Greg makes a point to discuss MUDs and roleplaying games, noting that these games do not have explicit goals set out for the player. He goes on to note that these games allow a player to pick and choose his own goals -- and often the goal simply comes down to character improvement. Greg also addresses the issue of boredom in these kinds of games; an interesting point. MMORPGs, games that allow players to do what they wish within the world, are constanting being updated and maintained to provide new content because, inevitably, the players of the game become bored with constantly redoing what is available to thm. There is an issue with games that have no set point of completion; eventually a player strays into the realm of repetition and eventually becomes tired of the game. I have played, and ceased playing, a number of MMORPGs. The first of these was Ragnarok, a Korean MMO. Within Ragnarok existed a core flaw; the only real goal or activity within the game was solely character improvement through the repeated killing of the most experience per hour effective monsters. Many MMORPGs, while boasting open ended gameplay that allows a player to choose what to do within a world, fall into the 'grinding' trap -- forcing players to mindlessly repeat the same action in order to advance. Developers of MMOs find that the biggest challenge is keeping end-game content, things for the player to do once they have reached the ceiling, up to date and engaging. Within the MMORPG genre, boredom is the greatest threat.
An amusing area of Greg's book is within the 'Struggle' section, and is in regards to his description of 'coperative games'. He notes that the call for cooperative games is a call for games without struggle or conflict. However, in today's world of gaming, a cooperative (or co-op) game is a game wherein players work together specifically to achieve a goal, and the conflict/struggle comes from the challenge within the game itself. The term co-op gaming, in regards to a game such as Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light, appears to have different meaning within Greg's book. It is interesting that Greg notes that cooperative play is entertaining in the attempt to achieve a mutual goal, but seems dismissive of the term "cooperative gaming".
Greg makes a comparison between EverQuest and Ultima Online during the Structure session, explaining that while both are intensely similar games, EverQuest does not allow player versus player conflict, while Ultima Online encourages it through better rewards for doing such. He explains that such a small difference creates a huge change in player interaction; Ultima Online breeds fear and avoidance of other players, while EverQuest players engage in relaxed conersations and assist each other. This was very apparent when I played World of Warcraft; within the same game the difference in player interaction could easily be seen between PVP and non-PVP servers. Within a PVP realm, players often instigated witch hunts to take out players of the opposite faction, and paranoia ran high while out and about exploring the realm; high levelled players saw killing lower levelled players as a sort of sport. Relations between the two factions were as the developers intended; people were at war and developed a genuine dislike for players of the opposite faction. By contrast, on non-PVP realms, while conversations between factions were difficult due to chat filters, players from opposite factions were happy to ignore each other, or even sometimes assist using what little communication there was available with emotes and stunted phrases.
Straight on from the previous point, Costikyan then stresses the importance of understanding how game structure affects player behaviour, and explains that the player killing aspect of Ultima Online was not wholly intentional, pointing out that the developer's previous games focused on moral, prosocial paths. However, it is very difficult to predict how people will respond to certain structures. An example of a negative response would be one wherein people attempt to find creative and roundabout ways to exploit the system in order to cause another player grief or difficulty. Within many, many multiplayer games, player versus player interaction is prohibited. In a competative environment, though, people become very adept at finding ways the developers did not intend to kill or take revenge on one another. Going back to Ragnarok Online, player vs player is restricted to designated PVP zones, some of which are only active at certain times of the week. Players found that certain monsters had patterns of aggression that would allow them to switch target to the nearest and more vulnerable players, to prevent easy 'tank and spank' encounters. This behaviour allowed players to gather up large groups of monsters and then run them passed another player, causing all of the monsters to swap targets and ambush the unsuspecting victim. Costikyan briefly touches on this by stating that 'by an dlarge, you can expect that a player will respond to the incentives a game provides. Not always; players sometimes delight in doing the perverse'.
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