WEBVTT - How MMORPGS Work 0:00:00.320 --> 0:00:03.000 Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve Camray. 0:00:03.240 --> 0:00:08.760 It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With 0:00:08.880 --> 0:00:14.720 tech stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hi there, 0:00:14.760 --> 0:00:17.079 welcome to the podcast. My name is Chris paul At. 0:00:17.160 --> 0:00:19.520 I'm an edder here at How Stuff Works, and today 0:00:19.600 --> 0:00:22.599 I have sitting next to me writer Jonathan Strickland. Thing 0:00:24.200 --> 0:00:27.560 I just leveled up. Okay, yeah, there there's an idea 0:00:27.560 --> 0:00:29.960 that we were playing with, and that was to tackle 0:00:30.560 --> 0:00:34.720 massively multiplayer online role playing games or m m O RPGs. 0:00:35.040 --> 0:00:37.440 It's one of those one of those few times where 0:00:37.440 --> 0:00:40.360 the acronym is is almost, if not more difficult to 0:00:40.400 --> 0:00:45.879 say than the full thing. Right. Yeah, they they're they're very, 0:00:46.000 --> 0:00:49.440 very popular, extremely popular. They're so popular, they're more popular 0:00:49.479 --> 0:00:52.080 than popular things. Okay, I don't know what you know. 0:00:52.200 --> 0:00:55.760 And Korea they're huge too, that's true. That's their enormous 0:00:55.800 --> 0:00:58.920 Actually Asia really they really do dominate. But let's let's 0:00:59.240 --> 0:01:01.360 jump ahead of our kind of talk about what these 0:01:01.360 --> 0:01:04.760 things are. So for those of you who don't know UM, 0:01:04.959 --> 0:01:07.440 and I imagine that's probably a very small minority, but 0:01:07.480 --> 0:01:10.840 this is a there, it's a game that UM that 0:01:10.959 --> 0:01:13.880 you where you take on the persona of a character 0:01:14.360 --> 0:01:18.280 that lives within a certain virtual world. That world could 0:01:18.319 --> 0:01:22.959 be anything from fantasy setting, like a token esque kind 0:01:22.959 --> 0:01:26.520 of fantasy sorcery right sword and sorcery, Or it could 0:01:26.560 --> 0:01:29.360 be science fiction. It could be the wild West, it 0:01:29.360 --> 0:01:35.080 could be a vampire society. Really, it's just limited to 0:01:35.160 --> 0:01:38.200 the imagination of the person creating the game or corporation 0:01:38.280 --> 0:01:42.000 creating the game. Um. But you create a persona that 0:01:42.080 --> 0:01:46.119 exists within this universe, and you play through that persona, 0:01:46.680 --> 0:01:52.080 exploring the world, achieving tasks, making friends and enemies. Um. 0:01:52.120 --> 0:01:55.800 And you're doing it online over the internet along at 0:01:56.160 --> 0:01:59.120 with about you know, a couple of thousand to several 0:01:59.160 --> 0:02:03.080 hundred thousand other people at the same time. So it's 0:02:03.600 --> 0:02:07.800 it's a social thing because you do encounter actual other players. 0:02:07.840 --> 0:02:10.079 I mean they're the characters. Many of the characters you 0:02:10.200 --> 0:02:12.640 encounter will have at the other end of them a real, 0:02:12.760 --> 0:02:17.200 live human being controlling that character. Um. And yet it's 0:02:17.200 --> 0:02:20.160 also a computer game. So that's that's sort of the 0:02:20.160 --> 0:02:22.639 the pie in the sky kind of m m O 0:02:22.840 --> 0:02:25.640 RPG rundown I guess. Yeah. But if you didn't know 0:02:25.680 --> 0:02:29.040 the the acronym and the name for it. You probably 0:02:29.080 --> 0:02:31.760 heard at least of some of the games like World 0:02:31.800 --> 0:02:34.880 of Warcraft, which is by far the most popular it's 0:02:34.880 --> 0:02:37.520 got in the United States. Well, that's true. Well it's 0:02:37.560 --> 0:02:41.920 got quite a few fans overseas as well, but request 0:02:42.800 --> 0:02:46.560 um some others. Right, Well, and we can wait, Loot 0:02:47.520 --> 0:02:50.119 spent a couple of Yeah, we can spend a couple 0:02:50.120 --> 0:02:52.840 of minutes talking about sort of where this whole idea 0:02:52.919 --> 0:02:55.519 came from. Yeah, that's true, that's that's where we are now. 0:02:55.560 --> 0:02:58.880 But you know it didn't happen overnight. No, this is 0:02:58.960 --> 0:03:02.960 this is a It was a process of evolution, and 0:03:03.320 --> 0:03:05.880 Chris and I can probably talk a little bit about 0:03:05.919 --> 0:03:09.919 the the source for this, UH this kind of game 0:03:10.120 --> 0:03:14.920 because he and I have both been exposed to it. UM. 0:03:14.960 --> 0:03:18.720 Back in the late seventies, UH a war gamer or 0:03:18.720 --> 0:03:21.920 a few war gamers were trying to find a way 0:03:22.000 --> 0:03:28.640 to have smaller UM squad based adventures as opposed to 0:03:28.800 --> 0:03:34.440 giant battle confrontations, and a couple of them UH started 0:03:34.480 --> 0:03:37.840 to develop this idea of a role playing game. This 0:03:37.880 --> 0:03:40.000 was a paper and pencil game. You had you had 0:03:40.000 --> 0:03:43.320 a piece of paper where you would create a character 0:03:43.760 --> 0:03:46.920 and you would generate stats with some sort of random 0:03:47.000 --> 0:03:51.200 number generator, which in those days were dice. Um, different 0:03:51.240 --> 0:03:55.960 sided dice to to create different kind of stats. Yeah, 0:03:56.280 --> 0:03:59.240 I once upon a time had quite the dice bag, 0:04:00.240 --> 0:04:02.960 a huge collection. That is, since I have no idea 0:04:03.040 --> 0:04:07.200 where it is now, it's probably somewhere in my parents house. Um, 0:04:07.240 --> 0:04:09.040 but I have not seen it for many, many years. 0:04:09.360 --> 0:04:11.800 But at any rate, you would use these dice to 0:04:11.800 --> 0:04:15.520 create your character, also to kind of determine how random 0:04:15.760 --> 0:04:18.479 or or events that were based on chance, how what 0:04:18.600 --> 0:04:22.440 the outcome was, right? Right, So let's say you're encountering, uh, 0:04:22.960 --> 0:04:26.120 you're playing the most popular one is Dungeons and Dragons. 0:04:26.120 --> 0:04:28.320 I think that most people have probably heard it, right, 0:04:28.320 --> 0:04:32.360 That's the one everyone's probably at least heard in passing. Um. 0:04:32.440 --> 0:04:34.840 So let's say you're playing your Dungeons and Dragons, your 0:04:34.880 --> 0:04:38.560 your your third level paladin, your third level paladin encounters 0:04:38.720 --> 0:04:42.800 a cobald and you want to the cobolds attacking you, 0:04:42.839 --> 0:04:44.599 and you want to attack it. You know, you would 0:04:44.680 --> 0:04:48.159 roll a die to determine, based upon your paladin's abilities, 0:04:48.480 --> 0:04:52.960 whether or not your strike makes contact. Yeah, it's not 0:04:53.040 --> 0:04:56.480 like you have to imagine here if you've never played 0:04:56.560 --> 0:04:59.800 one of these pencil and paper games that it's not 0:05:00.279 --> 0:05:02.400 if you've played World of Warcraft, it all sort of 0:05:02.440 --> 0:05:05.400 happens in real time. The computer is generating those numbers 0:05:05.640 --> 0:05:07.880 as you're playing the game, and it's you know, you 0:05:07.960 --> 0:05:11.760 attack and you can only swing your sword so fast. Um. 0:05:11.800 --> 0:05:14.280 But with these pencil and paper games, there was somebody 0:05:14.320 --> 0:05:16.640 who would run the game. It would tell you what's 0:05:16.680 --> 0:05:18.480 going on, and you'd have to ask, you know, well, 0:05:18.680 --> 0:05:21.000 what does my character see? Like, Well, this is all 0:05:21.040 --> 0:05:22.719 of a sudden, this thing jumps out at you and 0:05:22.760 --> 0:05:25.000 you don't know what it is. It's like, what does 0:05:25.040 --> 0:05:27.360 it look like? And you have to ask because you're 0:05:27.360 --> 0:05:29.919 playing a role you don't know, you know, it's not 0:05:29.960 --> 0:05:31.920 in front of you. You have to guess. And they 0:05:31.960 --> 0:05:34.600 have to say, well, there's a thirty percent chance that 0:05:34.640 --> 0:05:38.800 you're going to completely miss roll the die and it says, well, sorry, 0:05:38.839 --> 0:05:41.320 you missed, and now you're getting ready to die. It 0:05:41.360 --> 0:05:44.120 was really really a kind of interactive storytelling. Sure, and 0:05:44.960 --> 0:05:46.880 some people got more into it than others. Some people 0:05:46.920 --> 0:05:49.359 would really take the role playing part of the game 0:05:49.600 --> 0:05:52.760 very seriously. They would they would be in character as 0:05:52.760 --> 0:05:55.279 they're playing. Yeah, we even have an article called how 0:05:55.520 --> 0:05:58.920 live action role play, which is about people who dress 0:05:59.000 --> 0:06:00.919 up in the costumes and actual to go out and 0:06:00.920 --> 0:06:03.159 and you know, interact with one another in person and 0:06:03.600 --> 0:06:07.279 pretend to be those characters, right and so um, for them, 0:06:07.360 --> 0:06:09.680 the role is the most important part. Other people, it's 0:06:09.720 --> 0:06:12.520 the game part. You know, they're really interested in their 0:06:12.520 --> 0:06:16.080 stats and uh, you know, collecting the weapons exactly. They 0:06:16.600 --> 0:06:19.440 and the same sort of uh, some sort of behaviors 0:06:19.440 --> 0:06:22.080 have kind of spilled into the m M O RPG world. 0:06:22.080 --> 0:06:23.880 But before we get into that, we can go to 0:06:23.920 --> 0:06:27.240 the next step, which really was the computer role playing game, 0:06:27.800 --> 0:06:31.440 which was again text, right, the original ones were text 0:06:31.440 --> 0:06:33.799 and then and then you would get some primitive graphics 0:06:33.800 --> 0:06:36.640 like I played the Wizardry series and the Wizardry one, two, 0:06:36.680 --> 0:06:39.600 and three, infect um, and those were those had some graphics, 0:06:39.640 --> 0:06:42.279 although they were very primitive graphics, and things like Bard's 0:06:42.320 --> 0:06:45.880 Tail and the Ultimate series and uh, but in general, 0:06:45.920 --> 0:06:48.599 you still weren't playing these online with other people. You 0:06:48.600 --> 0:06:50.480 were basically they were just telling you what you were 0:06:50.520 --> 0:06:52.800 doing and you say, okay, I go left. Right. There 0:06:52.839 --> 0:06:55.080 was no real role playing like that. I mean, you 0:06:55.080 --> 0:06:57.840 had you had a character you controlled, but you didn't 0:06:57.880 --> 0:07:00.359 really they told you your role, yeah, you and you 0:07:00.360 --> 0:07:03.440 didn't really you know, you couldn't, especially the early ones, 0:07:03.440 --> 0:07:06.520 you couldn't really talk to anyone. You couldn't establish a personality. 0:07:06.560 --> 0:07:09.520 You were just kind of, you know, taking through stuff right. 0:07:10.200 --> 0:07:13.200 The later ones ultimate things like that, there was a 0:07:13.240 --> 0:07:15.360 little bit more where you you know, depending on how 0:07:15.440 --> 0:07:18.200 you talk to people during conversations that could change the 0:07:18.200 --> 0:07:21.200 outcome of the game. So that kind of started getting 0:07:21.200 --> 0:07:22.680 a little bit of a role playing thing in there, 0:07:22.680 --> 0:07:24.880 but still it was it was a one person, one 0:07:24.920 --> 0:07:28.080 computer experience, so there wasn't any real social interaction. You're 0:07:28.120 --> 0:07:31.280 just kind of it's this artificial social interaction with these 0:07:31.320 --> 0:07:34.320 these nonplayer characters that are all controlled by the computer. 0:07:35.680 --> 0:07:39.400 So that moves us on to when the Internet started 0:07:39.440 --> 0:07:41.800 really making it big. One of the first things that 0:07:41.840 --> 0:07:44.200 college students started figuring out how to do was making 0:07:44.240 --> 0:07:47.800 games that they could play with other people over the Internet. 0:07:48.440 --> 0:07:52.080 And there were three major kinds of these games when 0:07:52.120 --> 0:07:54.360 they first started hitting the internet. Um, they were all 0:07:54.440 --> 0:07:57.640 kind of related. Uh. There were MUDs, which stands for 0:07:57.880 --> 0:08:01.280 multi User Dungeon. There were Moves, which was a mud 0:08:01.440 --> 0:08:04.400 object oriented game, so the objects could have their own 0:08:04.600 --> 0:08:09.160 um um abilities and traits and objects or anything in 0:08:09.200 --> 0:08:11.720 the game. Really they could not just necessarily like a 0:08:11.760 --> 0:08:13.720 sword or a pot, but it could be a person, 0:08:13.800 --> 0:08:15.200 that could be a table, it could be you know, 0:08:15.200 --> 0:08:18.400 pretty much anything. And then you had the Mush, which 0:08:18.440 --> 0:08:22.840 was a multi user shared hallucination. A little tripy there, 0:08:22.880 --> 0:08:25.680 but these these were text based games where you could 0:08:25.720 --> 0:08:28.520 actually interact with other people all at the same time. 0:08:28.640 --> 0:08:32.880 So you'd be in this this world um reading about 0:08:32.920 --> 0:08:36.360 it and performing actions and um. There was a bit 0:08:36.400 --> 0:08:38.480 of a role playing aspect to it, although again a 0:08:38.520 --> 0:08:40.720 lot of people were really focusing more on the game 0:08:40.960 --> 0:08:43.720 than on the role and in my experience, a lot 0:08:43.800 --> 0:08:46.360 of them turned into chat rooms. You'd go into a 0:08:46.440 --> 0:08:49.200 section of the castle or whatever, and then people would 0:08:49.240 --> 0:08:53.520 jump out of character and just start talking about whatever. 0:08:53.880 --> 0:08:56.480 It was very it was very much like uh like 0:08:57.000 --> 0:08:59.920 using some of the I r C type chatting, except 0:09:00.160 --> 0:09:03.360 that people were you were theoretically in a castle somewhere 0:09:03.440 --> 0:09:07.000 and you know, and some people just chose it. They'd 0:09:07.040 --> 0:09:09.240 look at it as the challenge to see who could 0:09:09.280 --> 0:09:12.120 get the highest level the fastest. You know. Again, it's 0:09:12.160 --> 0:09:14.760 not a lot of role playing there. But then UM 0:09:15.120 --> 0:09:18.600 as time went on, there were some game developers who 0:09:18.679 --> 0:09:21.560 were really determined on making bringing this to the next level, 0:09:21.600 --> 0:09:23.920 which is really adding graphics to it and having a 0:09:24.559 --> 0:09:27.160 um at least a two D, if not three D 0:09:27.360 --> 0:09:31.079 kind of experience. UM so that it made it more immersive, 0:09:31.320 --> 0:09:33.160 and it wasn't you know, you weren't just reading text 0:09:33.200 --> 0:09:35.120 because a lot of people just skip over the text anyway. 0:09:35.160 --> 0:09:38.600 You might have spent twenty minutes writing the perfect room description, 0:09:38.920 --> 0:09:40.880 but everyone else just wants to see what's the monster 0:09:41.000 --> 0:09:44.360 that's in there and where's the nearest exit. Um. So 0:09:44.679 --> 0:09:48.280 that's when two games in particular really started taking the 0:09:48.880 --> 0:09:52.679 lead on that. One of them was Ultimate Online, which 0:09:52.920 --> 0:09:55.960 was a project that that evolved out of the Ultimate 0:09:56.000 --> 0:10:01.560 Game series developed by Richard Garriott Richard lord Ish Garriott UM. 0:10:01.600 --> 0:10:03.840 And the other was ever Quest, and for the longest 0:10:03.840 --> 0:10:05.920 time that was the that was the Those were the 0:10:05.960 --> 0:10:09.080 two biggies. Ever Quest and Ultimate Online really battled it 0:10:09.080 --> 0:10:11.280 out to be the leader, and ultimon Line I think 0:10:11.280 --> 0:10:14.559 had the early edge, but ever Quest quickly overtook them. 0:10:14.760 --> 0:10:17.719 Um ultimon On line suffered some problems with griefers, which 0:10:17.760 --> 0:10:20.720 are players who specifically make it their purpose in life 0:10:20.760 --> 0:10:23.840 to ruin the good time of everybody else, right right, 0:10:24.280 --> 0:10:28.160 And these, uh, these games are what I think of, 0:10:28.360 --> 0:10:31.920 at least in my from what I've read or what 0:10:32.080 --> 0:10:34.160 I think I was the beginning of the M M 0:10:34.200 --> 0:10:38.360 O RPG economy because people started and and this may 0:10:38.400 --> 0:10:39.719 sound weird to you if you've never played one of 0:10:39.720 --> 0:10:43.800 these games, but people would start selling virtual items for 0:10:44.000 --> 0:10:47.280 real cash. Um. There was an article in Wired magazine 0:10:47.280 --> 0:10:49.560 a few years ago about somebody who was a player 0:10:49.559 --> 0:10:53.439 on Ultima who had a horde of weapons and things 0:10:53.440 --> 0:10:57.240 that he was selling for American dollars um, so you 0:10:57.280 --> 0:10:59.400 could he Basically, they would play the game. And there 0:10:59.400 --> 0:11:01.720 are people if you look on some of the search engines, 0:11:01.800 --> 0:11:04.640 you can find a way to play for money. And 0:11:04.679 --> 0:11:07.079 I think what they're doing, I didn't, you know, it's 0:11:07.120 --> 0:11:09.280 in a hurry, but I think what they're doing is 0:11:09.520 --> 0:11:12.960 they pay you to go on, create a character, play through, 0:11:13.080 --> 0:11:15.360 get some weapons, and then also they will give you 0:11:15.400 --> 0:11:17.200 cash for those weapons so that they can turn around 0:11:17.240 --> 0:11:20.400 and give uh, you know, get five for a plus 0:11:20.480 --> 0:11:23.680 two sort of cleaving vegetables. Right. There's also there are 0:11:23.679 --> 0:11:26.319 also people who will play your character for you so 0:11:26.360 --> 0:11:30.040 that you advanced. There will be an experienced grinders, right, 0:11:30.080 --> 0:11:32.040 just so that you have a stronger character faster, and 0:11:32.040 --> 0:11:34.959 you don't have to go through the drudgery of leveling up, 0:11:35.559 --> 0:11:37.840 which really kind of defeats the whole purpose of a 0:11:37.960 --> 0:11:40.040 game when you think about it. I mean, they're looking 0:11:40.080 --> 0:11:42.160 for the reward, and yeah, there, it depends on what 0:11:42.200 --> 0:11:45.000 you're trying to get out of virtual reward. It's not 0:11:45.120 --> 0:11:47.839 a real reward. The whole point of the game is 0:11:47.880 --> 0:11:49.800 to enjoy it while you're playing it, and the only 0:11:49.880 --> 0:11:52.719 enjoyment you get is having the strongest character. How long 0:11:52.760 --> 0:11:56.160 does that last? That's that's true. That's true, And and 0:11:56.320 --> 0:11:59.600 there are other examples. A Second Life had a crash 0:11:59.640 --> 0:12:02.840 of its it's bank system a few months ago. Of course, 0:12:02.880 --> 0:12:05.000 Second Life isn't really a role playing game, well it 0:12:05.120 --> 0:12:07.840 kind of, I guess in a way, it's more I 0:12:07.840 --> 0:12:09.560 think of it more of as a virtual environment. But 0:12:09.600 --> 0:12:12.040 it does definitely have some m m O RPG elements 0:12:12.080 --> 0:12:15.080 to it, and and do create an avatar. And I 0:12:15.120 --> 0:12:17.240 have I have a controversial thing. I want to uh 0:12:17.320 --> 0:12:18.720 to mention it. I don't know. I don't want to 0:12:18.720 --> 0:12:20.120 take you off the track because you had some things 0:12:20.120 --> 0:12:23.080 you wanted to talk about. But um here here's what 0:12:23.200 --> 0:12:26.439 I think we should rename mm O RPGs. I think 0:12:26.440 --> 0:12:30.400 we should just call them games because pretty much everything 0:12:30.440 --> 0:12:33.320 now has some kind of online component to it. You 0:12:33.320 --> 0:12:37.040 can get a console game like Halo or you know 0:12:37.080 --> 0:12:39.319 some of the even some of the sports games and things, 0:12:39.360 --> 0:12:41.360 and you can play with other people and essentially you 0:12:41.360 --> 0:12:44.360 are playing maybe you're playing you know, Madden Football with 0:12:44.400 --> 0:12:47.480 somebody else online while you're playing you know, the Kansas 0:12:47.480 --> 0:12:50.880 City Chiefs. It's a it's a role and to some 0:12:50.960 --> 0:12:53.400 degree it is a role playing game. Yeah, you can 0:12:53.440 --> 0:12:55.480 think of it as a spectrum. I think. I mean 0:12:55.840 --> 0:12:57.920 because when I think of role playing games, I really 0:12:57.920 --> 0:13:02.400 do think that you're you're taking on a character. And ideally, 0:13:03.160 --> 0:13:06.520 if it's a true role playing game, you're you're in character, 0:13:06.640 --> 0:13:10.160 you're playing as that character. You're not you're not you 0:13:10.160 --> 0:13:14.800 wouldn't be Chris who happens to be playing the Dark 0:13:14.840 --> 0:13:19.280 Elf Mohawk like like Mr t Um. I don't know 0:13:19.280 --> 0:13:22.960 if you've seen that commercial. It's awesome, but it's uh yeah, 0:13:23.040 --> 0:13:26.400 so you you would want to you would want to 0:13:26.440 --> 0:13:29.199 be kind of part of this world, right, You're not, 0:13:29.520 --> 0:13:31.920 You're not just someone who's controlling a little guy. It's 0:13:31.960 --> 0:13:35.400 not like a remote control car. Ideally, ideally you are 0:13:35.480 --> 0:13:38.400 an inhabitant of this world. Um and I think, but 0:13:38.480 --> 0:13:40.760 even in games that are designed for that, you don't 0:13:40.760 --> 0:13:44.800 really find that the majority of players treated that way. Um. 0:13:44.840 --> 0:13:47.360 There there's always a core of players who really are 0:13:47.400 --> 0:13:49.240 serious about it, and they have a good time and 0:13:49.280 --> 0:13:51.079 they have fun with each other. But there are a 0:13:51.120 --> 0:13:52.920 lot more people, I think, who just go on there 0:13:52.960 --> 0:13:54.680 just to you know, kill a couple of hours, so 0:13:54.800 --> 0:13:57.000 they're not really into the hole. Let me take on 0:13:57.040 --> 0:13:59.240 this role and play this character. I think you have 0:13:59.280 --> 0:14:01.680 to be if you're one of the serious, more serious 0:14:01.720 --> 0:14:03.600 minded gamers, you have to be a little tolerant of 0:14:03.600 --> 0:14:05.200 the people who are just there to kill a couple 0:14:05.160 --> 0:14:07.640 of hours, right, And unfortunately the people are just there 0:14:07.679 --> 0:14:09.680 to kill a couple of hours aren't always tolerant of 0:14:09.760 --> 0:14:12.760 the core players because I mean, we think about it, it 0:14:12.640 --> 0:14:14.920 it does seem a little strange to run into someone 0:14:14.960 --> 0:14:16.880 who's something you know, it's a real person on the 0:14:16.880 --> 0:14:18.959 other end of this character, but they're still talking to you. 0:14:19.120 --> 0:14:22.440 Kind of funny that there there's a disconnect there that's 0:14:22.480 --> 0:14:24.160 hard to get past. But there are tons of these 0:14:24.200 --> 0:14:27.040 games out there right now, yea. And they're not all 0:14:27.080 --> 0:14:29.680 you know, shoot them ups. There are things like uh, 0:14:30.040 --> 0:14:32.840 you know, Puzzle Pirates, which is one of my favorite hope, 0:14:32.840 --> 0:14:35.680 Puzzle Pirates in which you solve puzzles to do your 0:14:36.280 --> 0:14:38.240 h to do your duties on the ship with your 0:14:38.320 --> 0:14:41.920 your mates, but you everyone talks like a pirate and 0:14:42.200 --> 0:14:44.440 they basically there is a chat element of it. It's 0:14:44.480 --> 0:14:48.960 a casual gaming thing. Um. They are other things like 0:14:49.200 --> 0:14:53.600 Club Penguin for kids or Hello Kitty online. You can 0:14:53.640 --> 0:14:59.040 tell I have a daughter in kindergarten because actually, oh stop, 0:14:59.040 --> 0:15:02.200 I just like um and and my my personal favorite 0:15:02.240 --> 0:15:04.400 that I'm really interested to see come out, which is 0:15:04.440 --> 0:15:07.160 supposed to be here in two thousand nine Lego Universe, 0:15:07.240 --> 0:15:10.640 in which you can play a Lego minifig, which is 0:15:10.680 --> 0:15:12.760 just really cool. And but they're I mean, you're right, 0:15:12.800 --> 0:15:15.480 it's a there's a spectrum. There's everything from you know, 0:15:15.600 --> 0:15:18.720 going online to play Capture the Flag and Unreal to 0:15:19.080 --> 0:15:21.440 you know, where you're actually one of the soldiers go 0:15:21.600 --> 0:15:25.880 running around or you know, a little mini fig. Yeah, 0:15:25.880 --> 0:15:29.440 and you've got I would say that fantasy probably dominates 0:15:29.640 --> 0:15:33.440 the genre, and we've got things like the Ultuan Line EverQuest, 0:15:33.560 --> 0:15:36.480 World of Warcraft, Age of Conan, which came out not 0:15:36.520 --> 0:15:40.520 that long ago. Um uh, the role. Let's see, there's 0:15:40.720 --> 0:15:43.480 a Warhammer online which is shipping right now. I think 0:15:43.520 --> 0:15:47.400 it's Brandon according this podcast. Um yeah, a Lord of 0:15:47.440 --> 0:15:50.840 the Rings online. So there are all these games that 0:15:50.840 --> 0:15:53.880 that kind of stem off of existing licenses as well. 0:15:54.000 --> 0:15:56.520 I'll tell you one that I almost joined, but then 0:15:56.520 --> 0:15:58.200 I waited to kind of see how it would go. 0:15:58.320 --> 0:16:00.440 And then I'm glad I waited because it's like I 0:16:00.440 --> 0:16:04.720 would have been disappointed was Star Wars Galaxies, because you know, 0:16:04.760 --> 0:16:08.120 I'm a big original trilogy Star Wars I'm gonna say 0:16:08.120 --> 0:16:12.400 that again, Original trilogy Star Wars band and uh and 0:16:12.400 --> 0:16:14.960 and just the thought of being able to play, and 0:16:15.200 --> 0:16:17.120 immediately I was like, I want to be I want 0:16:17.120 --> 0:16:18.480 to be on the Empire. I want to be in 0:16:18.480 --> 0:16:20.240 the Empire and I want to hunt down those rebel 0:16:20.280 --> 0:16:23.320 scum and um, which kind of gives you incited into 0:16:23.320 --> 0:16:27.000 my personality. But uh, but it didn't pan out so well. 0:16:27.040 --> 0:16:28.960 Apparently there are a lot of problems with it. So 0:16:29.440 --> 0:16:31.200 I'm glad I kind of took my time. But there 0:16:31.200 --> 0:16:33.240 are tons of them out there and pretty much they'll 0:16:33.360 --> 0:16:36.840 you know, just like you can find websites all cater 0:16:36.960 --> 0:16:38.800 to just about anything, you can probably find a game 0:16:38.840 --> 0:16:42.040 that caters to just about any kind of genre. But 0:16:42.120 --> 0:16:44.840 be prepared if you're interested in in starting these. Not 0:16:44.880 --> 0:16:47.240 all of them have a giant financial commitment where you 0:16:47.280 --> 0:16:49.880 have to pay dollars to buy the game and then 0:16:50.040 --> 0:16:54.120 loaded in. Uh. Some of them are are free, yeah, 0:16:54.160 --> 0:16:56.280 and they'll give you an opportunity to try the game 0:16:56.400 --> 0:16:59.480 or or you can play all that you want for free. 0:16:59.720 --> 0:17:01.840 It's up you can't access certain features, which is how 0:17:01.840 --> 0:17:03.640 they lure you in to pay your ten dollars a 0:17:03.680 --> 0:17:06.200 month to get access. Well, you know, you can't have 0:17:06.400 --> 0:17:08.760 the ability to change your character's clothes, but if you 0:17:08.800 --> 0:17:10.680 paid the ten dollars a month, you could. Or you 0:17:10.880 --> 0:17:14.440 won't be able to use this particular really cool sword exactly. 0:17:14.440 --> 0:17:16.800 But if you pay this the subscription fee and become 0:17:16.840 --> 0:17:20.240 a premium member, you totally could and uh if you 0:17:20.359 --> 0:17:22.280 if you do start doing that, you may find out 0:17:22.280 --> 0:17:25.600 why the people who played EverQuest used to call it 0:17:25.640 --> 0:17:29.240 Evercrack because, as a friend of mine found out as 0:17:29.240 --> 0:17:31.159 he came in bleary eyed to work one day, They 0:17:31.200 --> 0:17:33.440 can be extremely addictive, and all of a sudden, it's 0:17:33.440 --> 0:17:35.160 four thirty in the morning, you find you've been playing 0:17:35.160 --> 0:17:38.320 all night, and then you end up doing that every night, 0:17:39.000 --> 0:17:43.560 your job performance mighty suffer. Well. Uh, you know, so 0:17:43.840 --> 0:17:46.880 be be warned if you get into this there could 0:17:46.880 --> 0:17:49.440 be some financial commitment to it and uh maybe a 0:17:49.480 --> 0:17:53.360 little lost time. Right. Yeah, if you have an addictive personality, 0:17:53.400 --> 0:17:55.400 you might want to take it easy on these exactly. 0:17:55.400 --> 0:17:57.080 But they can be a lot of fun. Yeah, I 0:17:57.400 --> 0:18:00.479 thought i'd mentioned one other kind of tangential. It's kind 0:18:00.520 --> 0:18:02.440 of interesting here. Um I was going to talk a 0:18:02.480 --> 0:18:06.399 little bit about the Avatar Machine. This is just just 0:18:06.440 --> 0:18:11.040 a cool little project that um I engineering and art 0:18:11.200 --> 0:18:14.760 student named Mark Owens created and he's over in the 0:18:14.840 --> 0:18:17.959 United Kingdom, and the Avatar Machine. The purpose of it 0:18:18.000 --> 0:18:21.919 was to see how because Owens is very interested in 0:18:22.040 --> 0:18:25.680 the way that people and objects interact and whether or 0:18:25.720 --> 0:18:31.359 not we imprint an emotional kind of UH status to 0:18:31.400 --> 0:18:35.400 certain objects like UH and he's done lots of experiments 0:18:35.440 --> 0:18:38.320 with this very kind of interesting philosophical experiments. One of 0:18:38.320 --> 0:18:41.359 them is the Avatar Machine, and the idea behind it 0:18:41.400 --> 0:18:45.000 was that he made an observation that people within these 0:18:45.040 --> 0:18:50.160 worlds often have show a lack of empathy towards others. Um, 0:18:50.400 --> 0:18:53.280 they're not real, right. You know you're you're interacting with 0:18:53.359 --> 0:18:57.400 a computer generated character. You know you've you're removed from 0:18:57.400 --> 0:19:01.280 the actual person who is controlling that other character. So 0:19:01.480 --> 0:19:04.160 it's harder to think of things like, oh, I could 0:19:04.200 --> 0:19:06.119 be hurting this person's feelings or I could you know, 0:19:06.240 --> 0:19:08.360 how would how would I feel if this person were 0:19:08.400 --> 0:19:11.240 doing that what I'm doing to them to me? Um. 0:19:11.400 --> 0:19:13.480 So he created this thing called the Avatar Machine, and 0:19:13.520 --> 0:19:15.439 what it is is it's a helmet that has a 0:19:15.440 --> 0:19:20.080 monitor in it um and a harness that that that 0:19:20.240 --> 0:19:24.520 suspends a camera a few feet above and behind the 0:19:24.600 --> 0:19:27.719 person who's wearing the costume and behind their head, so 0:19:27.760 --> 0:19:30.400 the cameras focused down on the person wearing the gig. 0:19:31.080 --> 0:19:34.800 So you're like wearing this thing, and from your view 0:19:34.880 --> 0:19:37.080 when you look in the monitor, you see yourself from 0:19:37.080 --> 0:19:40.560 a third person perspective, just like you would in a 0:19:40.600 --> 0:19:43.880 lot of them. Many of the M M O RPGs 0:19:43.880 --> 0:19:45.760 had that same thing, and he even designed it so 0:19:45.800 --> 0:19:47.840 it had a kind of world of warcraft look to it. 0:19:48.480 --> 0:19:51.320 Decided that as one of his inspirations, and so he 0:19:51.359 --> 0:19:53.080 said that you know, at first when people start wearing it, 0:19:53.119 --> 0:19:56.399 they're a little disoriented, and then they they start to 0:19:56.400 --> 0:19:58.359 move around once they gain a little confidence. You know, 0:19:58.359 --> 0:20:00.439 It's it's weird to look at your alf from the 0:20:00.440 --> 0:20:03.119 third person perspective and then still try and move in 0:20:03.200 --> 0:20:05.280 a space because you know, you're not seeing the ground 0:20:05.280 --> 0:20:08.640 immediately in front of you as you would normally. It's 0:20:08.720 --> 0:20:11.080 pretty literally an out of body experience, it really is. 0:20:11.240 --> 0:20:15.040 It's a it's a computerized out of experience. And um. 0:20:15.400 --> 0:20:18.280 He said that after a few minutes, people would start 0:20:18.280 --> 0:20:20.720 swinging their arms and stomping around as if they were 0:20:20.760 --> 0:20:25.040 this giant, you know, character, and even intimidating other people. 0:20:25.160 --> 0:20:28.360 And they were behaving the way that people who control 0:20:28.400 --> 0:20:33.800 a third person perspective character behave online. So maybe there's 0:20:33.840 --> 0:20:36.320 this thing that if you're not within your own skin, 0:20:37.280 --> 0:20:39.879