Profile: Raltar
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• • Ok, this isn't even an MMO.

  • I'm assuming players can interact with each other. That wasn't my question. My question was "Can players alter the world in ways that will effect other players?"

     

    Let me give you an example of what I mean:

    Lets say my friend "Bob" finds a nice spot on the beach and decides that he would like to build a beach house there. Can he do that? Will the house be there when he comes back later?

    Then lets say I want to visit "Bob" at his beach house. Will I be able to go there? Will other people be able to go there? Will people be able to reach the location of Bob's house without his premission?

    Lastly, lets say that "Bob's" Arch-Nemesis "Micheal Prejean III" who is an Animal Liberation Front terrorist decides to show up with a flame thrower. Can he burn down Bob's house?

     

    Thats what I mean when I talk about a "persistant world" where players can actually have permanent effects on the envrioment and other players.

     

    

  • Posted: 7/19/08 7:15 PM
    The Agency
• • sl is not an mmorpg

  • Originally posted by Lydon  

    Pointless scenario because we aren't talking about SL in its initial capacity now are we? Plus, I would STILL consider them to be playing a game. That player created a virtual persona whom they control in the Second Life universe. Adding more to my argument, that single player would have actually been very lucky considering they could develop to their hearts content! Besides doing that, they could partake in activities such as exploration. Are you suggesting that exploration is not part of a game?  

    You clearly missed the point of both scenarios. The point was this: We aren't talking about what someone meant for something to be or what was decided in a boardroom by a bunch of suits. We also aren't talking about what you imagine Second Life to be. We are talking about what Second Life actually is! Its a piece of software!

    And the question we are trying to anwser here is "Does that piece of software qualify as a game?"

    The anwser is "No, it doesn't!"

    Scenario #1 proved that if Second Life were devoid of user-created content that it would fail to qualify as a game.

    Scenario #2 proves that even WITH user-created content it still doesn't become a game.

    So Second Life itself, as a piece of software, is NOT a game.

    Originally posted by randomt
    

    Saying SL is a game is like saying:

    The internet is a game.

    Both are not. But both are mediums on which games can be run. Don't see what is so hard for people to understand about it.

    You see, THIS GUY GETS IT!

    Second Life itself is NOT a game.

    Second Life is an envrioment where you could possibly create a game within the borders of that envrioment. But that action alone does not convert the envrioment itself into a game.

     

    

  • Posted: 7/19/08 6:51 PM
    Second Life
• • sl is not an mmorpg

  • Originally posted by Lydon
    
    In the end, my little friend named The Dictionary will sort this out easily:
    

    Video game (noun) -any or various games played using a microcomputer with a keyboard and often joysticks to manipulate changes or respond to the action or questions on the screen.
    

    
    

    That's exactly what SL is. Case closed. 

    
     

    LOL, case closed eh? By that definition you just handed the arguement to me because you can't run Second Life on a microcomputer!

    Clearly whatever dictionary you got this from consdiers a "video game" to be the type of game you would play on a console style system hooked up to your TV set as opposed to the modern software that we run on our home computers. Sorry bud, I don't think a book written by stuffy old people 20 some years ago can save you today.

    Originally posted by Lydon
    

    Moving on...your analogy simply does not compare the two well at all.

    Fair enough, it was a rather far-fetched concept. So I'll hit you up with not just one but TWO new scenarios I thought of while waiting for your brilliant dictionary maneuver.

     

     

    Scenario #1:

    Lets take an MMORPG like Asheron's Call. Remove ALL the players from the game and revert the software back to its original condition as of the date it was first released to the public. The game is now in a totally pristine condition: There are no player-owned houses and no updates to the game from the developers beyond what they originally intended for the world to look like.

    Now, allow ONE PERSON to enter that world. Is he playing a game? Yes, he is. Because Asheron's Call was designed as a game and had all of the features of a game at the time of its inception. It did not need to be modified or altered in any way to become a game. It IS a game.

     

    Lets repeat this process with Second Life. Remove all the "residents" from the "metaverse" ane revert the "metaverse" itself to the condition it was in when Second Life was first released to the public. There are no user created objects or enviroments in the "metaverse" any longer, only those objects and enviroments which Linden Labs added to the world.

    Now, allow ONE PERSON to enter the "metaverse" that Linden Labs has created. Is this person playing a game? No, he isn't. The current "metaverse" does not have the features of a game because in its original condition as invisioned by Linden Labs those features did not yet exist.

     

    So, as we can see here, Second Life was NOT designed by Liden Labs to fulfill the function or purpose of a game the way that an actual MMOG is.

     

     

    Scenario #2:

    Lets take a single-player game like Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion. We know this is a game.

    Now, lets allow someone to modify the game. Lets say this person decides that he likes the graphics of the game but hates the combat. This person decides that hes going to create a mod to remove all combat from the game as well as leveling, falling damage, monsters, spells and nearly every other feature of the game. He is however going to allow players to alter the appearance of their character any way they want. Then hes going to allow multiple people to enter the same world at the same time. Lastly, hes going to create a chat interface so the players can send text-based messages to each other.

    What we have now is a mod that effectively transforms Oblivion into a chat room with high tech graphics. And there isn't anything wrong with that. Maybe there are folks out there who would enjoy this mod for role playing purposes.

    By merit of the fact that this mod exists, does Oblivion itself (in its original unmodified state) cease to be a game? No, it doesn't. Just because some guy made a mod that changed the game into a chat room doesn't mean that I can't still use the original version of the software as a game.

     

    Now, lets reverse this scenario for Second Life. Due to the results of Scenario #1 we already know that Second Life (in its original unmodified state) is a piece of software which does NOT meet the definition of a game.

    But lets say we release thousands of people in the "metaverse" of Second Life. A few of them decide to modify small parts of the game world to resemble a game. They allow a small number of people at one time to enter a limited area and whack each other with swords. After a certain number of wacks from a sword a person "dies" and is teleported to another part of the "metaverse" where their sword doesn't function.

    By merit of the fact that this small group of players altered a small portion of the "metaverse" to resemble a "game" of a sort, does that change the entire piece of software into a game? No, it doesn't. Because that still isn't the primary function of the software, nor does it change the fact that the majority of users of that software are not using it as a game.

    Thus, Second Life, even after being modified by its users, still DOES NOT qualify as a game.

     

     

    And here is the bottom line: Second Life is not a game because the original software as designed by its original creators was not a game and cannot be used as such. Any piece of software can be reasonably altered to preform a function its original creators did not intend for it to fulfill. But that doesn't alter the function of the original software.

    And the original creators of Second Life (Linden Labs) state quite clearly on their own website that Second Life is a "Metaverse" and NOT a game. If you can find me even one example of Linden Labs officially and clearly calling Second Life a game then I will take back everything I have said and concede this debate to you. But until that happens Second Life is unarguably NOT a game.

     

    

  • Posted: 7/19/08 4:33 PM
    Second Life
• • Ok, this isn't even an MMO.

  • Originally posted by JonnyG 

    The game includes character development over time, guilds, and crafting in a persistant world.  The game will have public areas and missions,  private instanced missions, as well as some public/private missions.  Most of the missions will be instanced, but not all.

    That makes it sound like Guild Wars. That isn't a bad thing by itself since I rather liked Guild Wars. The thing about guild wars was that the world really wasn't what I would define as a persistant world at all. The world was actually very linear, with one mission after the next. Everything was instanced and nothing you did ever really became permanent in the world. Players were almost totally unable to alter the world at all. You could own a guild hall, which would look exactly the same as the guild hall owned by thousands of other guilds and this was really the limit of how much control you could exert over the world.

    So the real question here isn't "is it an MMO" because thats really beside the point. The real question is will players be able to interact with the world in a way that will have lasting changes both for themselves and for other players?

     

    

  • Posted: 7/19/08 3:37 PM
    The Agency
• • sl is not an mmorpg

  • Originally posted by Lydon
    

    Just because it's a car that drives you from one point to another does that change the fact that it has a washing machine installed in it? No. That's no regular car, it's a multipurpose vehicle.

    You could call the car from my analogy a "multipurpose vehicle" and that may even be an accurate statement but that doesn't nullify my analogy, it merely ignores the key point of the analogy.

    Your car may be able to do your laundry because it has a washing machine in it but it still doesn't qualify as a laundromat because it is still lacking many of the features required to qualify as a laundromat. This is the point of the entire analogy because Second Life has the same issue. It may have some features in common with an MMOG but it doesn't have enough to actually qualify as an MMOG. Just look at the way you guys keep calling it a "Sandbox MMO" but not an MMOG. Thats because even you can see its missing the game part.

    Some of the users of SL may have modified parts of the world to have a few basic features of a game, but that doesn't make SL itself a game any more than having a washing machine in your car makes the entire car a laundromat. At best you could claim that very small parts of the Second Life "Metaverse" are being used as a game, in the same sense that parts of your car are being used to do your laundry. But that doesn't make Second Life itself a GAME which is what this debate is about.

     

    

  • Posted: 7/19/08 2:53 PM
    Second Life