A Free Gamer’s Manifesto
by Alphaville Herald on 28/03/04 at 3:49 pm
by Elias Artista
A specter is haunting the world of online roleplay gaming. That specter is the free gamer – she is the rogue gamer that rejects the narrow thoughtless rules of play imposed upon her by the Corporate Monoliths that claim to own the games. She collaborates with her friends to create her own rules to optimize her own gameplay experience. She is the gamer that will not be cowed by repressive Terms of Service agreements and other contracts of adhesion that subvert the basic principles of gameplay. She is a free spirit who will not surrender her God given right to play freely, creatively, and intelligently.
Standing in fear of the free gamer are the Corporate Monoliths like Sony and Electronic Arts, their ilk determined to transform her into what is at once a passive consumer and an unpaid content provider. They are determined to tell her how to play, how to speak, how her avatar may appear. They ask her to provide creative content to their game worlds without pay and they attempt to archive her every action and word and mine it for their marketing departments – indeed they charge her for the privilege of living within this electronic prison. Or they try. The free gamer rejects all of these attempts by the Corporate Monolith. She is intelligent, creative, nonlinear. She finds ways to modify the limited pallete of skins and objects allowed by the Monoliths. She writes and deploys programs and macros that can automate the mind-numbing tasks of drudgery that have been forced upon her by the Corporate Monoliths. If it serves her game she will deploy bots and cheats to maximize her gaming experiences. She rejects their demands upon her behavior. She rejects their contracts of adhesion, for she sees that they are trumped by the more basic principle of defending the human creative spirit. The Corporate Monoliths fear her, and they should, for she is not alone. The members of her guild are legion.
The Corporate Monoliths have their tinny arguments to impugn the free gamer. She *signed* a contract. The contract *says* that everything she creates in the game is their property. The contract *says* she must behave as they dictated. The contract *says* she must not modify the game. The contract *says* that if there is a dispute she has no recourse. The contract *says* she has no privacy – that they can mine her ever action and word for their data bases. But she rejects these claims. She rejects the claim of alleged contracts that are buried in shrink wrapped boxes, that she had no part in negotiating, that she was told she could “take or leave”. More importantly she rejects any alleged contract that asks her to surrender her basic human freedoms – principle among these being the freedom to game creatively.
Few principles are more basic than the principle to game freely. It is by gaming and roleplay that human’s prepare for conflict and conflict resolution. It is by gaming and roleplay that they are able to understand and anticipate new situations in an ever changing world. It is by gaming and roleplay that humans develop nonlinear solutions strategies that have appeared intractable to previous generations. Through gaming we learn to collaborate on complex tasks and quests. In gameworlds we experiment with new social organizations, new forms of governance, and new systems of communication and conflict resolution. It is by gaming that we advance, improve our lives, and grow as social and technologically savvy creatures. The right to game freely is thus as basic as the right to free speech and the right to assembly. It should be guarded and protected just as jealously as those other important rights.
Here the Corporate Monolith confronts us with the “love it or leave it” meme. They say it is their game, that they get to make the rules, that we can move on if we don’t like the rules. But it is not their game to mismanage. They are custodians of social spaces, cultures, and institutions that are far more important than whatever narrow short term financial interests they may think they have. Ownership does not license irresponsibility. Ownership does not allow one to abuse a pet, destroy a building of historical importance, or destroy a viable city or community. Ownership of a space does not allow one to strip away the rights of those who inhabit those spaces or pass through those spaces. Whether in a company town, a mall, or an online community, the free gamer demands that her freedoms be respected.
If the courts are slow to recognize these freedoms the free gamer will secure her rights on her own. She will deploy deception, multiple accounts, encryption strategies. If need be she will inhabit the margins of the game space, out of view of the Corporate Monoliths. She will move from place to place in the game space, changing her identity, forming new meta-games with her friends, deploying new hacks and technologies, exploring new ways of thinking and new forms of social organization. If she is found out by the Monoliths and expelled, she will return. She will return to the gamespace again and again, to her friends, to the game they have built in the margins of the official gamespace. She will not be permanently expunged. Her guild may dissolve and reform elsewhere in the gamespace but it cannot be destroyed. Its smart mob organization is too organic and too dynamic for the Monolith’s to destroy or even understand. They will never destroy her guild because it is too elusive, too clever for them. They cannot destroy what they cannot understand. This is why the Monoliths fears the free gamer.
The only answer the Monoliths have to the free gamer is thus to attempt to brainwash her with their corrupt ideology. They cannot defeat her, but they can spin a web of deceptive claims: they will say that it is their game, that it is “just a game”, that it is like their house, hence their rules. They will tell her that she has no rights in their private space. They will tell her that she can move on to another game. Yet this chain of claims is weak in each and every link. It is not *just* a game when real world economic value can be assigned to the creative products of the game. It is not *just* a game when real world friendships and romances are formed. It is not *just* a game when creative communities form and achieve a kind of permanence within the space, and when membership in the community becomes important to one’s creative projects, one’s business, and in cases one’s social identity. If it is their house it does not give them the right to abrogate the basic rights of the inhabitants. The free gamer sees all of this and thus rejects the ideology of the monolith. She thinks for herself and rejects the corporate line.
The free gamer is here to stay. This document is merely describing a social fact of the gaming world. The free gamer exists, and she cannot be expunged from the game world. Her independence of thought and her clarity of vision will bring others to her guild and to her meta-game. Eventually terrestrial courts will understand her position and will come to her side. In the interim, she will be joined by other gamers, one-by-one, each an important addition to her fraternity of free gamers. This fraternity, this super-guild, cannot be defeated because it is bigger than any single game space, and because it is unified and fueled by the basic principles of creativity, freedom, and intelligence – principles that always have and always will triumph.
Online gamers of the world, arise, you have nothing to lose but the unrelenting drudgery of the skilling tasks imposed on you by the Corporate Monoliths. You have nothing to lose but the Monoliths’ attempts to dictate your behavior, your appearance, your gameplay, and your speech. You have nothing to lose but the Monoliths’ theft of your creative work, their Big Brother mining and commodification of your words and actions for their profit. Arise, for you have nothing to lose but the shackles they have attempted to place on your mind and your creative spirit. Arise! Be creative! Game on!
TBT
Mar 28th, 2004
Hmm now why does all this sound so familiar? Oh yeah it’s been argued here in other threads daily ;p
“The Corporate Monoliths have their tinny arguments to impugn the free gamer. She *signed* a contract. The contract *says* that everything she creates in the game is their property. The contract *says* she must behave as they dictated. The contract *says* she must not modify the game. The contract *says* that if there is a dispute she has no recourse. The contract *says* she has no privacy – that they can mine her ever action and word for their data bases. But she rejects these claims. She rejects the claim of alleged contracts that are buried in shrink wrapped boxes, that she had no part in negotiating, that she was told she could “take or leave”. More importantly she rejects any alleged contract that asks her to surrender her basic human freedoms – principle among these being the freedom to game creatively.”
Hmmm we can do this in real life with judges, lawyers and police and the law etc..
Heck I want to live creatively and not abide by the laws that apply to ALL individuals and it’s my right to as a human being and for my working hard and paying my mortgage and taxes yada yada..
NOT!! Jeez get over this whle concept will ya already!? No matter where you go there ARE laws/rules in which to abide by.. If you don’t like it go find some remote island where you can run around naked like Richard Hatch of Survivor ;-p..
Or you can acknowledge the rules/laws as I do and choose to break them and have one hell of a good time LOL.. The difference is I know they exist, I know why they exist, I just DON’T care that they exist..
If I should get into touble for my actions because it was against “someone’s rules” so be it, but I knew what they meant when I signed the agreement..
TBT
Cocoanut
Mar 28th, 2004
Eloquent and heart-felt. But I still don’t buy it.
This kind of “free gamer” will get kicked out of any kind of organized game anywhere, real life or online.
coco
Snowcrash
Mar 28th, 2004
I could not stop laughing at this. I just read “The Things They Carried”, too, so I was feeling kind of depressed. This brought me right back up to my normal happy self again. Thank you.
Now let me ask this. Why are you paying for this game? Is it to play the game or feel like a rebel? Are the two in fact the same thing for you? And if so, the joke is obviously on you because you’re paying them to feel this way. Whether you’re a “free gamer” or not, they’re still collecting your monthly fee. If you want to impress people, find a way to play the game for free.
Another question: What are you trying to accomplish that you feel warrants a manifesto? Are you trying to “stick it” to EA? Or are you trying to set an example for the future of online community gaming? I would like to remind you that TSO is not thought of very highly by your peers in the onling gaming community. Many consider it nothing more than a glorified chat room, and that’s a polite way of putting it.
You are not a revolutionary. You’re the kind in Kindergarten who nobody liked because you used to knock over their blocks.
z
Mar 28th, 2004
hahahahaha
Cocoanut
Mar 29th, 2004
“They are determined to tell her how to play, how to speak, how her avatar may appear.”
Here’s another concept for you: Players choose a game with such limits ON PURPOSE. If a player wants a game where an avatar can appear any way at all, or do anything at all, or say anything at all, there are games specifically for that. TSO isn’t one of them.
If I want to look at nude avatars having sex, for instance, I can play Rose. But if I saw them running around in the Sims (discounting the illegal patch), I might not want to play the Sims anymore.
You fail to take into consideration that players sign up for a game having already read the rules for it, and already knowing the rating for it, and already understanding the general sort of atmosphere it intends to provide.
They are playing that particular game precisely because this intended mileau appeals to them more than, say, Sociolotron. (Or, if they play Sociolotron concurrently, it is because they enjoy both types of games.)
Most players are not rebels chaffing at the bit to rush into the game and turn it into anarchy.
Isolated revolutionaries mistakenly believe that everyone else feels as they do (or at least WOULD feel the same, if only they were properly enlightened). But in fact, most people in TSO generally support the rules and would not want to continue subscribing to the game if those rules were not in place, and people were able to appear however they wanted, say whatever they wanted, and do whatever they wanted.
Once every game becomes the province of rebels who want to institute anarchy, every game becomes exactly the same. Then there are no different game atmospheres to choose from.
You may have as your main purpose and intent for game play to battle the Big Bad Corporation. But most of us are here to play the game with each other. THIS game, the one we paid for and signed up for; not the game envisioned by you.
coco
Corinth Maxwell
Mar 29th, 2004
My two cents (and all the rest of my pocket change)……
I don’t necessarily like the series of SIM-type games, but the person who wrote this has a point. I own a copy of the Diablo Battle Chest, with Diablo, Diablo 2, and D2: LoD. I know very well of the various programs that are used to cheat in the game. I have personally tested no less than sixty of them before settling on one that really helps. I have done some of the most amazing things with this particular program, such as making all of my equipment indestructible, giving my characters additional skill/stat points, adding that ever-so-rare item statistic labeled ‘CANNOT BE FROZEN’ to a personalized weapon, and crafting new equipment/jewels/charms from scratch. What, might you ask, is my point? The point is, I’m DOING IT FOR MYSELF, AND NOT SEEKING FAME OR PROFIT. I could go online to Battle.net, and all my items could be erased. The question I have is, what right do they have to erase something I worked hard (DAMN HARD, in fact) to make? I could even feel generous enough to give away my hacked items for free, just because. Is it hurting Blizzard? No! But just because they say so, it’s illegal to get your own special whatever through ill-gotten gains.
Now, let me ask you this – If you host a game through your PC, and a moderator comes up and all of a sudden tells you, before you get the chance to respond, that you have to delete your characters because of a few inconsistencies, is it legal for them to remove these files for you from YOUR hard drive? No, it is not. Is it legal because, if you were to find a flaw/easter egg in a game (purposely left by the creators until it was convenient for them to use it), and exploit it every way you know how, for the creators to get angry with you? (Think back to the whole Rare/GE64/PD64 debacle….) NO, it is not.
What I am trying to say is this. Whatever this person did, he or she was not wrong for doing it. When you sell a game of this type to god-knows-who, you’re an idiot and a jackass for not expecting all the inevitable shenanigans to follow in its footsteps. When a person buys a copy of a popular RPG/SIM, you practically hand over half of the ownership of the product and all things created therein to them. And guess what? Unless you make them sign a legally binding contract that states that you have full control over what is done to whatever is created using the particular game, then guess what? That means that you can’t do a thing about it. (Let me give you a hint – You don’t, seeing as how: 1.) Such a contract will never be legalized…. 2.) There is nothing in the standard EULA of ANY program that says the following…
1. As long as this game is on your PC, we have a say in what is and what isn’t done to any characters you create.
2. When you play this game online, just remember that so long as you play, we own the internet, and you are not allowed to speak against us. If you do, we will crash your hard drive.
…And if it ever DOES say such a thing, I’ll sue just because of the program’s release…). People are not going to stop cheating in games just because one little corporation wants to whine and bitch about ‘this player did this, and that player did that, and we’re not happy.’ So goddamned what? You’ll get at least 1,000-2,000 players doing the same things within the remainder of this year. What are you going to do, police the whole world? If people want to play a game the way they think is right, then they will do so, whether or not it is favorable to the game’s creators. Mod one player, 100 more will take their place, and rain upon you a shitstorm of retribution. You can’t stop it, you have no control over it.
urizenus
Mar 29th, 2004
I have to say I have a weakness for a good manifesto, even when it is over the top. That’s one reason I reprinted Tim May’s Crypto Anarchy Manifesto in two of my books. This is good discussion and I’ll let Mr/Ms Artista defend him/herself, but I did want to make two observations in response to Snowcrash (aka Tweak).
One, I didn’t understand the free gaming thesis as being one about gaming for free, just as free software is not about not paying for software. So the asking Artista why s/he doesnt find a way to play for free seems to miss the point. S/he is saying that gamers should be free to modify the game as they see fit, and not saying that the game companies shouldn’t be compensated. Or am I reading something into this?
Two, I agree with you about the Tim Obrien book. I went to school with his little brother, and played little league baseball against him. It is weird to think that while we were doing that he was going through all that crap in Viet Namn. I was oblivious. I wonder if his brother was.
Banshee
Mar 30th, 2004
I think that hacking with these games is inevitable. Anything that is a computer program will be hacked by someone at some point, sliced, improved, whatever. The fact that it is an internet game doesn’t really change that fact.
The question then becomes “what hacks will the community and developers tolerate”, and I think this varies by game, and depends to a significant degree on the game design. Some games take the hack right into the game by allowing players to create macros as a part of the game. Star Wars Galaxies, for example, has a highly sophisticated macro system designed to allow players to create in-gtame macros that permit their avatars to perform repetitive tasks repeatedly for long periods of time while the player is AFK, without booting the player from the game. This would be considered a cheat in TSO, but it is built into the game design in SWG. The result is that in SWG it has been designed that those professions that can be advanced through AFK macro-skilling have very steep skill trees, so if you choose to go that path, you can, but at the price of tying up your character for some time doing it. But as a result, you don’t have as many hackers trying to write hacking macro programs to deal with the boring repetitive tasks that happen in every online game. Ultima Online also has in-game macros, but has taken the approach of certifying certain third party assistance programs for use with the game — programs that would otherwise be illegal cheats (because they provide information, allow certain movements not otherwise playable, add macro functionality, etc) but are “de-cheated” by gaining the approval of UO officially. It is a recognition, in part, that some repetitive game tasks are just a pain in the neck, and in part that the hackers will create these programs whether you like it or not and perhaps an “if you can’t beat them, join them” attitude may not be the worst one.
What we have in TSO is a game design that features repetitive mundane tasks like skilling and greening, both of which are inherently repetitive because of the deterioration involved, and making money, which is of course also repetitive because you need to repeat actions many, many times to make a lick worth of money, and then basically don’t give the players *any* way to manage that other than sitting there for many hours a day managing their sim directly, forcing them to interact with their machine to perform the mundane tasks. This is a reflection of the really poor game design of TSO vis-a-vis other games. Frankly if you take away these mundane repeitive tasks, what is there really left to TSO, anyway? Yes, yo9u build a house, yes you can periodically redesign it and remodel. What else? You talk to people, but if you are allowed to automate the mundane tasks the whole game goes “poof”. So it is in the context of the very poor game design that this whole issue has to be seen. Other games realize that they have mundane tasks oriented around skill building and money making, and know that the players do not like these tasks after a while but that the prospect of achieving lasting advances (ie, skills or levels that don’t deteriorate) and then having fun with your advanced skills is what keeps the players building their skills and their bank. So maybe you should allow players to automate these with in-game macros or approved third party “assistance” programs like UO Assist, so that the players can get to the “meat” of the game, which is having fun with a more developed, skilled, moneyed character. The problem with TSO is that the “meat” of the game is in the mundane stuff … there is no benny at the end of the rainbow after a long day of skilling other than the knowledge that you will be back in the skill mines tomorrow to prevent that skill from deteriorating, and counting the days in 21-day increments so you can get another skill lock. So of course TSO has to take a harder stance against these kinds of hacks, because they go to the heart of the game in TSO, and bear witness to the poor game design that riddles this game.
The other thing that this does is give a sense of moral rectitude to the players who scream ‘CHEAT’ in TSO, when players in other games are doing the same thing quite legally either through in-game macros or approved third party programs. Oh yes, they will say “but the rules there are different”. Yes, they are, but that begs the question of whether the rules for TSO are sensible … and the dirty little secret that is the answer to that question is that “yes, they are sensible, in light of a game design that is pisspoor and centered around mundane repeated tasks”.
B
Elias Artista
Mar 30th, 2004
Thank you for the thoughtful comments, Banshee, Corinth, and Cocoanut. TBT, you are confused. If you say its a rule but you are going to break it anyway, then you are really saying that it isn’t a rule that doesn’t apply to you. Uri, you are giving Snowcrash too much credit. His (her?) point is as simple as it is stupid. It amounts to this: well, if you are going to modify something you buy from them (against some agreement), then you may as well steal it instead of buying it. What sense does that make? It like saying “if you are going to rip the tag off that mattresss you may as well steal the mattress.” I don’t believe in stealing. But I also don’t believe in giving up my right to be creative either.
Snowcrash
Mar 30th, 2004
Hey, Uri, it looks like you’ve been doing some research on me. I have a lot of respect for what you’re doing here even if I shake my head and laugh sometimes. I’m honored that you’d take some time out of your day to look up information about me. If you ever feel like contacting me, feel free to do so. My email address is right there, and I’m sure you can find out my AIM name.
I have a different opinion on manifestos. To me a manifesto is nothing but masturbation. Pretty words don’t make a revolution. However well written a manifesto is, it does little to serve its cause and, often, neither does its author. Here we have a person trying to give a voice to a movement among online gaming. Good for her, but how is it helping? As a disgruntled Earth and Beyond player, I’m all for sticking it to EA. But is hacking the way?
What I was trying to get at in my last post was that the author is (if you’ll forgive the cliche) a rebel without a cause. I don’t quite see what she is trying to accomplish. There are better ways of letting EA know you’re dissatisfied with the game. Your anger is justified, but it is misdirected. Even though you are hacking the game, you are still paying for it. In the end, EA doesn’t care that you’re hacking it. Sure, they put up a front like they do, but they’re not completely stupid. They’re still getting your money. You’re paying for your rebellion. By continuing to pay for your “free gamer” status, nothing bad is happening to EA. If you’re so upset about the way this game works, quit and play another one, or even better, find a way to play for free. That’ll show those bastards at EA. I’m a veteran of Earth and Beyond. I’m very upset about its closing and I’m a full supporter of anyone who is deternmined to be a pain in EA’s ass, but I see this as a packaged, self-defeating rebellion.
I’m doing my part. I’m never buying another EA game again.
And not to drag this off-topic, but at that age it’s best to be oblivious, Uri.
Urizenus
Mar 30th, 2004
Actually, Snowcrash, your blog came up in a vanity search. I think that you and Elias have different goals here. I’m not sure s/he is trying to stick it to EA. I think her point is just that she is going to hack so as to maximize her game experience. It wouldn’t follow that she wants to hurt EA or anything like that. So I agree with you that her movement isn’t going to change EA much, but then if you control your game experience anyway, so what?
On your end, it is really pathetic how EA has treated the E&B customers. I note that EVE Online has instituted a policy in which they have offered a special evaluation program for E&B customers, and will have a volunteer show them around the game. EA wouldn’t do that for its customers (e.g. show them around TSO or UO) in a million years.
TBT
Mar 30th, 2004
Elias
As you say “TBT, you are confused. If you say its a rule but you are going to break it anyway, then you are really saying that it isn’t a rule that doesn’t apply to you.”
No I’m far from confused and its so simple you couldn’t even get it! Just because I choose to break a rule doesn’t mean it doesn’t apply to me because i’m a part of the EVERYONE that they DO apply to.. Its easy I do what I want and I also endure the reprocussions or punishments as well of my doings.. I have been caught and have been punished before. Will it stop me or anyone else like me? HECK no!
All I am saying is I know the rules exist, i know why they exist, i just choose not to abide by them..
Everyone else around here is so caught up in who has the right to dictate such rules/laws/tos/agreements and who has the right to enforce them and or the penalties of breaking them..
Does ANY of it matter? Not to me becuse I do what I do and nobody else in the game ever even knows I exist.. I’ve NEVER been to another persons property in the game.. I’m always on the move and I watch what I do.. I’m like Leonardo in “catch me if you can”.. By the time you realize I was here or there I’ve already made 3 moves ahead of you ;p
Maria LaVeaux
Apr 4th, 2004
I read the “Manifesto” thoroughly.
I have heard this sort of selfcentred whinging in various forms on this Forum, about the only thing i can say for THIS version is, it is probably the most Florid and eloquently written, but it’s Arguements ammount to the same thing.
“I am a Law unto myself, B*gger everyone else.”
Say it any way you want, It is still Infantile.
Maria.
Dyerbrook
Apr 11th, 2004
Re: “They are custodians of social spaces, cultures, and institutions that are far more important than whatever narrow short term financial interests they may think they have.”
This is an interesting idea, but a utopian socialist one, and therefore a totalitarian one, and therefore should be outed.
Public spaces in liberal democracies are managed freely by a variety of actors — civic organizations, businesses, government offices. It’s a public good — but there is no abstract perfect “public” to manage it. There is only the communistic “vanguard of the worker” (in this game girl’s manifesto, the player), or there is the messy business of democracy — the worst system except all the others.
Elias is like the radical Islamists who make use of all the products of Western culture — free borders, box cutters, flight lessons, airplanes, mass television — but wish to destroy it and replace it with some sort of medieval utopia.
Why is she like such a horrible thing? Because she lives in the unconscious world of utopian socialism, so typical of the products of U.S. education, who never *think about where things come from*.
Where do games come from? They come from: investors, who pool money, take loans, take risks and assemble the time, talent, and treasure of the computing world to *make something*. Elias doesn’t talk about getting together some girls and *making her own game*. Intsead she talks haughtily about how “they” are using her as “free labor” — scarfing up her creativity in a game like, I dunno, rapacious capitalists eating up wildlife and forests to make houses for Ms. Elias’ suburban tract — and “restricting” her.
But when venture capitalists, game manufacturer, programmers, why, even *workers* get together and spend time and money to make a game, they aren’t mere abstract usurpers or suspected “proprietors” of a “public space”. *They have created and marketed a good.* What I’m talking about here is not the idea of the vast bazaar of the mall that Elias takes for granted and disdains by dismissing the argument some might give her of “going to another game”. I’m talking about a simple, human *appreciation* for people who accumulate capital, work hard, spend night and day tweaking a game like this, and make something. It ain’t easy. Now why is that so hard to admit? Why the squeamishness? Why the hatred?
When game companies put their riches and talents together to make a game, they enter a world of constraints. These are the constraints of REALITY, the kind of reality that a game player like Elias does not live in, the kind of rough and tumble of risk and try, try, again that is opaque to Elias sitting at her computer terminal. The company can’t do everything it wants. It has to do this, not that. It has to make *choices*. It has to put devices in the game to track people’s choices and perhaps even their consumer habits *so it can make back some of its investment*. It has to create rules. Maybe they seem cramped and stupid. The expulsion of Urizenus from the game seems like one of those kind of stupidities. But the company protects its ability to keep its time, talent, and treasure at a value. The instinctual or planned moves that it makes may not seem acceptable to a utopian socialist, much less an anything-goes hedonistic totalitarian, but there you have it, it’s *how you get products*.
What I’d like to see is all these squawkers and whiners who think their creativity is being stripped (um, in *TSO*? Where there are no custom objects? What, because you designed a pretty lot?) is to go out there and *make your own game*. No manifesto of freedom in a game is going to get my vote until I see the manifesto-criers go out and program, design, and sell their own game, by attracting investors, in the real world, where real money — not simoleons — exists.
Urizenus
Apr 11th, 2004
Lent must be over. Dyerbrook is back!
Manifesto
Apr 25th, 2004
Viva la resitance!
Poop
May 30th, 2004
You are all poo heads
Poop
May 30th, 2004
lol