Prior to this project I never really played any MMOs. Although I honestly don't find myself actively playing any MMOs after this. I do have a new found respect for them. I can now see how with every close knit community there will always be a culture that will develop from it. The virtual world of MMOs, to me before this experience, were never considered a social environment. Honestly it is probably one of the most social environments that are out there.Everything is very blunt and direct. There isnt too much sugar coating to what is going on the game, and how people will interact with each other. Games like WoW, you'll have situations like Serenity Now that will invade funerals. Or EVE Online were players will lose thousands of US dollars when one ship is attacked. Then there are games like City of Heroes and Champions Online, where you can customize your avatar almost exactly to what your liking is.
The environment is more casual, and you can return back to the game without feeling to disconnected from the game.
Again I haven't found a game that I would play on frequent basis but I could see myself going back to a lot of these games just to see the changes in the environment. Although I'm not a fan of griefing, I would probably go back to the games to see the changes in the style of griefing as more restrictions are applied to many of these games. Because I have found that in any multiplayer game you will always have griefing. Its just what comes with environment of gaming with many people. This works similarly even in non-electronic games, you'll have teaming up and cheating that is either incorporated in the game (like B.S.) or discouraged (like in monopoly). But in the end there is no control over griefing and it is inevitable to happen.
Maple story is a free MMO 2d side scrolling game. Although the game is free, it does have many items that players can buy items for many reasons. Some are just leisurely, for example having a pet follow the owner around; others purchase items for trade. Each player is sent on a quest by an NPC, most of the questing being beating monsters or avoiding danger in obstacle courses. Within the game of Maple Story there are quests, minigames, marriages and events. Marriages, in Maple Story, like everything else must be achieved by completed the sufficient quests. The couple can invite guests, and the wedding ceremony is a series of quests. To hold a reception players must buy a ticket from the Cash Shop. Minigames are played to win in-game prizes. Players can also form guilds, to socialize with other members while working together to win quests. When I began playing Maple Story, I had some issues finding the chat button. So I started "griefing" I began following other players, fighting the same monsters they were fighting and stealing their coins. Once they got frustrated with me and began to talk to me, I found the button.I found that unlike all the other MMOs, this seemed to be the one aimed towards children and tweens. This became apparent, by the style of the game, through the artwork, side-scrolling, and the pay-by-item economy. I even noticed, when I would enter Maple Story later in the night, it was more uncommon for me to find someone playing, unlike all the other MMOs.
Champions online is a game very similar to City of Heroes. The games are very commonly compared with one another. They can have many similarities for example death. Players can revive a teammate or respawn at a neutral site. Unlike CoH, respawning does not increase experience debt, instead you lose your hero stars; hero stars are gained by defeating the NPCs.
In Champions online there is this one feature, when you level up, you can test out all the things you could potentially purchase in this big testing area. After you gain a level, you can spend that levelup and get either powers that are punching, running, or jumping. In this game, before you pick one of the three, you get to test out all of them.As a result when you enter the level up area there are tons of people trying things out, which has led to a culture of people who are constantly looking for a fight when they are in the level up area.You walk in and if you stay there long enough it is a certainty that someone will ask you for a fight to see if their new level-up is competent. While some players sit there for like, 10 minutes, pick one, and go, some players will sit there for an hour or more.It's the only game where you buy level ups where it is acceptable to leave a party just to explore your options for an hour or two other then that it's standard fare.
People like to dual, people like to party up, elite players don't get that much better then regular joes so the elite aren't usually jerks in that game, but then again maybe those players leave for more competitive pastures.Since there is only one faction (heroes) all combat is pretty much only between people who agree to it. You could grief someone by constantly asking for a dual or by picking up boxes and throwing them but it's just not worth the effort; there isn't too many benefits to griefing. Standard kinds of griefing, like saying inappropriate things and being a jerk still happen, but it's not like in WoW where you lead raids on people just because you don't like them, or where you sneak into the main city and kill any players. Players must request to duel with other members in order to kill any other player.
City of Heroes is an action based game, stemming from the superhero comic book genre. I began my journey in the world of City of Heroes by creating a character and selecting an archetype, then selecting my primary and secondary, then I began to create a unique costume. In final steps of finishing my avatar, I was asked to write a brief backstory (this was optional) to my hero and a name. Players are given the option to go through a tutorial or skip over it and continue onto playing the game. A character's level increases by earning experience points from defeating enemies, completing missions, and exploring zones, then returning to a trainer.The advantage of leveling up is you receive more health, power, slots to find more power and larger inventories, as well as costume changes.Players are required to complete missions in order to level up. Missions consist of beating a boss or finding items.
City of Heroes has reward items within the game, but unlike most games the items can be called as intangible items, that have characteristics beneficial for the character to level-up. Inspirations are temporary power ups, enhancements cover array of items from magic enchantments to training techniques, and instead of money characters use influence.
Over time expansions of the game were developed, coming out with games like City of Villains. City of Heroes has a team of developers that keep in touch with players by playing as characters in the game and playing with their consumers. They have an online forum, like boards.cityofheroes.com, that help build the game for the players and the culture of the game. Like any mutliplayer game its merely impossible for their not to be griefing involved. I found that City of Heroes had more griefing involved than Champions online did. City of Heroes over the years has developed its own culture, unlike any of the other MMOs that I have research. It has truly developed its own culture that is not pertinent to the game but also to the world around. City of Heroes has inspired novels, comic books, collectible card games, RPGs, and soon to be movie.
Although City of Heroes has such a rich culture and the players seem to be more casual gamers. They were very friendly and for the most part I found that they were willing to help. I had the options of sending in world chats or private messages. In City of Heroes if you want to dual with anyone of the same faction you must go to the coliseum. If any players want to duel with a player of a different faction, he must go to a PvP area and announce that they want to dual. People tend to play fairly, when dueling players like to know what their capabilities are, so that they will know where they stand in a more structured duel.
I decided this week to do a comparison of two games that have made significant impacts on the MMO world, World of Warcraft and EVE Online, by building upon their own community they have developed their own culture. Although there are many differences, both virtual communities still maintain their own similarities. I spent a great deal of time in both games this past week and I thought that I would only be appropriate to do a compare and contrast of their cultures.
Communication and interaction of players and people are what actualizes the virtual culture. Both Eve Online and World of Warcraft have incorporated text and voice chat. This has caused players to develop their own terminology and slang, which has become universal among many MMOs. Although each game has abbreviations and terms used specifically for each individual game, both EVE and World of Warcraft share a common lexicon. Both MMO lexicons work with the common lexicon for the internet and other multi-player games. For example, terms like "BRB" meaning “be right back” and “away from keyboard” is abbreviated to "AFK", this is what most of us that use any form of chatting client would use. But players that play MMO games will also use the previously stated terms but alongside they will use Alt, meaning alternative character, and that means the character that the player is not focusing on at the time. As well as the term "noob", a starting player that one does not understand the game mechanics yet.
When venturing out into both worlds I found players to be friendly and willing to help. Obviously not everyone in both games wanted to take time out from their game play to help me, as a "newbie", understand the game. I found that both games were competitive in nature, and took some time before you actually found someone to interact with. Initially you are playing with several players to that like yourself are still trying to understand the game mechanics. Because of the general economic systems of the game, the monthly subscription fee, you find players are very invested in the game. This goes without saying that both games do have casual gamers. Players also do not limit their interaction with one another to the game. Each game has player-developed websites and forums outside of the game, for players to discuss missions, rules, introduce new players to the game history and partially the mechanics.
With the openness of the Internet architecture, players of both games are able to somewhat build their surroundings. By having players either level up or expand their skills, players are able to purchase better items in World of Warcraft or ships to use in the EVE. With players looking to build their character both sets of games understand the commodity that comes with working in teams, called guilds or corporations. Guilds and corporations act as small subcultures/businesses within larger ones. Players in the same guilds, for the most part, have the same objectives and the same goals. The rare times that players do have ulterior motives are when they are working against the guild/corporation. I found that most guilds and corporations do not accept trial memberships, because they are looking for commitment, reliability and security. Trial members do not provide the security of them staying with the game longer than the 10 day trial, let alone stay with their group.
Although we find that both MMO have general similarities, the differences far exceed the similarities. I found it surprising that two MMOs could have a plethora of difference with each similarity. Some of the differences between the games are the game servers, griefing, piracy, individualism and collectivism, along with countless more. For example, players may use similar terminology and slang but a great deal of the lexicon used by players is specific to the individual game. In World of Warcraft players will use AotC being a hunter class skill, Aspect of the Cheetah. While EVE Online players will use terms like NRDS standing for Not Red Don't Shoot. Both terms are specific for their game and cannot be used in games either game interchangeably.
In every multi-player game, it’s practically unavoidable to come across griefing. Eve and WoW deal with griefing completely differently. While WoW essentially does everything in its power to have griefing as limited as possible, Eve Online in some ways encourages it. Many Eve players will befriend players to either have them in their corporation or to use them to later strip the players of their assets including their ships, territories and money. Similarly piracy, protection racketeering, theft and ransom are incorporated into the game. One example of this was a corporation, infiltrated a prestigious corporation and proceeded to steal corporate property and finally assassinated the target's CEO. The target corporation lost approximately seventeen thousand US dollars. The developers do not deal with events like this, because the dangers are a part of Eve Online's economy. Players are expected to make financial decisions based on the possibility of other players' financial benefits, and this is similar to real-world economics. Whereas in WoW players are incapable of stealing another player’s possessions at any given point, developers of WoW will necessitate solutions where they see fit.
Players in WoW enter different realms, being faced with slightly different cultures in every server. One of the main advertising slogans that EVE uses is “one server one universe.” Players in EVE are constantly effect by what is going on around them. While World of Warcraft players have the option of entering PvE realms in which interaction with other factions will not directly affect their livelihood in the game. This strategy allows players to level up with greater ease and enforce an individualistic mentality. But for players to buy more powerful gear they must enter PvP zones, otherwise they will not have access to honor points, which allow you to buy the gear. Although beginner players start in non-PvP areas, inevitably they will reach a point where they will no longer have any areas that are not PvP. The entire game circles around the concept of PvP, because of this players feel the need to join guilds.
Both World of Warcraft and Eve Online have made a significant impact on the MMO world while maintaining and building their own community and distinct culture. The open format of these games allow players to develop a culture to their liking by communicating with other players using a lexicon distinct to their game as well as other MMOs. Joining groups with similar goals in guilds and corporations also helps create this open system. With the WoW being a multiserver game and EVE being a one server one world game, the players experiences with culture vary. Players of WoW are faced with the option of being individualistic, while EVE players are encouraged to be collective in nature. Also griefing in Eve often rewarded with profit, where as in WoW developers stifle griefing. At the end of the day both games build an environment for players to be a part of a community that is an escape from the real world.
Massive Multi-player Online (MMO) games that have drastically changed the scope of the gaming culture. Online gaming was developed from forums and college mainframes. These original games were called MUDs, and they evolved to provide a competitive environment but limited users geographically. Over time with the use of the Internet MMOs were established from the same concept. MMOs broke the barrier of geographic location and had gamers from all over the world play together and develop their own virtual community. Like any community people develop their own culture over time. This concept stands true with the gaming world.
I thought that it would be best to start my journey into MMOs, by starting with something simple. I started with LambdaMOO, I was first introduced to the game by our discussions in class about the article "A Rape in Cyberspace. LambdaMOO is a text-based game that is considered a MOO. MOO stands for MUD, Object Oriented. MUD games are interactive text-based games, MOOs are the same but with the ability to program or create interactive objects.
After reading Dibbel's article I was nervous about what the environment and the people that I was going to interact with, was going to be like. After the first couple of days, I noticed that the population of people in the world was never anything beyond 60-70 people. Because I was using a guest log in, I would have to start from the beginning every time I would play, making it more difficult to find people. Over sometime I would find someone, I found that everyone was very cordial and willing to talk. I found their willingness to talk was primarily because the game is entirely text based. Also I found that they were very relax and wanting to have conversations.
I noticed that the few times that I would try to act out and see what the peoples reactions were. I would almost always find that I would either be ignored or at times asked to keep it affable. Everyone seemed to be casual gamers, they play from time to time. But use the LambdaMOO more to socialize and read.
