"Advanced" use of virtual worlds? (Re: [MUD-Dev] MMORPGs & MUDs)

[Hans-Henrik Staerfeldt]

On Tue, 29 Jan 2002, Ola Fosheim Grøstad wrote:
> Matt Mihaly wrote:
>> On Thu, 24 Jan 2002, Ola Fosheim [iso-8859-1] Grøstad wrote:
 
>>> etc... RPers are quite obviously often more advanced in the way
>>> they use the game, because they use the game on multiple levels
>>> and in ways which has not been designed for and provide
>>> significant enjoyment (or the opposite) for other players as
>>> well. Now, the commercial designers treat them as "just a kind
>>> of gamer" because they dont constitute a significant
>>> population...
 
>> Quite obviously? Clearly it's not obvious or there'd be no
>> discussion about it.
 
> Oh come on, mud-dev'ers discuss the obvious all the time. ;>

Aside from the issue of being more or less advanced. Which way do
player evolve (or devolve depending on your viewpoint), or do they
change style at all?

Do they start as 'powerplayers' and end up 'roleplayers' or are
their style more static and unaffected by the environment. This
issue would surely also be of interrest to the commercial sector, as
a players development would dictate when he/she would fall outside
the games niche. This would in turn help predict the turnover of
players within the game given a specific set of implemented
features. This again could help determine if things like 'political
play' would be profittable to implement.

In other words; Do the roleplayers (in theese specifc games types)
not constitute a seignificant population because they have changed
style over time, and the game now offers less of what they want, or
is it because they were roleplayers to start with that didnt find
the game enjoyable enough?

Hans Henrik Stærfeldt   |    bombman at diku.dk    | work:  hhs at cbs.dtu.dk      |
Address:                |___  +45 40383492    __|__       +45 45252425     __|
DTU, Kemitorvet,        | Scientific programmer at Center for Biological     |
bygn 208, CBS.          |  Sequence Analysis, Technical University of Denmark|

_______________________________________________
MUD-Dev mailing list
MUD-Dev at kanga.nu
https://www.kanga.nu/lists/listinfo/mud-dev