The Evolution of Fantasy Role-Playing Games - Michael J. Tresca [112]
Like D&D, MMORPGs simulate human society by providing multiple players with a finite list of quantifiable traits to choose from. Both games attract players willing to invest large amounts of time, up to twenty hours per week (Beck and Wade 2004:56). And yet 25 percent of EverQuest gamers play with their romantic partners, with 70 percent of female players gaming with romantic partners vs. one-sixth of male players (Yee 2001).
Creator Roles
Coding Authority
Like the game master of tabletop role-playing games, the coding authority has a special role in massive multiplayer online role-playing games. Unlike MUDs, MMORPGs have a population that might at first seem unmanageable. Like MUDs, the role of the game master has been parceled out amongst the artificial intelligence of the program, such that nonplayer characters are largely (if not exclusively) the domain of a program that reacts according to its instructions—there is no human intelligence guiding its every move.
The coding authority is the game developer, the company that created the game and presumably runs it. Unlike MUDs, the coding authority is separate and distinct from players. It is less responsible for the day-to-day activities of nonplayer characters, but still has many of the responsibilities handled by game masters; they act as God in charge of nature, as the state in charge of justice, and as jester in charge of fun (Castronova 2005:204).
Comparing the responsibilities to those outlined by Gygax for game masters, the coding authority is responsible as the moving force to keep the game interesting, the creator to code the actual characters, the designer in modifying the rules, and the director in moving chess pieces (from luck, to weather, to other characters).
What’s missing, and what Castronova correctly points out is seriously lacking in MMORPGs, are the roles of arbiter interpreting the rules, overseer in crafting narrative for long-term play, and, most importantly, referee. In essence, it’s anarchy (2005:213).
Some coding authorities do develop an overseer role, providing events and narrative that alter the game world, but these are rare. Generally, the game grinds on in an automated fashion without dictates from the people who created it.
The reason for this anarchy is that the coding authority is not inclined to spend any more energy than necessary to generate a profit. Customer service is expensive and time consuming; the level of attention a game master provides is beyond the reach and resources of most coding authorities. Therefore, player killers go unpunished, violations of the game’s atmosphere and ethics are allowed to fester, and the game shambles on. Only if a majority of the population begins to stop playing the game and thereby threatens its profitability does the coding authority intervene (Castronova 2005:214).
EverQuest, for example, went so far as to offer a server that provided a greater level of customer service called Stormhammer: The Legends. Players took issue with the server’s existence, which they felt provided a level of service that should have been provided across all servers. Sony closed the server in 2005.
Coding authorities in the past have largely relegated governance to the players themselves, the implication being that in a sort of Wild West atmosphere, no one villain will step too far out of line because there is the possibility of being killed by someone bigger and meaner. This thinking falls flat in practice, as the culture degrades to the lowest common denominator—players take every opportunity to get away with murder (Castronova 2005:209).
This also applies to role-playing immersion, wherein