MINECRAFT!!!

When someone imagines a virtual world, many different preconceptions may appear in a persons mind. They may think of a social situation, like Second Life, where the purpose of the world is to interact with others, and the world itself is merely a tool of the communication. Someone else may think of games like EVE online where the playing with others is secondary to your own personal enjoyment and success in a large scale game. However there is a brand new virtual world that is changing many people's thoughts about what a virtual world really is, and its a game all about mining. Minecraft is low tech online game that can be played for free or bought for $10 dollars. their is no objective and there is no goal, there is only you and nearly infinite world(6 times the size of the surface of the earth) and what you want to do with it. The game is set in two time-frames day and night. during the day you are free to explore the land and mine for resources, once you have resources you can then construct buildings. the limit to what you can build is endless. Flying cities have built, as well as castle under the ocean and fully fuctional space ships. At night various monsters will try and attack you, however depending on how well you buildings are made you will be safe.

Minecrafts popularity extends from the retro appearance of the game the seemingly endless variety of buildings and objects that can be constructed using the game. Some players have recreated entire game worlds from other popular game series within Minecraft, gaining praise from traditional game developers.
An online version of Minecraft has recently released by the game makers to let players collaborate on even larger projects.

Minecraft city

Minecraft spaceship

Minecraft Earth

Morality and the illusion of choice in games and virtual worlds

As game as increased in complexity the concept of choice and allowing players to create their own stories and feel the affects and consequences of moral actions has become an integral aspect to many games. This helps create a deeper level of immersion within the game and gives the players actions more weight as they connect to our emotions and real world beliefs and not simply to prescribed goals within the game. However there is a counter argument to this belief and it brings up a unique question in game design. If a game is designed to allow to make choices based on your morality, did you actually make a choice? Or simply follow one of several paths created by the game designer? Can choice ever actually exist in a world where every action and choice must be created by a person programing the ability for you to make those choices, and therefore all those possible choices are simply illusions made by an invisible creator, rendering the player into nothing more a puppet being manipulated by the game creators.

In an attempt to better express the concept of choice in games, The game Bioshock created what is considered by many people in the game community one of the strongest statements on morality in games ever made. Bioshock has at its core a very simple story of a man being trapped in a strange underwater city and he wants to escape. You control the character as he tries various plans to escape. During the game however their is a very infamous twist near the end of the game based around the players ally, a character named Atlas. Atlas is the only ally the player has for the majority of the game, he gives the player information about their situation and advice on what to do and where to go, a common function of AI companions. He is also very polite and always asks "would you kindly" before asking you move on to the next part of the mission objective.
Near the end of the game it is revealed that Atlas is in fact the antagonist of the game and every time he says the words "would you kindly" you have no choice but to follow his orders. This is explained not to the character you are controlling but to YOU the player. You are not in control of the game, the game has lied to you, it has betrayed you. when you thought you were make choices based on your own morality you were in fact nothing more than a puppet on rails.
The only comparison I can give to this moment in another medium would be the novel "The Murder Of Rodger Ackroyd" when it is revealed the narrator did it.

Bioshock the game

An explanation of Would You Kindly

Social commentary in games

Games and virtual worlds are praised for their ability to bring people together in new and unique ways. However a situation that is becoming more relevant in the examination of games is their ability to tell narratives and how these narratives reflect modern society. While social commentary is not new to games with some of the earliest games every made being joke filled text adventures that often made fun of the games very own technical limitations. Newer games have been able to create more complex statements about life and the world around as they have been also capable of creating a world we can reckognize as being similar  to our own.

Sometimes this statement on society happens purely by accident and becomes almost a post-modern art piece.  One of the first virtual worlds Ultima was met with high expectations and a large fan-base. It allowed every player to build homes, raise families and even rule entire kingdoms with other players supporting them. This all sounded wonderful, however overtime players began filling the game world with their homes leaving no place left to adventure, turning the entire game world into an endless city sprawl with small patches of parkland that very powerful players controlled and used as a farm for money and reasources. Many people found the situation Ultima became to immensely ironic of real life in that even during play all anyone wants to do is fight over real-estate.


 Ultima-Information about the online game.

Online evolution

Over the  last 10 years games have been able to take advantage of the increased use of online accessibility to allow what originally may have been closed isolated narratives to evolve into online virtual worlds that adapt the wants and desires of the playerbase. This has lead to several changes in overall game design. The first is that players never view a game as being "complete" anymore, as there is always the possibility that the game makers will add more content to make the game bigger or more complex. A second change is that a bad game can fixed after its released. whether it is a technical problem that needs to be addressed or the players feel more narrative needs to be added for a better experience there is always hope that this can be addressed in the future. 2 examples of this are the games Fallout 3 and Bioshock 2. Fallout 3 had what is known as a hard ending, in that once the narrative is complete the game can no longer be played, however many players found this conclusion rather jarring as it stopped them from exploring the game world after the end of the story. This lead to the creation of a story change where the ending was removed so that players could play to their hearts content.
In Bioshock 2 the issue was more complex in that many players felt the game was not as good as the original game and that its narrative was simply bad. This lead to the creation of a completely new narrative that could be played as an alternative to the original that many players and reviewers felt was stronger than the original . These are both large scale examples of online expansions to a videogame, but they are strong indicators or where games are currently going in the future.

expansions to Fallout 3

bioshock 2

Religion in Virtual Worlds

While video-games as a form of technology and art-form has made many leaps over the last 30 years, there are still areas of our culture that are difficult to express in the medium and are considered very controversial. Religion as concept is used often in games and virtual worlds as device to explain game mechanics and the structure of the virtual space. Almost all virtual worlds have a fictitious back-story to explain why the player should care about their surroundings and some form of fictitious religion is usually part of this narrative and often based somewhat on real world religions. The concept of current religions being used in virtual worlds and games is very rare and usually met with displeasure by the users of the game for various reasons, for example not all members of the game community practice the same religion, or the interpretation of the religion by the creators of the game is considered inaccurate by religious members of the game community.
Some games attempt to make very broad statements about religion that may be offensive to people of faith. A recent example of this is the game Assassins Creed 2 where the antagonist is the Pope. In regards to the specific genre of virtual worlds, more leeway is given in what can and can not be done, as much of the content is created by the players themselves. Several guilds in World of Warcraft are themed around real-world religion's. The religious themed virtual world called The Bible Online is currently in development, and as the concept of morality figures more prominatly into games, the concept of religion will most likely increase as well.

Article abour religion in games

The bible online

more about religion and games

The Power of Creation!!!

While there are many games that allow you to explore virtual worlds either alone or with friends. There is a small genre of games that allow you to create virtual worlds of your very own. In these genre of games, often referred to as "god games", the player has near limitless power to create planets, living entities, even societies that the player can then mold into whatever form of culture they choose. Two specific games stand out as famous examples of this genre, the fire game, Black and White cast the player as a literal deity at the dawn of time. The player had the power to be a benevolent god who protected his people through and miracles or a dark and evil deity who cursed the land and demanded constant sacrifice to feed your ego. There no punishments for either play style, the game simply altered itself to fit how you wished your world to be.
The second game, Spore has the player guide an individual species through evolution, from a single cell organism to a space faring race seeding other planets with life. The innovation of spore is that every other organism  the player interacted with is a creation of a different player from their own version of spore from a central sever. This meant that the more precise and effective your creature was, the more likely it was to thrive in other players worlds and interact their societies, influencing their evolution.
God games continue to be a small genre of the overall game industry but their influence has been felt in the design and development of many of the virtual worlds that have risen to prominence.

God Games-information about god games

A virtual world that belongs just to you

While the concept of the virtual world is normally used for online multilayer games, there are many examples of vibrant offline worlds that are designed for the enjoyment of an individual player. While these games have only person playing the game they are filled with complex AI characters going through routines that mimic real life and this gives the illusion of a world that continues beyond the players immediate location. In many times this illusion, is real and the AI is in fact having fights and conflict all on its own without the player being involved.

A good example of this style of game is Red Dead Redemption. A western game designed to encapsulate the feelings and emotional up-heaving of the old west during the turn of the last century. The game creates a fantastic atmosphere around the situation and allowed the player to live a life in the old west and truly immerse themselves into the period situation.

Another game that is a good example of a strong single player virtual world is the game Bioshock where the player explores an undersea city that was designed to be a great utopia but had failed to lived up to it's creators designs and had fallen in disrepair. This game allows the player to explore a realized fictional world at their own pace and leisure and understand how they fit into this fantastic situation.

bioshock - link to website about bioshock

red dead redemption - link to website about red dead redemption