This is a total drive-by post, I admit it.  But I'm just looking for some info and you guys seem like a group that would know.

I was one of the very first players of UO online, starting with the beta in 1998/9.  I was obsessed with it for a year.  I don't play games any more, though maybe I will one day when my kids are grown and my career doesn't demand so much attention.  I'm looking forward to what the gaming scene in 2030 has to offer.  Assuming I'm still breathing.

But I was there at the very beginning, and I wrote it all down.  I've got a story about it and people seem to like it, but I'm not a professional writer and I don't know where to send it.  It's long - 15,000 words, 26 single spaced pages - which will also make it hard to place.  And it's not fan fiction either, so it doesn't fit into an easy category.

What might make it easier is that I'm not looking for money.  I'd want to retain rights, but I'd be happy to see it out there for free on the web, just so other people could (would?) read it.  It's actually a pretty cool tale.

So - you guys are the experts on this.  Where do I go to submit this? 

And I pasted the beginning here, so you can decide if you even like the style...

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My story takes place where fantasy and reality overlap. It’s about a turning point in human existence that has passed unremarked so far, a moment when something fundamental changed for the species, a course change for the ship of history steaming placid as a cow through green fields of time. The helmsman spins the wheel and the rudder swings over though the ship keeps straight for a while before she begins to turn.

But the rudder has turned.

We are nosing over to our new direction even now. And the course change will gain clarity with every passing year, become more obvious. It will never lessen until the day technology dies. And if that happens, most of us will die as well.

Skynet is a bad idea, Air Force guys.

You’re gonna get us all killed by those robots, I’m telling you.

But in the meantime, the times they are a-changin’ and we should take note. Maybe I’m the only one who was there who wants to write it down anyway, we were a small group, only five hundred of us in the Beta, and writers not so common among Beta testing computer gamers anyway. Maybe I’m the first to take the multiverse completely seriously, to recognize it as reality. I sort of hope so. Because that part is true: reality is falling into a new pattern, a new alignment, even as we speak. Part of what is real has changed forever, though none of us will live long enough to see the final result.

I don’t know anyone else who’s said so out loud, though I might have just missed it.

There’s an awful lot of stuff out there flying by, you can’t catch it all.

I was present at the dawn of virtual time, the birth of the multiverse.

I saw God reach out his fingertip to touch Adam, the moment of germination, the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. It’s true. Because I was part of the first persistent online universe. The very first.

Even the Beta test before it went Gold, before it went live. The first time it ever happened, that people lived online. The first iteration, the first large group ever cut loose from physical bodies to become pure ego, pure identity, pure personality interacting on the web, avatars without worry of physical pain or legal repercussion. And the way we reacted to the stimulus is worth recording, the way we rose or sank to the occasion. What we did, the first explorers of the virtual universe, Digital Cortez and Hex-Code Pizarro, free of compulsion, free of consequence, able to act however we wished.

It wasn’t very pretty.

And maybe you’ll want to say that it wasn’t quite divine creation, God and Adam, whatever. But that Play-Doh-stuck-together-with-duct-tape-and-Elmer’s-Glue world was the original incarnation of the endless parallel electronic universes that are all around us now. The multiverse, where more and more of the future will be lived. It was a vision of the future, that cloudiest of crystal balls.

It’s real already, and growing.

There are friends there, and enemies.

The first live version of Ultima Online had a hundred thousand players.

In that hundred thousand there must be others who remember events as clearly as I do, or better. I only know personally what happened on Chesapeake, and there were fewer than ten thousand of us there. But there may be other voices; someone else may someday have something to say about this, maybe a footnote in a musty history of the digital dawn, more accurate in its facts than my account.

If anyone cares that much. Maybe not.

But anyway, don’t get after me about every little detail. This is my version of events.

And one final caveat. There is something missing from this story.

There is no female lead. There is no kissing. There are no girls.

That is not a problem. There were no girls on the desert island in Lord of the Flies and those fellows did just fine. Girls have cooties anyway.

This story is about boys.

THE GREAT PK WAR

Just a quick note first. UO released in Sept of 97, so you have your years wrong.

Excellent read. You have a gift for a particular kind of writing, I'll call it "casual earthy" because of the tone. I liked it a lot.

As far as submitting it, I don't know where you could go. Someone may have a site that collects player stories, but there's just not a lot of demand for it. Players want to play, not read about what others played. But yours is different. It seems like something that deserves a place. I just don't know where, off hand.

This story is about boys?  Are you unaware that there were girls playing then?  At least a few.  I know there weren't a lot of us and thank the gaming gods it wasn't ABOUT virtual romance back then, but we were THERE nonetheless.  It's okay though.  I enjoyed reading what you wrote and I'll read your "story about boys" if I ever get a chance. However if you say that no girls existed in this virtual world....I will raise hell about the inaccuracy of that statement.

Originally posted by Pingmeister
If I am not mistaken it is pretty straightforward to submit an ebook to Amazon.com. Just copyright your work, package it as an ebook and submit. http://www.amazon.com/gp/seller-account/mm-summary-page.html?topic=200260520

That actually would be cool, to make your own book and get a copy for yourself. I haven't checked out Kindle, that might be another way.

Or you could make a blog here on this site and save it that way.

Originally posted by just1opinion

This story is about boys?  Are you unaware that there were girls playing then?  At least a few.  I know there weren't a lot of us and thank the gaming gods it wasn't ABOUT virtual romance back then, but we were THERE nonetheless.  It's okay though.  I enjoyed reading what you wrote and I'll read your "story about boys" if I ever get a chance. However if you say that no girls existed in this virtual world....I will raise hell about the inaccuracy of that statement.

Yeah, there was an all girls guild. Except they had one guy in it who did it just to support a friend.

My first guild had a couple of girls in it, one was another member's wife.

You know, although I had considered the idea of an e-book and didn't think this story really qualified, maybe it sort of does.  I could send it in to Amazon with a sale price of... a nickel, maybe?  Not so I can collect nickels, but I can't imagine Amazon sells e-books that don't involve some money, even an absolutely minimal amount.  But I can figure out the minimum allowed price and use that.  At least as a starting point to make an electronic version available.

As far as the years, the funny part about that is that yes, I evidently got them wrong.  It has been quite a while.  What I can say for sure was where I was living at the time (which was the same place from 1995 to 2001) and that I was newly married... which did take place in 1997.  I suppose Verizon might have records of when they made DSL available - I had one of the first accounts available, just because of random chance and having been in a location where it was possible to get broadband very early.

I wasn't actually a UO Beta tester, but I really was one of the opening round of subscribers who logged in on Day 1.  The story just tells better as a Beta tester :-)

So thanks - I guess I'll go poke around Amazon (or similar) then come back and see if I can get anyone to cough up a nickel!

...uh, and reading the posts that appeared while I was writing my response...

there were undoubtedly some girls playing.  But there aren't any in my story.  Not meaning any offense by that, it just didn't seem like there were any around.

In re the blog idea - is that possible here?  I'd love to put up the whole story and see what you guys think about it, and I'm certainly not in it for anything but the fun of telling the story. 

Originally posted by GrumpyOldGuy

...uh, and reading the posts that appeared while I was writing my response...

there were undoubtedly some girls playing.  But there aren't any in my story.  Not meaning any offense by that, it just didn't seem like there were any around.

In re the blog idea - is that possible here?  I'd love to put up the whole story and see what you guys think about it, and I'm certainly not in it for anything but the fun of telling the story. 

Yeah, front page, at the top, go to blogs, and create your own.

Oh, and I'm pretty sure you can do free e-books.

Originally posted by just1opinion

This story is about boys?  Are you unaware that there were girls playing then?  At least a few.  I know there weren't a lot of us and thank the gaming gods it wasn't ABOUT virtual romance back then, but we were THERE nonetheless.  It's okay though.  I enjoyed reading what you wrote and I'll read your "story about boys" if I ever get a chance. However if you say that no girls existed in this virtual world....I will raise hell about the inaccuracy of that statement.

The story is an autobiography.

Obviously, it's just there was no girls BY HIM.

You probably shouldn't rub that point in too much, or talk about all the girls you got to hang out with in the same games. :<

Well, I tried to create a blog, but apparently I need a rank of 5/100.  Probably relates to the fact that I just created my account here and have no rank whatsoever (which is only fair) - I'll try again in a day or two, and see if I can create it then.

You guys are making me remember why I loved MMORPGs... I played Everquest for a couple of years after UO, loved it, helped found a guild, etc.  Then along came the kids, and real life.  Heh.  In fact, here comes my three year old now.   Aieeeee!  Run away!

I'll swing back by and post here once I get the story up and available somewhere.  I think you'll enjoy reading it.

Thank you all for your help.

Yes, definitely post back here once you get the story up, where ever that ends up happening, I too would like to read it. I actually have a story written myself, and although I am likely not going to post it anywhere, as it is likely garbage, this atleast inspired me to finish editing it up.

Originally posted by Meowhead

Originally posted by just1opinion

This story is about boys?  Are you unaware that there were girls playing then?  At least a few.  I know there weren't a lot of us and thank the gaming gods it wasn't ABOUT virtual romance back then, but we were THERE nonetheless.  It's okay though.  I enjoyed reading what you wrote and I'll read your "story about boys" if I ever get a chance. However if you say that no girls existed in this virtual world....I will raise hell about the inaccuracy of that statement.

The story is an autobiography.

Obviously, it's just there was no girls BY HIM.

You probably shouldn't rub that point in too much, or talk about all the girls you got to hang out with in the same games. :<

I'm thinking it might be a shard specific "problem," because we definitely had "girls" (actually women) on Lake Superior. I'm not sure what shard this autobiography takes place on, so I can't really debuff his statement about his own experience. Even if he WAS on the same shard, that doesn't mean he knew all the same people. After all....these were in the days before any such thing as global or "world" chat, back when you only knew the people you personally happened to meet. It was a golden era in gaming, and I'm interested to read what he has written....girls or no girls. lol :)

Originally posted by just1opinion

 

I'm thinking it might be a shard specific "problem," because we definitely had "girls" (actually women) on Lake Superior. I'm not sure what shard this autobiography takes place on, so I can't really debuff his statement about his own experience. Even if he WAS on the same shard, that doesn't mean he knew all the same people. After all....these were in the days before any such thing as global or "world" chat, back when you only knew the people you personally happened to meet. It was a golden era.

Wait, why do the males get to be boys, but the females have to be women? D:

I wasn't calling you and other people girls to be demeaning, it's just to match you to boys.  'A game that boys and women play' just sounds... ... ... kind of weird. D:

Unless you're playing Cougartown. (... that sort of sounds like the name of a Facebook game. D: )

Originally posted by Meowhead

Originally posted by just1opinion

 

I'm thinking it might be a shard specific "problem," because we definitely had "girls" (actually women) on Lake Superior. I'm not sure what shard this autobiography takes place on, so I can't really debuff his statement about his own experience. Even if he WAS on the same shard, that doesn't mean he knew all the same people. After all....these were in the days before any such thing as global or "world" chat, back when you only knew the people you personally happened to meet. It was a golden era.

Wait, why do the males get to be boys, but the females have to be women? D:

I wasn't calling you and other people girls to be demeaning, it's just to match you to boys.  'A game that boys and women play' just sounds... ... ... kind of weird. D:

Unless you're playing Cougartown. (... that sort of sounds like the name of a Facebook game. D: )

Sweetie, I quoted "girls" because it's the word I myself had been using. It had nothing to do with how YOU said anything. :)  You didn't do anything wrong.  AND, it's "boys" because that is the world the OP used. :)

I would be interested in this "Cougartown" game, I think. lol ;)