The Fair Trade Commission has launched an on-site investigation following allegations that the item drop rates in Wemade's online game 'Night Crow' were manipulated.
According to industry sources on the 17th, the Fair Trade Commission began an investigation at Wemade's headquarters in Seongnam, Gyeonggi Province, and secured data related to Night Crow's item drop rates.
Night Crow is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) released domestically by Wemade in April last year.
Wemade updated the drop rate information for probability-based items ahead of the enforcement of the amended Game Industry Act, which mandates disclosure of such information. However, controversy arose when many items were found to have updated drop rates that differed from previously announced figures.
The drop rate for certain high-value items was corrected from 0.0198% to 0.01%, and from 0.1% to 0.32%, while the drop rate for lower-value items was revised from 91.9802% to 95.7%.
The Night Crow management team stated that the discrepancies were due to errors made during the registration of probability information, but users suspected manipulation of the rates and filed complaints with the Fair Trade Commission.
The Fair Trade Commission is reportedly conducting the investigation with the possibility that the game company intentionally manipulated the rates to increase sales.
This is not the first time that controversies over manipulation have arisen following announcements of probability revisions.
Previously, Gravity's online game 'Ragnarok Online' also disclosed last month that some item drop rates had been incorrectly displayed.
The Fair Trade Commission is also reported to be conducting an on-site investigation of Gravity as of today.
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