I am always on about how badly i want to RP, so this second bit is more about how I like to play, why I like to play, and why I keep playing.

 MMORPG's offer an opportunity in a society that has shut itself off to all but the smallest of cliques and friends, a chance to begin again. A new world awaits you, in the off-world colonies...(sorry, just watched Blade Runner - FInal Cut.) A lot of us americans will watch other countries come into a game, and BLAM, they have a community, and a purpose of movement, and they ALWAYS group up for the big returns on MMO's that reward such communities.

 Sadly it has become hard to join groups, and a certainly, it is the american way that is influencing itself on our games. This can be seen in  the technical separation nowadays of  "n00b" guilds versus "l33t" guilds. We devise more ways to not accept people than we do to accept them.

This however does not faze me, and I do keep trying, in different worlds and games, to find ways to bring us together, and we do eventually find a way to work with each other. One way of this is how guilds will fall apart, and the good guys who are left collect the leftover folks and start again. This is one of the reasons I keep playing. Keep playing long enough, and you will eventually find a group of folks to settle in with, and make new friends.

My style of playing has evolved from both hardcore RPG and the constant playing of RTS games. Both genres of games have kept my interest, although honestly, I do not care to play RTS anymore. Mostly, just one or two decent MMO's hold me down, for now.

This however, has recently changed for me.

At 3 in the morning two weeks ago, I looked over from gaming on Anarchy Online, to see my apartment building on fire. I t pretty much devastated the building, I had to relocate, buy all new crap, and start over. The event was a life threatening one only if you realize had I slept, I would not be alive. Everyone escaped the fire with no or minor injuries, so it was all good in the end, but, it put into perspective how I think about games, because honestly, thats why I am alive.

In farting around with my friends online, and being interested in something other than my morose little life, I was able to act when needed. I should stop worrying about how I spend my time, and enjoy instead the time I have to spend it.

no spell check, and its late, excuse my mistakes.

 It's late, and I am tired, and my head hurts cause I still use a CRT instead of an LCD

I miss the most, role playing, and all its glory when its happening. I replied to a flame today, which I almost never do. I will find myself typing out a reply to the flame, when I say, yah know, this just isn't that important to me, and erase everything I wanted to flame about. I don't do any other forums, except my alliance forum in EVE, and even there I don't say much, mostly just get intel from it.

The plea I want to make is hey- I love to role-play, and I can't find it. But EVE is making me change my mind about what role playing is, and what I want from it. I used to be pretty strict about the game I wanted to play, it needed a big RP factor, and needed some sort of ummmm, fluxy, groove, something not really I can define, but rather just feel. I haven't really felt it since I left Gemstone, a text (yes'm, that says text) based sorta uber MUD, which was the beginnings of MMO's. I was completely into my charector, totally tied into that universe, in a way I hadn't ever really felt from an online game. The problem is, text is limiting in way that graphics are not.

Oh wait, I hear the flame... You don't know what your talking about Dag, text is unlimited in and of itself, you can describe anything with text, graphics limit your imagination.

Well, that may be true for a lot of you, but I find my imagination is spurred by the graphics, and I have read more books than most folks out there, and well, I prefer graphics in my game. Even back in DnD days, before Cyberpunk, before GURPS, we wanted as many miniatures as we could get.  This love of the graphics has lead me to try many different games, and always, I am left wanting for more role play.

And here, right now, I am realizing something, this has happened before. Before I found Gemstone, I was feeling the same way. MUD after MUD, table top after table top, I just wanted to immerse myself into a role, and let my inner sanctum out in a game, let me delve into myself and see what I was like and not like. In a game, I can be evil, or side with evil, and be good in evilness, or be bad at it, or be good in goodness, or bad at it. It's an experiment of the psyche, a learning experiment that can not be played out in any other way. I can apply myself and give it my all, or walk away from it and be done.  Especially since its game, its only bearing on me is whether or not I indulge myself on a personal level to the other players, which I tend not to do, prefering anonminity anominity? bah, to late to look it up, to stay aloof of the mixing of RL and nonRL.

Guess I gotta keep pushing for that RP only server in Hero's Journey, or wait untill some magical faery comes along and blesses me with the ultimate game.

Eve has done wonders for me though, it is rather immersive, and although I do not really play a role, I do play a toon, who has tons of stuff to do. With Vent, chat, fleet, orders, PvP, skills, I am rather into EVE right now, living in 0.0 space and building a corp with my RL friends.

It ain't the groove I want tho, just as WoW, AO, UO, EQ, and a good few others have not been. I see myself playing for another year, maybe two, then burning out on it. Cause hey, its a facinating challenging game, the best I have seen in graphics yet, but umm, challenges are always bested, and I ain't playing a role I choose, I am playing a toon, who is lucky enough to be in the right place with the right corp at the right time.