Warcraft Far Reaching

Warcraft has a widespread audience. According to the article in our reading as of March 1, 2006 there were 6 million subscribers. Almost three years later I can only imagine how much that amount has grown. By now, it should be in Spain. Spanish speaking players can now enjoy the game in their own language.

Corporate Culture in Second Life

Since the goal of Second Life is to "have social interactions and do business," it was just a matter of time before the corporate world gets involved. If a company can use the virtual arena to market itself or its products, why not. Because Second Life involves so many people in its community, then this is the perfect place to market. That many people could not be reached in any other medium. Not everybody though is keen on corporate. But it is nice that users have a choice, like in real life, to simply not venture off into that area. They can continue to socialize and create they own worlds.

Games For Women

Personally, when I think of virtual games I always think of children and guys. Specifically because my nieces and nephews (elementary level kids) are always playing them. When I am at work, I see guys playing them. Girls never seem to be interested. When girls get online they're on MySpace and other stuff. So I can understand women feeling that the gaming industry is created more for men and that women are being overlooked, even though the game's creator says it's not so. Also, like all other industries where women have had to make strides to secure a place for themselves, so it is with the gaming industry. The WIGI organization is an important one. Women must continue to move up in this industry because if they don't it will be dominated by men who will always get the top positions. I applaud their effort.

Intro to Second Life

Second Life is interesting, especially the way you can go in and create the different environments. As mentioned in the video, you can create simulated stores and businesses and make them work. Creating your own merchandise and placing them in the stores on displays gives a virtual view of how the business will operate before you embark on the journey of starting one. From viewing one of the other Second Life videos on YouTube, I found out that people are making money in real life from their Second Life creations, or graphics, that others can use. If people are finding a way in real life to make a living by creating income in Second Life, then it's all worth it. It goes beyond just having fun.

Gender Imposters

The danger in virtual communities is that children and teens are playing around with them and meeting people who are not what they say they are. If teens are constantly interacting with the same person, they get sucked in and lose all sense of reality. Children's minds are impressionable. Sometimes they don't know the difference between what's real and what is not. These other worlds give them a sense of belonging, something a lot of them don't get at home. Technology is great, but sometimes the creators of these games can take it a bit too far. Because the inhabitants of these worlds can be pretty much who they want to be, it's easy for them to pose in a different gender. Sometimes the players take things too far, as in the case of "Joan" in "The Strange Case of the Electronic Lover" by Lindsy Van Gelder and "Sue", who lived in South Wales and was actually a married man that everybody thought was a woman. Don't get me wrong. I love the creative mind. It still amazes me what these people can do with technology.

Alternate Identities

With all the stuff that's going on in the world today, I can see why people go into these virtual worlds and get lost. They need new identities, they need a new life because they don't like the one's they have. They don't like who they are so they create another person and proceed to live outside of reality. I don't see how people can spend so much time trying to be somebody they're not. Games can be fun to a certain extend. But when it begins to consume you, you're in trouble. But I think so many people are addicted to them that it seems to be ok. Hmmm. Wonder when they're going to advertise a new drug to cure this disease. Wonder what kind of syndrome will they call it.

History of Virtual Worlds

The evolution of new technology never ceases to amaze me. Virtual games have evolved over time from their origin of MOO’s, MUD’s, and IRC’s (Internet Relay Chats). If a technology guru/user was dissatisfied with one application, he wrote a program and created another. The IRC sounds like the origin of chat rooms and social websites we’re using now. Its sole purpose was so that people of common interest could communicate with each other. Role-playing or creating environments was not what it was intended for. As these applications continued to be created, users found they had either more or alternate options than the previous version. Ultimately, they all played a role in the development of 3D virtual worlds as we know them today.

MOO's and MUD's

I remember seeing, years ago when the internet was young, people sitting at the computer with all this text on the screen playing games. I guess it was exciting to them at the time because it was something new. I didn't know what it was. I didn't know much of anything about the computer back then.

Reading the wikis about MOO's and MUD's seems kind of complex. I admire the developers of these programs. One thing I did find interesting with MOO's is that "users can perform object oriented programming with the server, ultimately expanding how the server behaves to everyone." Now that sounds like the virtual world games where each player brings his own personality to influence how the game is played.

Game Communities

Sometimes when I'm at my sister's house and see my little niece engrossed in an online game with avatars, It looks real interesting. But then I see how much into this game she is, without even blinking. It seems kind of scary.

After reading essays on gaming communities, that seems kind of scary also. No wonder people are losing their minds. They get to play in these domains that aren't even real but yet they're doing things that are. One person said the character came from behind him and gave him a "thump" that he could feel. Then the same character sneaked up on him and killed him. He was dead. The fact that these players bring their own unique personalities to the game so that it is unpredictable makes this thing too real. A person could lose all sense of reality. Especially when it was indicated that in the Narrath game that 20% view themselves as living there and 22% express desire to live there there. Again, that's scary. I think the future may be like a SciFi movie.