One of the more complex challenges in creating a massively multi-player on-line (MMO) game is crafting an environment where players have both fairness and depth. When you add depth and richness to the game, you simultaneously create immersion and complicate fairness. Players like immersion, it's what keeps them playing, so it's good for the game maker as well. Players hate inequity, it is the source of the deepest feelings of injustice. Endless cries of those who feel their class is the weakest, or some other player had an opportunity they didn't litter cyberspace. How will the designers of the future tackle this problem in a more realistic and useful on line world that lies in our future? MMO life on line - the virtual medium that will be the official living space of our immaterial selves.
First, let me explain the outlandish claim I just made. Yes, I believe we will one day regularly "plug-in" to another world that will break many logistical barriers. This will be a gradual process, and the sophistication and capabilities of which will scale with time. We've already begun the process with MMO role playing games, generic persistent worlds, and countless miniature realms that kids play in on various websites. At the same time, presence technologies are evolving to incredible sophistication with systems like holographic meeting rooms and virtual reality hardware. Eventually these two lines of technologies will merge and our ultimate form of communication will be meeting in a virtual world. Today we interface in these worlds with mice, keyboards, web cams, and microphones. First we will develop better interfaces to these worlds similar to virtual reality tools we have already seen. As this technology advances, these devices will tap more and more into our senses. As these experiences become more palpable, the meaning they have for us will increase in tandem. Perhaps one day we will even gain the ability to completely transfer our minds into the virtual world itself as in the singularity proposed by Ray Kurzweil. It is regarding these advanced modes of interfacing with a virtual environment that my ensuing questions relate to.
First life on line must be the ultimate place of immersion. To enable this, anything must be possible - complete depth. Otherwise, it will merely be another game. But how will it be designed to be fair? How can it be set up so that everyone has equal opportunity? With or without knowing it, I think the game makers of today are starting to address some of the big challenges of a world with a greater scope. Maybe we should back up and ask if it should be fair. After all, our physical world doesn't seem all that fair sometimes. People are born into different situations with different opportunities. Yet at the same time, we do seem rather proud of the notion that two people born in relatively similar situations are equivalently in control of their own destiny. It is this expectation of local fairness that leads to the touchy balance in today's persistent on line worlds.
When we compare the virtual worlds of today with the physical world, they seem to accomplish equity in completely opposite ways. Game designers accomplish it by creating an extremely controlled environment where they have very strict rules around what can and cannot be done, and can tweak the balance with a set of virtual "knobs" at any time. Our physical world intrinsically fosters it with it's complete sandbox effect. We are the makers of our own society and have naturally molded it into one of equality (though it took a while and still isn't quite perfect). There is always someone who can and will break the rules or upset the balance. So what do we need to make a world where anything is possible, without creating complete chaos? Providing a sandbox is not enough. We will need to import things from our physical sandbox to our virtual one to make it work. A few of these are justice/consequences, unlimited space/potential for growth, and yes, unfortunately, identification/security.
Something that is needed in a virtual environment that will set it apart from games is justice and real consequences. We have hints of this in one of the current more sandbox-like games, EVE Online. In Eve, you have bad guys. I don't mean lame bad guys who just exploit some loophole or cause an annoyance. I mean real bad guys - pirates. They can hunt down and kill other players, but there are consequences. The space police "Concord" come and relieve them of their ship in a hail of rail gun fire and missiles. This is all theatrical and just an example, but it's a good one because it shows how balance can be achieved in a sandbox environment by including an element of justice. Of course this requires a way to actually threaten with meaningful loss. Perhaps the most valuable thing would be the ability to connect to the environment itself, and so restriction of that access itself could be punishment.
Unlimited space and potential is also required. Most MMO games have limited space and resources which is a necessary control element in a game, but is the source of most forms of abuse that occurs. In an environment where information is the currency rather than pretend goods, the underlying system must scale with the needs of its users. Another concept that can be related from the games of today here is instances. This is a mechanism in most games where popular areas in the game world have multiple instances running at the same time so they are not overcrowded by people. I see a more sophisticated version of this emerging where you also have the ability to generate an instance of any environment you want for meeting people in as well as public environments that people might hang out in. You might break the it down in to three main types of environments; public places where anyone can go, invited group areas that instantiate for the purpose of specific people meeting, and your own personal space. I'm using the words space and place here very loosely, but even your individual space I imagine would be a room or something where you're just surrounded by gesture driven interfaces that you work or relax in.
Security is one of those things that is necessary but we wish we didn't have to bother with it. I don't know if ever the human race will become 100% altruistic, but it surely won't happen before we have full immersion virtual reality, so this world will need security. Given that anyone can appear any way they wish, it will be necessary to have a reliable method of identifying who somebody actually is. The anonymity we associate with the Internet today only applies to the casual interactions. Even today, anything we do that is sensitive such as banking or accessing our health records is governed by a set of controls that confirms our identity. For life on line to be a place where business can be conducted, a secure method of establishing your identity and making it available to others you interact with will be necessary. This also helps to enforce consequences because each individual has only one identity that allows them access.
Even in their currently primitive state, on line worlds provide remarkably engaging immersion and capability for social and professional interaction, as well as entertainment. Some people find themselves spending several hours a day immersed in these worlds. Sometimes significantly shifting their focus to them, or being told that they may even have an "addiction" to this form of entertainment. Is it possible to be addicted to entertainment? If so, I guess I have always been. While I don't believe it's accurate to characterize a high amount of time spent in on line social environments as an addiction, there can of course be situations where this activity becomes unhealthy. This time has to be moderated until our bodies have an outlet for the stress that is generated or we are completely separated from our bodies. People have died from experiencing too much stress in front of a computer for too long at one time. We are wired up to create all kinds of chemicals in a stressful situation that need to be used up somehow. The fact that such stress can be induced is a testament to the immersion that we already can experience with our simple interfaces.
The capability to meet with anyone on Earth at any time is a world changing concept. Imagine the burden of transportation on the Earth and ourselves shrinking dramatically as people no longer commute to work or fly over oceans on business trips. Think of the comfort you can give a loved one half way across the world going through something terrible when you can virtually be there in person rather than fumbling with words over the phone. Consider the ripple of change that might run through our planet as this brings us one step closer to a unified planet of people rather than a set of countries surrounded by borders and distrust. Surely the ability to instantly put yourself in the environment of any culture would lead to a great softening of the separation from the rest of the world we feel today.
Today our virtual environments are mostly games and our business and entertainment are two dimensional web pages. But as those of us who have played an MMO with friends know, there's another world in there if we can only convince our senses of it. It's full of real people given a whole new set of possibilities to explore. What we can do with it today is fairly limited, but as that changes it seems plausible that more and more of our virtual interactions will gravitate toward the kind which comes most natural to us. Full dimensional presence.
First, let me explain the outlandish claim I just made. Yes, I believe we will one day regularly "plug-in" to another world that will break many logistical barriers. This will be a gradual process, and the sophistication and capabilities of which will scale with time. We've already begun the process with MMO role playing games, generic persistent worlds, and countless miniature realms that kids play in on various websites. At the same time, presence technologies are evolving to incredible sophistication with systems like holographic meeting rooms and virtual reality hardware. Eventually these two lines of technologies will merge and our ultimate form of communication will be meeting in a virtual world. Today we interface in these worlds with mice, keyboards, web cams, and microphones. First we will develop better interfaces to these worlds similar to virtual reality tools we have already seen. As this technology advances, these devices will tap more and more into our senses. As these experiences become more palpable, the meaning they have for us will increase in tandem. Perhaps one day we will even gain the ability to completely transfer our minds into the virtual world itself as in the singularity proposed by Ray Kurzweil. It is regarding these advanced modes of interfacing with a virtual environment that my ensuing questions relate to.
First life on line must be the ultimate place of immersion. To enable this, anything must be possible - complete depth. Otherwise, it will merely be another game. But how will it be designed to be fair? How can it be set up so that everyone has equal opportunity? With or without knowing it, I think the game makers of today are starting to address some of the big challenges of a world with a greater scope. Maybe we should back up and ask if it should be fair. After all, our physical world doesn't seem all that fair sometimes. People are born into different situations with different opportunities. Yet at the same time, we do seem rather proud of the notion that two people born in relatively similar situations are equivalently in control of their own destiny. It is this expectation of local fairness that leads to the touchy balance in today's persistent on line worlds.
When we compare the virtual worlds of today with the physical world, they seem to accomplish equity in completely opposite ways. Game designers accomplish it by creating an extremely controlled environment where they have very strict rules around what can and cannot be done, and can tweak the balance with a set of virtual "knobs" at any time. Our physical world intrinsically fosters it with it's complete sandbox effect. We are the makers of our own society and have naturally molded it into one of equality (though it took a while and still isn't quite perfect). There is always someone who can and will break the rules or upset the balance. So what do we need to make a world where anything is possible, without creating complete chaos? Providing a sandbox is not enough. We will need to import things from our physical sandbox to our virtual one to make it work. A few of these are justice/consequences, unlimited space/potential for growth, and yes, unfortunately, identification/security.
Something that is needed in a virtual environment that will set it apart from games is justice and real consequences. We have hints of this in one of the current more sandbox-like games, EVE Online. In Eve, you have bad guys. I don't mean lame bad guys who just exploit some loophole or cause an annoyance. I mean real bad guys - pirates. They can hunt down and kill other players, but there are consequences. The space police "Concord" come and relieve them of their ship in a hail of rail gun fire and missiles. This is all theatrical and just an example, but it's a good one because it shows how balance can be achieved in a sandbox environment by including an element of justice. Of course this requires a way to actually threaten with meaningful loss. Perhaps the most valuable thing would be the ability to connect to the environment itself, and so restriction of that access itself could be punishment.
Unlimited space and potential is also required. Most MMO games have limited space and resources which is a necessary control element in a game, but is the source of most forms of abuse that occurs. In an environment where information is the currency rather than pretend goods, the underlying system must scale with the needs of its users. Another concept that can be related from the games of today here is instances. This is a mechanism in most games where popular areas in the game world have multiple instances running at the same time so they are not overcrowded by people. I see a more sophisticated version of this emerging where you also have the ability to generate an instance of any environment you want for meeting people in as well as public environments that people might hang out in. You might break the it down in to three main types of environments; public places where anyone can go, invited group areas that instantiate for the purpose of specific people meeting, and your own personal space. I'm using the words space and place here very loosely, but even your individual space I imagine would be a room or something where you're just surrounded by gesture driven interfaces that you work or relax in.
Security is one of those things that is necessary but we wish we didn't have to bother with it. I don't know if ever the human race will become 100% altruistic, but it surely won't happen before we have full immersion virtual reality, so this world will need security. Given that anyone can appear any way they wish, it will be necessary to have a reliable method of identifying who somebody actually is. The anonymity we associate with the Internet today only applies to the casual interactions. Even today, anything we do that is sensitive such as banking or accessing our health records is governed by a set of controls that confirms our identity. For life on line to be a place where business can be conducted, a secure method of establishing your identity and making it available to others you interact with will be necessary. This also helps to enforce consequences because each individual has only one identity that allows them access.
Even in their currently primitive state, on line worlds provide remarkably engaging immersion and capability for social and professional interaction, as well as entertainment. Some people find themselves spending several hours a day immersed in these worlds. Sometimes significantly shifting their focus to them, or being told that they may even have an "addiction" to this form of entertainment. Is it possible to be addicted to entertainment? If so, I guess I have always been. While I don't believe it's accurate to characterize a high amount of time spent in on line social environments as an addiction, there can of course be situations where this activity becomes unhealthy. This time has to be moderated until our bodies have an outlet for the stress that is generated or we are completely separated from our bodies. People have died from experiencing too much stress in front of a computer for too long at one time. We are wired up to create all kinds of chemicals in a stressful situation that need to be used up somehow. The fact that such stress can be induced is a testament to the immersion that we already can experience with our simple interfaces.
The capability to meet with anyone on Earth at any time is a world changing concept. Imagine the burden of transportation on the Earth and ourselves shrinking dramatically as people no longer commute to work or fly over oceans on business trips. Think of the comfort you can give a loved one half way across the world going through something terrible when you can virtually be there in person rather than fumbling with words over the phone. Consider the ripple of change that might run through our planet as this brings us one step closer to a unified planet of people rather than a set of countries surrounded by borders and distrust. Surely the ability to instantly put yourself in the environment of any culture would lead to a great softening of the separation from the rest of the world we feel today.
Today our virtual environments are mostly games and our business and entertainment are two dimensional web pages. But as those of us who have played an MMO with friends know, there's another world in there if we can only convince our senses of it. It's full of real people given a whole new set of possibilities to explore. What we can do with it today is fairly limited, but as that changes it seems plausible that more and more of our virtual interactions will gravitate toward the kind which comes most natural to us. Full dimensional presence.
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