MMORPG’s involve a whole bunch of people, customers, playing a game together, obviously after some time these people will become friends or enemies with each other. Then all of a sudden the person running the game decides to add an Non-Player trader that discriminates against avatars that were made a long time ago, without the knowledge that there was even a possibility of gender-based discrimination being in the game.

It’s terrible to do that to people. If I was playing a game and suddenly I found out that I couldn’t do certain things because of my avatar’s gender, I would be completely horrified. If it had said before creating my character “This game is based on a real society, an imperfect society that included discrimination and other things that are now frowned upon in today’s world. Please be aware that your avatar’s gender may affect your ability to do certain things in game” it would be better, at least then the game wouldn’t be misleading players.

It also bothers me that this “Pharaoh” treats the game players more like lab rats than customers. People didn’t sign up and pay him so that they could be “tested” to see how they react to discrimination. People played to have fun and possibly to get away from being discriminated against in real life.

In my opinion, this was completely out of line.

strangely, I find myself agreeing with Coco. GMs can mess up their own games by introducing elements (sexist npcs) that mess up the spirit of the game. I would just add that when this happens and the offense is extreme enough, voting with their feet is not the only option available to the gamers. They may even have the responsibility to take action that will undo the perceived damage (protests, stikes, etc).

I also agree with Hummie about boards vs games, although I am suspicious that there are deep differences, given the similarity of pseuds and siggys to avatars etc.

i noticed in TSO that many people chose to be scammers. they were scammers in-game while protesting mightily about how nice they were. it seemed a pattern: touch a scammer and sooner or later you’d be listening to somebody tell you how nice they were in RL. i have no problem if the nice RL lady next door is the queen of scammers online, although it does put a question mark in my head — about the social game process, not about the nice lady next door.
someone will no doubt say “well. the nice scammer lady next door is like the actress who plays the evil bitch in a movie. its not real.” to me, that explanation doesn’t work, and it doesn’t work because it appears, at least to me, that the actress/drama explanation mightily over-simplifies the process of consciousness.

i think that blahblah boards are theatre and literature. i think blahblah boards are more or less run by the same impulse that runs the soap opera (and the novel, which is a flavor of soap opera).

i think that games are different. i don’t necessarily think that games are fantasy. i don’t necessarily think that games are make-believe, pretend, type stuff. games have a duende, poetic power, that blahblah boards don’t have. i think games give a powerful, but submerged, element of human consciousness and desire an opportunity to speak — and act.

Secondly, Grand Theft Auto COMES WITH its sexism in place already. Imagine if Kyle came all of a sudden came into TSO and started passing out special objects, but not to females. Females would have to get some guy to get them for him.

Thirdly, the BDSM people in TSO play their BDSM game only with each other, with each other’s express permission, and mainly on their own lots. While you or I may be offended by their entire schitck, they aren’t demanding we play along. And they aren’t in possession of some special TSO goodie only they have that they won’t give out unless you kiss their feet and declare yourself a slave.

They aren’t the designers of TSO, with the powers that entails.

Game designers can act out their fantasies as much as they like, and do, every time they design a game. However, they cannot come into TSO or any game they have already designed in the middle of its running and declare the game environment (and objects to win or trade therein) to be suddenly available only to men, or to whites, or to whoever. It’s tantamount to false advertising for the game – get the player’s money, then insult them and not allow them to play.

coco

What I find absolutely HILARIOUS about this is that when players play slave auctions, or when BDSM engage in play of making people slaves, everyone in the liberal politically-correct squad in the game community says “that’s OK” and “we must celebrate this” and “it’s just a game” blah blah. But as soon as one GM makes an NPC that calls women slaves, SLH and Terra Nova and everybody and their brother is blogging about it and getting all indignant. What a double standard!

coco

Still, it’s about this: yes, people should have the right to build whatever fantasy they want online. If it’s sexist and chauvinistic Egyptian traders who won’t trade with women so they can supposedly be “realistic” like centuries ok, ok, fine. But then it will be part of other people’s fantasies to crusade against them with their current-day values, and that’s OK too.

*putting sharp objects out of reach… backing away slowly…trying to remember where I put that pepper spray…*

Before grabbing the headlines of what you think to be drama — do what you tell your students to do — research, base it on facts, then your research will be concise, complete and valid.

About the only monster dropping loot in your real life is you dropping waste into the toilet. He shoots, he scooooores! Ahhhhhhh, bet you can’t wait to play that real life game again. You’re so full of it, playing the toilet game is an obsession for you.