nexon was fined by the South Korean FTC after being caught deceiving players by falsifying and manipulating the success rates of gacha items in games like Maplestory.
In today's video, we take a look at what has gone down as the longest running scam in MMO history.
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[@banhartday]

I worked for Nexon years ago. Horrible Korean micromanaging and definitely predatory practices. To scam people into spending they would actually rig it so the first person who bought whatever new most expensive pack/bundle in a game would get something super desirable, which would send out a game wide announcement. That would drum up sales but those would be with the typical horrible RNG

[@coldsnap5742]

It boils down to three words. Microtransactions are evil.

[@Dudex11a]

@@coldsnap5742 In my opinion I think it all depends on the type of microtransactions. While I can agree with you that the majority of microtransaction implementation are predatory and evil, I think it can be used as a good constant source of income to keep servers up. For me, It really comes down to implementation, like: - Are the microtransactions pay to win? - How much do the microtransactions cost in comparison to server maintenance?

[@coldsnap5742]

@@Dudex11a This all started with horse armor.

[@tablespoon1277]

Just spill everything u know pls why are u holding back

[@A_Person_64]

>I worked for Nexon years ago I'm sorry for your loss. Maplestory in the 2000s was my first forray into the world of MTX and FOMO and man was it not pretty despite me only buying a $25 cash card ONCE. I can only imagine the landscape now that the formula has been weaponized into such an insane degree. Gacha games are gross

[@wfjhDUI]

5:05 THEY PATENTED THEIR SCAMMING TECHNIQUE. The shamelessness is unreal.

[@user-xv9tm4qq3i]

As a Korean our gaming industry sure is something all right......

[@mr_gl00m32]

It's truly a game industry of all time.

[@wayge]

it isnt much better outside of Korea either. the whole Industry needs a reboot

[@NicoparaDEV]

I used to be addicted to metin2 until I realized what a shshow the game is

[@hyperssr]

I mean the player base is crazy too. Got multiple artists fired for essentially retweeting an article years ago and then they thought she was a feminist

[@user-xv9tm4qq3i]

@@hyperssr It makes me sad when I see replies like this, treating the Korean playerbase as incels. Korean social norms may be different from the west, but at the same time there ARE reasons (mostly political/social) why things are the way they are over here, whether the western playerbase knows it or not.

[@TheNightman.]

The message isn't clear, because the penalties are a joke. Fine them over half their revenue and shove the executives in jail, ban them from ever working in the industry ever again, take all of their money and give it to the workers of the company. THEN they'll fucking listen

[@troykv96]

They really deserved to have their stolen revenue confiscated.

[@mr.rainc0at614]

Yeah, but the Korean government maintains that's for the civil courts. I won't say it's fair for customers to have to pay legal fees themselves against the biggest gaming company in Korea, but they are in a really good position to sue for damages and fraud.

[@PikaPower131313]

You don’t think the workers of the company knew this? They programmed the damn thing

[@rarigate]

Yeah lmao it is a slap on the wrist. They company is even happy that only a miniscule amount was sued lmao

[@atlantic-jz9ix]

Half? If a normal citizen stole 480m, they’d lose 100% and be in jail

[@xxfloppypillowxx]

Lol the only lesson Nexon learned from this was that you should manipulate RNG because if you do you'll profit 471M and all you'll need to do is spend less than 0.02% of that revenue stream to do so.

[@dovesr0478]

For corporations, a fine is not a penalty for breaking the law. It's a tax for being allowed to break the law.

[@NateDates]

This is coming from the same team that tried to sue Dark and Darker devs for legally buying assets that's publicly available to all. So yeah, not surprised.

[@shadoninja]

Dang that is so sad to see they got caught only to be let go with effectively no consequence at all

[@ezmoneyy149]

Im sooooo happy Akshon is covering the Nexon problem. Left combat arms in 2011 or 2012 and im so happy many can see the predatory and unfair practices that they thrived on

[@MrTheRz]

The reason why i played private server than the actual server before.

[@lolingkwarts3999]

Despite S.Kor gamers being numerous and competitive, it shows how terrible their game companies are when the gamers mostly compete on non korean games

[@kavinh10]

if the fine is smaller then the crime, how is it any different then bribery.

[@domodesu5932]

Surprised MS is still going. Jesus, I use to play that game like it was a full time job and was gladly doing overtime all the time. Man I miss it

[@ElijiahCater-xg9dq]

Korean company try not to be corrupt challenge

[@slouch186]

the video of the guy singing "maplestory" and dancing used in the intro has been stuck in my head for so many years

[@zaandam0172]

When that server check came in and went on KZbin to watch that guy, KZbin had no ads, remember?

[@ChibiQilin]

There's been some new context that makes the whole situation even worse. Nexon recently announced major changes to cubes as a result of these penalties. Instead of selling cubes for NX, the paid currency, they're now changing it to meso only (the in-game gold you earn). So it's no longer gambling using real money, meaning they don't have to disclose stats or secret changes, etc. The problem is they also introduced a cap on the amount of mesos you can earn in-game, and there's already a meso-market where you can exchange NX cash for mesos. Meaning they learned their lesson... they'll just not get caught next time. Because now it's being sold for "in-game currency" which is limited, and you have to buy from other players if you want to exceed that limit.

[@kezia8027]

I'm so glad I found out the "hard" way how predatory they were 15+ years ago when I spent like $250-300 without even blinking... Honestly kind of a blessing though... Thankfully haven't been scammed like that since! (knock on wood)

[@kuyachaswhub3086]

The sad thing about this... The consumer still enables Nexon for this BS.

[@Miqzz]

To be fair, that's a thing entirely on the korean server, as i cant speak on the population there but atleast on the western servers, everyone's on reboot where you cannot actaully whale on cubes even if you wanted to not defending nexon for this tomfoolery, but they are milking an absolutely minority of the playerbase

[@Sazandora635]

The fact that you can't ever be certain that lootboxes/gacha rates are being truthful makes me reluctant to bother with anything that doesn't at minimum have a generous pity system.

[@Akiradono]

This is really annoying I spent so much money and wondered why rolls were trash.

[@Yutappy99]

And Nexon is still operating

[@13johs21]

seeing anything maplestory in this day and age hurts me because it was so simple back then now it's goten more greedy

[@moonflowerpalace3872]

It was greedy back then too. Screwed up your stats because you miss-clicked? PAY US MONEY!!!

[@schikey2076]

@@moonflowerpalace3872 people forgot scrolling was way egregious compared to potential and starforce lmfao.... at least you can reset potentials

[@Mexican00b]

all loot boxes games do it "chances to get item >1%" that could mean 0.00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000001 and they are not lying... the "fine" should have been "all winnings + 50m" or something like that a fine of 9m but when you win over 500m? they will keep doing it lol

[@lightspeedrescue]

As expected of the very company that created and introduce gacha system(named after gachapon tickets) and limited time cosmetics WITH EXPIRY DATES to the world, also taught gaming companies how to milk people with FOMO and retain players with events they can't afford to miss without falling behind.

[@AMabud-lv7hy]

Only reason I simply can't bring myself to spend money on The Finals even though it’s a great game, because it would be lining Nexon's pocket

[@silecalamaru2922]

the jjk background music is a nice touch

[@jeremygregorio7472]

The problem is corporations are always find a fraction of the money they made doing the crime

[@alfred9805]

Great video all around but I was completely missing context for this last clip and couldn't even tell whether the streamer was happy or sad with the result of his cubing

[@fhjunior6183]

Thanks for the vid

[@xdKyouzen]

They also ruined Combat Arms...

[@bigandhairyrichard6333]

and tried to ruin dark and darker

[@DixonYamouf]

That game deserved better idc it was the only free fps in the cod4 Era trying to fuck shit up and nexons greed ruined it from the start

[@Clarkzer0]

Combat Arms was genuinely great, just a shame Nexon locks basic mechanics behind a paywall.

[@aibadenshi]

Played abun of Nexon game and i always have that one thing i incredibly hate is that they doesn't support people outside of the region they support.

[@nanchoparty]

Hit me up for that class-action lawsuit home boy

[@izzysteez27]

Maple story was the ish back then. Who remembers “tiger” #1 on leaderboard?

[@felipenachmanowicz9393]

Wtf @Akshon? The message is clear, but the message is: scamming your players is worth it even if you get caught.

[@clippygoat]

Lmao, this is what i fucking needed to watch after getting dogshit dupes on Blue Archive's Blue Fest. As a former Maplestory player, thank god i got off that game almost a decade ago. Fuck Nexon but I'll still play Cunny Archive.

[@ThorAxiun]

🤮

[@lycheegucci2917]

sad to see my favorite childhood mmo become like this. I wish this game was in better hands

[@johawk360]

pretty sure SSBs are the same thing but for some reason thats not exposed

[@imnotgay_butineedthemoney]

Tyty for at least showing maple some love.

[@jotaguerrero1382]

And the worst of all is that maplestory Korea is currently generating some changes to the game that are actually unnecessary!! What it shows is that for the scam they committed, the players are the ones who are assuming the consequences.

[@michaelp.2856]

All this does is sends the message to scam players even more since getting caught results in being able to pay an extra ~2% tax to the government on top of whatever other taxes your company may have paid while keeping the bulk of it.

[@Chaosloki]

Nowadays you see a lot of bad gacha systems and loot boxes in games but it's insane to me that Maplestory entirely revolves around using different items to reroll different stats and the thing people are upset about is going from 1.7% to 1% instead of the whole existence of such a shitty system.

[@JoshSaysStuff]

And now Nexon has shut down the longest-running retro server. They genuinely hate the people who support them.

[@GyroCannon]

I hate that companies get penalized for illegal activities for amounts that aren't relative to the size of the revenue they got from doing said activities

[@MechPaul]

This isn't even the half of it. Their "fix" to the cube system will completely destroy GMS.

[@ElBandito]

This is why I never spend a dime on chance based game mechanism.

[@IKKIsama14]

This is why I don't play gachas.

[@rtheactech]

oh this...the concept of stealing in business

[@lukedanielgalon1596]

It’s kinda funny how the penalities of this is smaller compared to Spygate in F1. Luckily retired way too early from playing gacha games

[@ExtremelyDumb]

Not caping for gambling companies, but you can’t make every big game comply with gambling laws. Gambling laws are not updated to work well with the internet, and are specifically difficult to get a license for bc terrorism If all of these games had to have a casino license to run, most funding for games would go away and more companies would treat their IP like Konami Also it would make crypto NFT gaming way more prevalent

[@kezia8027]

oh my god... the dancing in some prep school uniform while singing the maplestory theme... That instantly takes me back 20 years...

[@NBDbingo5]

6:58 this outro sentence doesn't work because in the previous sentence you just said that the "consequences" of their actions was 470 million dollars in profit

[@otavioluna6433]

the least worst thing they've done

[@burningpipe2627]

Wait, in maplestory you dont utilize secondary stats in power progression for ordinary classes, making STR + DEX not being able to roll together actually statistically more beneficial.

[@acat5338]

It was just an example because it’s pretty clear the guy who made this video doesn’t actually play maplestory. The lines that were actually impossible to get was 3 lines of “Boss Damage”, “Ignore Enemy Defense”, and “Drop Rate”.

[@chrispham6599]

None of what you guys are saying excuses what Nexon had done

[@acat5338]

@@chrispham6599 I don’t think anyone was excusing what Nexon did. Basically all Maplestory players are pissed right now.

[@antiquehealbot6543]

And yet, lot of maplestory users are happy as Nexon has nerfed reboot server lol.

[@lollmaonice]

nexon will be the example of what would happen if you do this, and it's not the way you wanted

[@Syzyguy]

Well now I feel shitty about buying Dave the diver

[@ezmoneyy149]

It is fair to say nexon was the poster child for Pay To Win games

[@skyMcWeeds]

Blue Archive players shivering in fear

[@remuscalpe2885]

so if nexon pull this off chances are some online games develop in korea will have a slight chance of copying the idea of nexon...

[@ratovicius1]

I though the biggest scam was star citizen

[@honu_of_Tarlach]

do it again for mabinogi

[@NezeruGaming]

[Blue Archive gacha addicts sweating profusely]

[@salami155]

I said I wouldn’t touch a nexon game ever again on reddit. Blue Archive fans:😡 They just don’t care. At that point they deserve to be scammed if it is happening or not behind the scenes.

[@alvinvalentino5797]

Wait what's happening to BA? I'm out of the loop

[@cpubigdipper9145]

What about the maplestory pv with the infamous megalia symbol?

[@Frido19]

What's the song in the beginning called?

[@ramaluminus]

The House always wins.

[@ByakkoSL]

it's not really in mapple only. nexon would produce typical mobile gacha mechanic frequently. thank god, even though mobile players are stupid, these game would only last like maximum of 1 year before shutting down

[@Rthan-ft7fp]

like blue archive?

[@ByakkoSL]

@@Rthan-ft7fp i was thinking of games like ghost in the shell and dynasty warrior

[@SACokex3]

Fuck nexon. Becoz of this they changed cube to be only purchasable by meso. Then proceed to nerf the maximum meso obtainable per day. Hence making meso scarce. I guess the next step is to sell these meso directly or indirectly to players and continue milking them hard.

[@user-lo9bf4ds3y]

아니 메이플이 이 채널에 뜬다고? ㅋㅋㅋㅋ 원기형 어디까지 유명해질거냐고~~

[@-8h-]

Somehow, i feel like china is worse. Bad rates, and changes to characters appearances afrer you get them.

[@CrusaderGabriel]

I love a game from nexon that could only be categorized as a _kusoge_ (trash game, I love the Japanese term it kinda becomes its own genre): vindictus. As of recent years the game went full fan service mode making money by selling the most oversexualized cosmetics I’ve ever seen in videogames (that aren’t mods) and I love them so much… thing is, they put them inside loot boxes which annoys me too much, and you may get the “normal” version (regular sized… assets) rather than the cultured version… I’m like, literally they could sell the cultured version of the cosmetic directly at $100 and I’m willing to pay for it (and probably the normal version for $50)… that’s definitely way better than any loot box

[@ThePiesrbest]

Its ridiculous that Maplestory has zero competition. It'd such an amazing concept for an MMO controlled by the most garbage company.

[@looppp]

Nexon owns The Finals. Just sayin.

[@mjusufatur]

I hope dont jump the rope on The Finals

[@Rockmih]

7:05 but there were no consequences 🤔

[@salami155]

People who play their gacha games don’t care about this. Gambling is truly awful. It seems nothing will curb gambling addiction.

[@byejimmy8645]

D:

[@capten272]

just don t gamble with irl money in video games. at least not for ig advantages. im fine with suporting devs but putting houndreds of dollars into gatcha gambling games like genshin impact diablo mobile and maplestory is not the way to do so. thats not called supporting the devs its called getting scammed by devs in pay2win games. I do believe the csgo system is fine tho because skins are not pay2win

[@MiraiKishi]

"Treat your players fairly, or there will be consequences." You kidding me? This was just a slap on the wrist!!

[@Alsry1]

It’s called fines being fixed and not percentages. If you told a company the fine will be 20% of revenue no one will try to do anything

[@ExplodingImplosion]

Fines aren’t enough lmao we need jailtime

[@biraininhe1]

Boycott Nexon.

[@blargety]

Wait... So they scammed $471m from users. The Korean government got mad. Fined them $9m for their cut of the scammed money, and then get to continue business as usual and the players don't get a single cent back? Lol.

[@Kiba114]

i see you using jjk ost as bg music...

[@mattbyuh]

Jjk music. Rahhh

[@arvopenaali896]

Nexon was scamming people 15 years ago, p2w and bullshit, and somehow still going strong. I've long thought it's a cultural issue that Korean publishers are so predatory

[@cyberpunk_edgerunners]

原神还不是一个叼样

[@soejii6931]

they also ruined durango wildlands to me

[@user-rn7ng8fc2v]

Scammer

[@TK_Tazzkooler]

Legally 👎😂 i need the punch made dev strats cmon

[@namelessbag]

I love Maplestory so damn much, but Nexon is so absolutely cancerous that I've simply refused to play on an official server ever again after Odin MS came out. Wizet pretty much got bought by Korean EA

[@Kimeki00]

And this is why you don't get into gacha games

[@767corp]

I don't get why peoples get upset, every live service game is a scam, best thing you can do for yourself is just play offline SP games and gradually cure your addiction to this garbage that plagues the industry for decades now.

[@milkmaster9247]

Thank you for giving me another reason to hate nexon. I will never forgive them for what they did to dark and darker.

[@dragonmares59110]

I am sorry but anyone paying for lootbox in 2024 has only themselves to blame.

[@user-fx9eu5hw7u]

If you dont like nexon games, then dont play its just that simple. Problem is with players who insist to keep playing and spending money on the nexon games and they know that they are being treated like shit. If you boycott the game, the dev will change but most of the time, players wanna cry and complain and just move on eventually

[@unoriginal7276]

i love maplestory

[@pojoh2585]

Title and intros are kinda lying...

[@Half_Bl00d_H3R0]

Explain?

[@Sammysapphira]

@@Half_Bl00d_H3R0 Nexon didn't "Scam 500 million".

[@DarkonFullPower]

​@@Half_Bl00d_H3R0 Nexon got to keep the vast majority of their scam money.

[@elucidator1277]

Nice editorial......what does this have to do with E-sports? You should either re-name this channel to something more general, or make another channel for non-esports content.

[@jahnoh4119]

🤏🤏🤏🤏🤏 energy.