The Reality Of Virtual Worlds

Just noticed that Time named the still-in-beta virtual world, Second Life, one of its Best Inventions 2002. I'm curious if anyone reading has had a chance to check it out already?

Seeing this write-up reminded me again of something I didn't mention in my Slate piece on The Sims Online, which is the question of the game's graphics. Put delicately, they are not exactly state of the art. Am I the only one who has a suspension of disbelief problem with virtual worlds that don't represent themselves as true-3D spaces? I found Black and White a much more immersive environment than the Sims for precisely that reason -- it felt like a place that I wanted to go back and visit, just for the scenery. Obviously, from the amount I've written about him, I think Will Wright is a total genius, but I think sometimes he's too quick to downplay the importance of graphics in his games. It'll be interesting to see if the visuals handicap Sims Online at all -- since it basically looks like a game you could have been playing five years ago.

Updated, 11/14, 9:30 PM: Stewart Butterfield writes in to point out that "... Solitaire is the most played computer game of all time and there is a whole world of games that are extremely well-conceived, popular and fun -- but aren't played on a computer at all." Absolutely true, but Solitaire doesn't try to create an immersive world the way Sims Online is aiming to do. I think Tetris is certainly as addictive as any of these games -- but I wouldn't want to live there.

Still, Stewart makes a number of excellent points: "To me (and, of course, my bias is obvious) I'd much rather trade graphical sophistiction for interesting and powerful formalizations of the relationships between players and the ability for the network that emerges to drive the game."

Comments

[Stewart Butterfield]

As someone who's betting a lot on a game's ability to succeed without state of the art graphics, I'd say games can be succesful without state of the art graphics (come on reality, bend to my will!)

It seems very much like a question of all or nothing: half-assed 3d worlds may be hampered by low polygon counts, but Solitaire is the most played computer game of all time and there is a whole world of games that are extremely well-conceived, popular and fun -- but aren't played on a computer at all.

In my experience, I don't remember ever stopping playing any game because the graphics seemed outdated -- but that is primarily because I usually get bored of the game play long before the graphics seem outdated.

The more pressing issues for the Sims Online (and likely for Second Life as well -- this is the first I've ever heard of it) are: how long does it take someone to explore the entire possibility space for their character? How many hours of experimentation and investigation before they have "done it all"? And what mechanisms does the game have for enabling higher-level phenomena to emerge (things that are not under the control of any one player, but are a result of the summed actions of all the players)? Subscription-based games need to stay interesting for a long time ...

To me (and, of course, my bias is obvious) I'd much rather trade graphical sophistiction for interesting and powerful formalizations of the relationships between players and the ability for the network that emerges to drive the game.

[risser]

Just a thought, but a lot of people liked Zork, and a few want to live there (Been to any Renaissance Festivals lately?).

No graphic interface at all, except the king of all, the human imagination.

Now that I think about it, MUDs and MOOs are(were?) pretty popular among some folks as well.

Peter

[peterme]

Maybe it's a matter of perspective? In BLACK AND WHITE, you don't see you--everything you see is from your god-like perspective. In THE SIMS and THE SIMS ONLINE, there is a character 'representing' you on the screen... The more detailed that character would be, the less it would feel like it could be you.

I dunno. Just riffing here. I know that Wright is way-major influenced by Scott McCloud, who talks convincingly of amplification through simplification in UNDERSTANDING COMICS.

[Robert Daeley]

I recently had occasion to play a Mac OS X beta of WWIIOnline and was at first laughing at the dated graphics (nothing like a 2D line of pixellated bushes to hide behind). But after hours of immersive play later, I realized that I had a perfect exemplar of graphics != gameplay.

I've played I think every product released from the Maxis (now a part of EA) crew, from the original SimCity all the way through the Sims. It is the immersion in a 'World' or 'System' that is the fun part, with emphasis on the system part of it. What is going on in the gamer's head is at least as important, perhaps moreso, than how many polygons are displayed every second. Wil Wright has talked about creating software toys rather than games, and the thing about a toy is that it is not limited to one activity. Think of how simple (even boring) a ball is, but how many uses does it have? Depends on the user.

My wife, a non-gamer, occasionally gets addicted to a game and will play the snot out of it for hours. In looking at a list of four she has been hooked on, I see Systems:

SimCity 2000
Pokemon
Diablo II
Carmageddon

Yes, even that last one has a System, a process of 'Let's See What This Will Do' that is sparked by the user's imagination and is fulfilled (or not) by the game, by the toy.

Interestingly, despite the intricate System of The Sims and its progeny, my wife has no desire to try it out. Subject matter is very important, too, and for her, telling somebody to go to the bathroom and clean themselves doesn't appeal. If I weren't a history buff, specifically WWII history, I don't think I would have given WWIIOnline a chance after seeing my first flat tree.

[sam]

The best computer games I've ever played don't have graphics.

Try www.adom.de - it's a free game (which actually runs in a DOS window, or in Linux) but it's by far the best fantasy strategy/RPG game I've seen. Unlike its better-known predecessor, Nethack, it actually has a kind of story and a fairly coherent game world. And it puts across that game world through very short text descriptions, in a way that I feel is perfectly good. It's certainly a far better game than the graphic-ized, action-ized version of the same thing, 'Diablo' (and its ilk).

Apart from that I'm also somewhat into the 'interactive fiction' genre (text adventures), in which I'd recommend several games such as 'Babel' (if you like SF), 'The Plant' (if you're an X-Files fan), and 'My Angel' (if you don't fit into those categories). All these games and many others, along with information about how to download the interpreter software for your platform, are available from here:

http://www.igs.net/~tril/if/best/index.html

If you like reading, then of course you should have no doubt of the ability of text to create convincing virtual worlds.

There's no money in any of this, of course. But there are some damn good games.

--sam

[Songdog]

I've always thought of Wright's work as _toys_ rather than games, per se, because there is no fixed objective or sense of "winning". You can play games _with_ these toys, but they are much more open than games.

The enourmously successful Grand Theft Auto 3 uses a much more open design than most games before it, and MMO games bring persistent character development to huge communities of role players. Meanwhile, Wil Wright is bringing the Sims into the MMO genre from the toy side of things, and I'm very curious what computer entertainment will be like in five or ten years.

And yes, Tetris would be a _lousy_ place to live with new blocks appearing out of the clear blue sky all the time, and you never know when a whole neighborhood will disappear overnight.