May 2005
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt the MMO community? Jaycen Rigger
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt the MMOcommunity? Barry Kearns
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt the MMOcommunity? Jaycen Rigger
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? Matt Mihaly
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? Barry Kearns
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? Jaycen Rigger
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurttheMMOcommunity? Matt Mihaly
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurttheMMOcommunity? Barry Kearns
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheatinghurttheMMOcommunity? Tom Hunter
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheatinghurttheMMOcommunity? Steve "Bloo" Daniels
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheatinghurttheMMOcommunity? Jon A. Lambert
- SOC: Will company sanctionedcheatinghurttheMMOcommunity? Freeman, Jeff
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? Morris Cox
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt the MMOcommunity? Chris Richards
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt the MMOcommunity? Paul Schwanz
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt the MMO community? Peter Harkins
On Sat, Apr 30, 2005 at 11:55:44PM -0700, Jaycen Rigger wrote:
> What the hell is the point of playing if the rich can do whatever
> they want, while the rest of us have to slog through the normal
> game mechanics to get by? Buying virtual property outside of the
> game mechanics is cheating, pure and simple. Sony could police it
> if they wanted to, but they're too damned lazy and greedy to do
> it.
> Congratulations, Sony. May your blackened souls rot in digital
> hell.
This rant reminded me powerfully of David Sirlin's description of
the "scrub" as a player who invents their own rules of conduct that
prevent them from winning games[1]. Sirlin is a tournament-level
player of fighting games like Street Fighter and observes that
there's a class of players who regard "a wide variety of tactics and
situations 'cheap'" or as cheating.
http://www.sirlin.net/Features/feature_PlayToWinPart1.htm
There's three sets of rules at work here: Rigger's, Sony's, and the
actual implementation of Sony's rules. Buying and selling of
characters and equipment was not prohibited in the implementation of
Sony's rules, Sony changed their rules to permit it, and Rigger
refuses to accept the situation.
Part of this is about managing expectations, but because the
intersections between the real and virtual worlds are so uncharted,
players are strongly guided by their own intuition rather than a set
of shared community standards. EverQuest's norms allowed this
commerce but Rigger (and plenty of other people, judging from the
flames I've seen) don't share them. They were content to ignore the
practice when it was "unofficial" and they could point and laugh at
people who got burned, but Sony's acceptance has left them feeling
betrayed. Their opinion used to be the official one and now it's
not.
I don't mean to belittle these players or their feelings. I'm trying
to point out in frank language how this is an interesting and
complex conjunction of what games are, human personalities, and
human societies. This is the stuff virtual worlds live and breath,
and I think it's the most interesting part of virtual worlds.
Perhaps Sony could have handled this better by presenting it as an
anti-fraud program, but it's doubtful. The only reason everyone
didn't want to immediately throttle Captain Renault from Casablanca
when he was "Shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in
here!" is because it was done amusingly (so the audience immediately
smiled) and because Renault was being forced by the Nazis (so it
wasn't *really* his fault). Sony just didn't have those cards to
play, so it's hoping to trump with its "large profitable companies
can weather storms" card.
[1] In the article linked he at first defines it scrubs as
"unskilled players", but in later articles and posts on his forums
he narrows it to players with this behavior.
--
Peter Harkins - ph at malaprop.org - http://malaprop.org - SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt the MMO community? Sean Marshall
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurttheMMOcommunity? P J
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt the MMO community? John MacQueen
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt the MMO community? Peter Yu
- Concerning "Groups" Paolo Piselli
- Concerning "Groups" Jeff Gaskill
- Concerning "Groups" Koster, Raph
- Concerning "Groups" Jason Downs
- Action Figures John Buehler
- Action Figures John Buehler
- Action Figures Tom Gordon
- OT: UO Robin Hood Jaycen Rigger
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Jaycen Rigger
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Matt Mihaly
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy John Buehler
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Chris Richards
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Jaycen Rigger
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy cruise
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Jaycen Rigger
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Paul Schwanz
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Jaycen Rigger
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Paul Schwanz
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Jaycen Rigger
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Paul Schwanz
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy benton
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Rayzam
- DGN: Lords, Vassals, Serfs and the Clergy Jaycen Rigger
- DESIGN: Loot on demand (was: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity?) Freeman, Jeff
- DESIGN: Loot on demand (was: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity?) Cosmik
- DESIGN: Loot on demand (was: Will company sanctionedcheating hurt theMMOcommunity?) Koster, Raph
- DESIGN: Loot on demand (was: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity?) Jaycen Rigger
- Guest Voices #2: Griefing in Online Games Shannon Appelcline
- Guest Voices #2: Griefing in Online Games Joseph Hewitt
- Guest Voices #2: Griefing in Online Games Mike Rozak
- Guest Voices #2: Griefing in Online Games Jaycen Rigger
- Guest Voices #2: Griefing in Online Games
- Guest Voices #2: Griefing in Online Games J C Lawrence
- Guest Voices #2: Griefing in Online Games Paul Schwanz
- Guest Voices #2: Griefing in Online Games Mike Shaver
- Guest Voices #2: Griefing in Online Games J C Lawrence
- Guest Voices #2: Griefing in Online Games John Buehler
- [ANN] Solipsis, a shared virtual worlds in python J C Lawrence
- SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurttheMMOcommunity? ghovs
- Mud Dev FAQ - Part 2 Marian Griffith
- DGN: Emergent Behaviors spawned from - SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? Jaycen Rigger
- DGN: Emergent Behaviors spawned from - SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? Otis Viles
- DGN: Emergent Behaviors spawned from - SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? David Wright
- DGN: Emergent Behaviors spawned from - SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? Otis Viles
- DGN: Emergent Behaviors spawned from - SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? J C Lawrence
- DGN: Emergent Behaviors spawned from - SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? Michael Hartman
- DGN: Emergent Behaviors spawned from - SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? Adam Spivey
- DGN: Emergent Behaviors spawned from - SOC: Will company sanctioned cheating hurt theMMOcommunity? Jaycen Rigger
- DGN: Absolutes, percentages and ranges cruise
- DGN: Absolutes, percentages and ranges Paolo Piselli
- DGN: Absolutes, percentages and ranges Brian Hook
- What level maximum do players like best? Eric
- What level maximum do players like best? Mordengaard
- What level maximum do players like best? Pandora
- What level maximum do players like best? cruise
- What level maximum do players like best? Jaycen Rigger
- What level maximum do players like best? Damion Schubert
- Comments on Griefing Article J C Lawrence