[MUD-Dev] Re: WIRED: Kilers have more fun

[Mike Sellers]

At 08:42 PM 6/29/98 +0100, Marian Griffith wrote:
>In <URL:/archives/meow?group+local.muddev> on Mon 29 Jun, Koster, Raph wrote:
>
>> If you are coding a system whereby nobody can strike another person
>> *even in justifiable circumstances*, what sort of society have you made,
>> and what sort of ruler are you?
>
>Here we have a point worth of very serious discussion. And one where I
>very much have to disagree with you. I do not belief that there can be
>justifiable circumstances to strike at somebody else.  At least not in
>a game that attempts to provide a safe environment. And I'm willing to
>argue  that the same is true in games like uol  that do not attempt to
>create a safe environment.  However this is indicative on your view on
>violence in games (a view that is shared by many current players).
>Where violence and conflict is not a part of the game all rules change

This is an interesting point.  While you may disapprove of violence, you
must admit that it is part of how humans have resolved their problems for
millennia. You may find it distasteful and inappropriate today, but that
does not mean it's not there.  Prohibiting violent behavior in an online
world is kind of like prohibiting the color green -- sure you can do it if
you don't like it, but is your world diminished for doing so? =20

Rather than creating an online world (which, as part of *my* assumptions,
is intended to some degree to act as an immersive, familiar, comprehensible
quasi-simulation supporting a wide range of interactions) that simply
excludes violence, why not instead create a world within which the
inhabitants (that is, the players) have the realistic ability to create
areas in which violence is also deemed inappropriate?  This has all sorts
of social prerequisites and consequences, but that's where a lot of the fun
of the game/world/simulation can be found.  If some players value being
able to be online without the fear of violence, and others have the
propensity for violence, then there must be a third group who are willing
to prevent the second group from infringing on the first -- and thus there
is the foundations of an economy, with valuable services being exchanged
(and no, I'm not suggesting people have to RP cops or guards or whatever --
there are many ways around problems of playing boring roles). =20


>> A system where it is not even possible
>> to rebel against the thoroughly oppressive government, for that matter.
>> In the virtual setting, we have as designers and admins, the power of
>> gods. And yes, there are plenty of people willing to live under the rule
>> of jerks, plenty of people who would prefer to live their virtual lives
>> in a game where bullets can't fly by the laws of physics, where you can
>> wave a hand, but are programmed not to swing a fist. But I find it
>> unpalatable persnally--and also find it limiting to the development of
>> our code in that it reduces the problem set past the point of reason. If
>> you, as I know you do, Mike, feel that the work we do here is working
>> towards greater things in the colonization of the Internet, in the
>> development of virtual societies and virtual realities, then you must
>> also concede that we are not going to solve the issues that those
>> environments will create by coding in piles of restrictions that curtail
>> freedoms.
>
>Freedom of course is a myth anyway.  There is only the question if the
>laws are enforced before or after the event. Freedom only exists while
>it does not limit the freedom of others.=20

No, freedom is not a myth!  In fact, I would say that the single biggest
reason why people are dissatisfied with UO today (or M59 last year) is
because these games unexpectedly constrain their freedom at every turn.
More pointedly, these games *advertise* freedom and then don't provide it
-- many players *can't* do the things they really want because either the
game or other players constrain them from doing so. =20


Now, in most games your freedom is greatly constrained.  In card games you
cannot play with chess pieces, or make up your own winning hands; in video
games you are restricted to the viewpoint, character set, and goals set by
the designers.  These are ways, as someone else said, of "reducing the
problem set" to the point where the game in more-or-less instantly
comprehensible.  MUDs are different because, for the most part, they
purport to be different, and because they *can* be different.  Building a
persistent, long-term world based on Super Mario is not especially tenable;
but that is precisely what most MUDs are trying to do. =20

So here's my hypothesis: the more persistence a game/world tries to have;
the longer it is set up to last; the greater number (and broader variety)
of people it tries to attract; and in general the more immersive a
game/world sets out to be -- then the more breadth and depth of human
experience it needs to support to be successful for more than, say, 12-24
months.  If you try to create a deeply immersive, broadly appealing,
long-lasting world that does not adequtely provide for human tendencies
such as violence, acquisition, justice, family, community, exploration,
etc. (and I would contend we are nowhere close to doing this), you will see
two results: first, individuals in the population will begin to display a
wide range of fairly predictable socially pathological behaviors (including
general malaise, complaining, excessive bullying and/or PKing, harassment,
territoriality, inappropriate aggression, and open rebellion against those
who run the game), and second, people will eventually vote with their feet
-- but only after having passionately cast "a pox on both your houses." =20

In essence, if you set people up for an experience they deeply crave (and
mostly cannot find IRL) and then don't deliver, they will become like
spurned lovers -- some become sullen or aggressive or neurotic, and
eventually almost all leave. =20


> ...By deliberately disrupting somebody's
>game  you are basically commiting a crime.  Those who do not enjoy the
>anarchistic principles of current muds  could accept the limitation of
>their personal freedom  to prevent such events/crimes from occuring in
>the first place. I know I would not mind.

I suspect that yours is a strongly European cultural bias; I know that many
(most?) USAmericans would not feel the same. =20

>> To get back to what you said, I think that a pure roleplay game of large

>> size will have to be a Stalinist setup, yes. And I don't LIKE it. Then
>> again, I think that MANY muds currently use such a restrictive setup.
>
>Restrictive does not make it stalinist. Nor fascist. The game prevents
>certain actions that would,  if unchecked one way or the other, become
>harmfull to the majority of the players.=20

That is at least centralized and paternalistic -- it presumes that those
running the game know better what actions are harmful and what restrictions
are valid better than do those in the game, which may or may not be the
case.  It thus removes even the *possibility* that members of the
population may in fact be able to do a better job of this regulation
(anathema to many Americans :-) ). =20

Finally, running things this way quickly becomes quasi-Stalinist when
control is entirely centralized and the penalty for stepping outside the
lines is swift, severe (IC death or OOC banishment from the game), and
hugely imperfect, being based on imperfect algorithms and/or sysop
preference.  This is, I believe, an adequate description for how the
majority of online worlds are currently run. =20


--

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