social-structures
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Hyperspace Beacon: How do I play a Sith in SWTOR?
This is another one of those questions that I get asked a lot: How do I play a Sith in Star Wars: The Old Republic? I hope I'm asked because people like what they see and that I am also a good player as well as roleplayer, but I don't by any means believe that I have a grasp on everything that it takes to play a Sith. And I also believe that other people have a great -- if not better -- gasp on the nuances of the Sith personality. On top of that, many people don't play a Sith the way I do, so I don't want to discount that either. When I play SWTOR, I intend to have fun, and what I consider fun isn't the same as what other people call fun. I should give fair warning before diving into this outline: I'm not going to teach you the basics of roleplay; I'm going to hope that you already know that or that you've hopped over to Storyboard a few times. Secondly, I will use terms like "proper" or "best." Understand that I use those words from my perspective and that other players have a different and equally legitimate perspective, too. Lastly, this is far from exhaustive, and if you have any questions, I will spend some time in the comments answering them, or you can feel free to hit me up on Twitter.
Storyboard: The social contract
Have you ever thought about the fact that every single one of your characters is a murdering thief? Picture the scene for a moment: You have a group of people living in an isolated and rural community. Without warning, a man with heavy weaponry bursts in and starts hacking his way through every inhabitant of the community, smashing his way into locked houses. But he also stops at the body of each victim to gather any money or important belongings, slowly working his way through the community until there's nothing left but carrion and a few trinkets he didn't deem valuable enough to steal. On the news, this would be up there as a pretty shocking tragedy. In an MMO, this is a good chunk of the gameplay. And that brings to mind one of the major issues that faced by roleplayers hoping for verisimilitude: the horrible discrepancies between the social contract as we understand it and the one employed by the characters in the game. They're divergent sometimes, identical at other times, and universally ambiguous.
Ethnologist researches the development of social skills in World of Warcraft
A lot of players probably think that World of Warcraft breeds social skills, to the extent that contempt for one's fellow human beings can be considered a social skill. But according to Peter Stenberg of Umea University in Sweden, there are some actual developments taking place when you play. Stenberg has just released a thesis detailing the social developments he observed during his 250-day stint in the game, discussing the ways in which the virtual environment begins to blend into the real world and develop complex social structures. As Stenberg puts it, the overall atmosphere of the game forms a collective and developed society apart from the real world, something he claims "challenges the rather persistent view of the computer game enthusiast as a lone figure with only a flickering screen for company." Of course, veteran players of MMOs have no doubt noticed a wide variety of social structures that develop within a game, but Stenberg's work is interesting if for no other reason than it's meant as a serious examination of the phenomenon.
A wrap-up of the Paradox Interactive MMO conference in NYC
If you're unfamiliar with Paradox Interactive, you could be forgiven -- it's never been a flashy studio. But it does have a very solid track record of producing historical simulations and strategy games, including the critically acclaimed Mount & Blade and the Europa Universalis series. So when the company's New York convention includes two upcoming online games, it's with a background of producing solid games with a strongly simulationist angle. Two titles, Dreamlords Resurrection and Salem, were both on display at the conference, with two very different foci but similar levels of polish. Dreamlords Resurrection is an MMORTS with an emphasis on player armies rather than on city building. Players take on the role of a newly awakened Dreamlord attempting to work with allied players to claim as much land as possible... with the caveat that the game's regular resets will keep any one group of players from becoming too overpowering. Salem, meanwhile, is a sandbox game that plans to include not only open PvP but the threat of permanent death, forcing players to hopefully band together and police behavior. Both sound like interesting takes on the genre that will give players plenty to mull over as they move through development.
CCP Games lead economist on social structures in EVE Online
Phil Elliott from Gamesindustry.biz recently conducted an interview with CCP Games Lead Economist Dr. Eyjólfur Guðmundsson (known as CCP Dr. EyjoG) titled "Star Bucks." While the interview discussed the importance of social structures in EVE Online given the game's single-shard nature and of course the game's economics, he was asked questions about gameplay and some of the core foundations of the game -- namely the freedom to act and the consequences that result (or the perceived lack of consequences). Dr. EyjoG was asked about the concept of trust in the sandbox game, how some players feel there's not enough reciprocity in terms of consequences for one's actions in EVE. "Should we provide more security, more traceability -- that would help it out, but it's definitely a game design and balance question. For us we see the universe as it is, we don't see that need... at this point at least," Dr. EyjoG responded. The interview also hinted at some of the as-yet unrealized possibilities in the game such as player-requests to tie sovereignty in with rules that govern those regions of controlled territory and what the game might be like years down the line.
