Anti-Aliased: The mailbag edition pt. 2
I do really think limiting the gender of a person's character based on his/her real life gender is pretty outdated and useless. You pick the gender of the character you want to play (hence the "Role Play" RP in MMORPG) and you go from there. I know too many people who have characters of both gender, or who choose a gender based on the customization options available in the game.
And, lastly, yes, I'd be super pissed at an MMO if they only let me play as a guy. I like being the small female Paladin who stops thrown trucks with her shield, or the lithe amazon warrior who dances in combat with her polearm. That's fun to me.
So, there's your answer Matt. Thanks for the question. Next victim! *slams the gong again*
Just a thought:
Not long ago I was listening to EVE's Alliance Tournament via New Eden Radio. As a friend's Corp's match came to an end, the colour commentators made some fairly disparaging remarks about the fact that they were a roleplaying corp. This was really the first time I took a long, hard look and realized the divide between the folks who play the game as an RP experience and the folks who are just gaming the system. I'm not convinced that either is the "right" way, as that's the way things also tend to run in tabletop gaming as well. You'll always have the heavy RPers and the people who want to game the system. I do think roleplayers are beginning to find themselves in the minority in a lot of these games, though.
"I do think you're right and roleplaying is becoming a dying art."
|
Well Centrum God, that's not really a question, but I like your style, so I'll throw out a few comments and parable for ya. It's a two for one deal.
I do think you're right and roleplaying is becoming a dying art. Many companies open roleplaying servers but refuse to properly administrate them, usually sending roleplayers up the walls as their idea of fun is trounced on by a loudmouthed nine year old who thinks because he has his mother's credit card he's entitled to spew profanity at random passersby every 10 seconds. (I'm not bitter, no not at all!) Beyond that, many games don't take the time anymore to foster socialization outside of the occasional instance or group quest. We don't foster or create communities because every company is striving to have huge numbers like World of Warcraft, striving for quantity over quality of service.
However, color me horribly surprised when I was walking around Pandemonium in Aion three nights ago. I passed not one, not two, but three whole roleplaying events that were not being disturbed by griefers. And these weren't small events either — these were big. I saw a guild running an in-character dueling tournament, another guild getting absolutely smashed at Pandemonium's local bar, and a third guild actually praying in-character as daevas.
These events were in high traffic zones in the game's major capital city. Granted, Lumiel is the unofficial roleplaying server of the game, but it still astounded me that these people weren't getting their events griefed by every PvPrtard that walked by. I was astonished and I was really, really happy.
Roleplaying is a dying art... but it's not quite dead, thank goodness.
*bangs the gong one last time, only to have it fall off the wall and crack against the floor*
Er... um... that's it for this week's Anti-Aliased! Thanks again to MCC Student, Matt, Vitamin Dei, and everyone who sent me questions! If you weren't in the column, check your e-mails in the next few days for answers from me! Come back next week for a rousing edition of Sera repairs the office's floor while Shawn threatens to fire her! *flees*
Seraphina Brennan is the weekly writer of Anti-Aliased who is running as fast as she can to avoid the wrath of Schuster's Ungodly Large Repair Bill of the Gong Mishap. When she's not writing here for Massively, she's rambling on her personal blog, The Experience Curve. If you want to message her, send her an e-mail at seraphina AT massively DOT com. You can also follow her on Twitter through Massively, or through her personal feed, @sera_brennan.