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This Just In: We Can’t Trust Any Of You With Those Body Parts You Think About, Like, All The Time
Jul 24th
GLAAD announces they are going to combat homophobia in game communities. Joshua Meadows (sometime commenter here, frequent commenter on Second Life issues, and I suspect, you know, may be that way) has a few things to say about it.
I believe, after years of experience inside these environments, any plan that is little more than “Let’s ask the players to be nicer to each other,” is utterly doomed to failure. By the same extension, however, any plan that demands companies adopt an authoritarian stance against homophobic behavior is going to end up increasing vitriol against gay players.
More here.
In case you think he might be overreacting a tad: EA encourages convention-goers to molest their employees for valuable prizes. My reaction to this pretty much exactly matches Jeremy Preacher’s.
I understand that abysmally stupid ideas get floated in meetings all the time, but at a billion-dollar company like EA, you’d think SOMEONE would have the basic common sense to put a stop to a FUCKING CONTEST TO SEE WHO CAN HARASS YOUR EMPLOYEES THE MOST.
Tune in next week, when more people say things before and better than I could!
The Last Word On The Curious Case Of The Pouting Professor
Jul 10th
Gevlon is my moral compass, but in reverse. Although I do wonder how he would have handled 1999-era UO.
Transgressive Behavior
Jul 8th
The curious case of the poorly behaved professor continues, as in his blog, he poses the question – was his CoH’s character’s behavior in violating social norms while remaining within the letter of the game’s rules “worthy of wrath”? I’ll let you remain in suspense as to how he’d answer that… oh, wait.
I can only note that all the things Twixt is accused of doing in descriptions like the above are simple, mundane, and easily mimicked in-game things that really aren’t much fun and really aren’t in the spirit of the game rules at all – game rules that Twixt championed and for which he was universally reviled; one can only wonder, if doing such simple and mundane things indeed encompasses the Twixt story, why there is a Twixt story at all?
But lets talk about something else.
So if you picked “he didn’t answer but immediately changed the subject”, you win! And what does he talk about? Why, the cavail heard from people called upon their bad behavior in online games since online games have existed – it’s the developers’ fault for allowing it to happen!
Game rules are prohibitive and paradoxical; social rules – most particularly the ones I observed in CoH — are authoritarian and static, inhibiting game play. With social rules in effect, the CoH game becomes less a game and more a society. There is less play and more politics.
The CoH game designers – and other mmo designers — seem to have largely abdicated their responsibility to design a game in favor of providing a sandbox for players to use as they wish. This may be good for game designer jobs, their blog readers, and their pocketbooks, but it is not particularly good for their games.
Well, I guess I was told. But in this awesomely compact non-sequitor of finger pointing, Myers explains neatly how little he understands the subject he purported to study. Something that almost any MMO player understands quickly enough – that MMOs tend to be both ‘games-as-directed-play’ and ‘games-as-sandbox’ or ‘games-as-community’ – the ancient “games vs. world” argument in MMO discussion, raging for decades, that Myers seems to have missed in his haunting of Recluse’s Victory merrily PKing. For someone who literally wrote a paper on the impact of online community behavior, this is… breathtaking. In his comments on the blog piece, Myers goes further:
The problem with the “meta-game” is that frequently that term is used to excuse all manner of bs exploits and advantages that not all players have equal access to.
This is precisely why the “meta-game” is sport games like football, for instance, is so closely monitored (salary caps, no taping other team’s practices, etc.) and codified.
Without the essential characteristics of a game — this includes the rules characteristics I mentioned early in this post — the meta-game is meta-bs. With those characteristics, it is a big game which, yes, we can call a meta-game if we wish to.
The very point of an MMO is that it is less a game and more a society. Without that society, an MMO is simply a game with particularly long and somewhat dumbed-down gameplay. If a designer ignores that society, s/he is ignoring the social connections that make an MMO unique. This is also not particularly good for their games, their continued employment, or their pocketbooks, although it may give them more time to update their blog.
But let’s talk about something else. Namely, the original topic that Myers skipped – was his behavior ‘worthy of wrath’?
The very act of asking this question is itself transgressive. “If I violate the social norms of a community I inhabit, while remaining within the letter of its laws, should I be condemned?”
Oddly, in the Times-Picayune article, Myers implies CoH players themselves are transgressive, by violating the social norms of the community *he* inhabits – making harassing threats. He admits in the original article that NCsoft responded to them appropriately – yet still takes the position they should have done more, by creating an environment where he could violate the norms of a community, and the community could then… respond? If it were just a game, of course, it wouldn’t be an issue, because Baldur’s Gate 2 NPCs rarely if ever smacktalk.
But it’s not, and there’s the issue. It’s a community, and one Myers derided and taunted, and then was shocked, *shocked* to learn that the community derided and taunted him in turn. And of course, Internet anonymity being what it is – and something any basic student of online gaming would be familiar with in picoseconds – much of that derision and taunting violated the norms of *his* community. Which he (properly) appealed to the authorities (NCsoft) who (properly) acted upon it, as he himself stated. At which point he then… wrote a research paper describing how, when faced with transgressive behavior, an online community will react badly. Again, this is not news to anyone who, say, has been on Xbox Live for more than 10 minutes.
Myers even implies that my previous blog posting was transgressive, since I quoted at length the commenters to the Times-Picayune article who had first-hand experience with his research methodology – the “anonymous wall of mob”. Well, if that’s the case, let’s go to the source himself. What does Twixt have to say about Twixt?
See for yourself. Let’s do some research!
First, we discover that what’s on offer is a considerably scrubbed version. The account has a post count of over 650, and only a small fraction of those are available. Odd coincidence that. The vast majority of these posts are years old, from before Issue 13’s PvP nerfs last December, which Twixt took great offense to:
The devs can take my jump away
Can take my speed, tp, and play
But here I root and stand amazed
That they don’t also take ur phase.
Shortly afterwards, in a common affliction of bored Killer archetypes, Twixt apparently gave up on the game and out of boredom, just decided to, well, be a dick.
Screw this – PVP sucks. I’m coming back in here to farm and gank the noobies, but if you think Im gonna stand there and slug it out with little to no chance of fleeing insurmountable odds, you must be dinko.
However, a pre-scrubbed version of Twixt’s transgressiveness is still available online, and requoted below in case it falls prey to another odd coincidence. The entire thread is a fantastic summation of the reaction to Twixt by those who encountered him, and contains the following response from the “droner” himself:
1. Twixt windup doll says…
* base is safe
* get moar phase
* hoho
* get moar vills
* vengence weenie alert!
* hoho
* always die when you leave, gives the other side hope
* watch the language kiddies
* hoho
* lag, adjusting2.
01-03-2008 10:34:37 You have defeated make love
01-03-2008 10:39:02 You have defeated make love
(dozens of similar killshots deleted)
01-04-2008 22:30:39 You have defeated Mr MentaIity
01-04-2008 22:32:23 You have defeated Paul Radbot3. Elf Stalker who? Never heard of him.
Yes, it’s hard to see why anyone would take offense to such a prized member of the CoH community.
For more background, you can go to Myers’ paper, Play and Punishment: The Sad And Curious Case of Twixt. It contains the following helpful explanation of droning:
Since RV is a two-faction (heroes vs. villains) game, there are safe areas within the zone where heroes and villains can enter and leave the zone without fear of being attacked. Protecting these safe areas (“bases”) are security drones, which, without recourse, vaporize members of the opposing faction and transport them back to their own base on the opposite side of the zone map. There is no game-imposed penalty for getting droned, nor is any reward given to a player whose opponent gets droned.
Except… that’s not right. The entire reason Twixt’s opponents were so enraged by his “droning” was that, unlike death to PvP opponents, death to NPCs imposes an XP penalty, which in CoH/V can be fairly punitive. Myers is wrong here on a very key point – not only is there a game-imposed penalty for being droned, it’s one of the most punitive penalties in the game.
So either Myers deliberately lied about this impact to justify his own case, or he didn’t fully understand the rules – the game rules, not the community rules – of the online community that he was studying.
Whichever option you choose to believe, both are… well, fairly transgressive.
(Late ninja edit: some have said that, at least as of now, deaths to drones do not impose XP debt. However, while this makes the above quote far less black-and-white a mistaken assertion, given that Myers as Twixt gleefully often did the same maneuver into NPC mobs which do, the larger points still stand.)
Honesty From The Mmogoblogosphere
Jun 25th
From a comment on Brad McQuaid’s being excited about the new Dream Theater album:
Talk bout Vanguard, or what you’ll be doing next.
Save this ‘New Dream Theater’ stuff for people who care about you as human. To us you are just a thing that will deliver us a game.
Well, that’s that, then!
Trust In The Light! (Unless It’s Perky, Cute And Nerdy)
Jun 1st
Don't I just REEK of moral clarity?
This just in: people lie on the Internet.
I know, really? We could just stop right there. This story has been told many times before, and the fact that I started this entry with the picture of a midriff-baring female elf paladin tells you all you need to know.
But if you want to know more – well, there is always more.
So the latest controversy roiling the Warcraftblogosphereofdramas is that of Paladin Schmaladin, prior to this week a popular blog-slash-reference for raiding paladins.
Paladin Schmaladin was written by Ferraro, who when not a world-class raiding paladin, is a QA tester for Blizzard. No really! Also… she interned at the CIA. NO, REALLY!
Also, this was her profile pic, on Blogger and WoW Insider:
Hi! I'm Ferraro!
…yeah. I know. I know. Amazingly, I know your world will be rocked to its core to find that all is not as it appears to be here.
First, after WoW Insider’s profile. Jagoex, another WoW blogger who writes about Warlocks, pointed out some similarities between Ferraro’s posted pictures and another perky cute blonde geek. Now, it’s entirely possible that Sarah Townsend, when not hitting up trade shows and microblogging and posting Flickr shots from parties raids in WoW. I mean, I believe in fairy tales. And warlocks are a bunch of filthy lying bloggers anyway. (Note: no laughing at my WoW Armory, plz. I don’t have time to be a hard core raider. Plus I’m not a cute blonde.) To quote Jagoex:
So what does all of this craziness mean, exactly?
Well, for starters, a bunch of love-struck boys are going to experience some heavy frustration when this comes to light, and we are bound to see some nerd rage soon. For bloggers like me, it is a little disheartening. Ferarro has basically been lying about her identity for years, and stealing someone else’s content and posting them as her own. She has taken advantage of another blogger and her reader’s trust, and that makes my job as a fellow blogger just that much harder.
On a WoW-related front, this mess also means that Ferarro isn’t a game tester for Blizzard. The “game-testing” images that were posted on Paladin Schmaladin were relabeled TechDarling images that were taken at a blogging expo.
>I gotta admit, just thinking about this gets me a little angry, and my mind is going crazy with a series of difficult questions: what drives a person to do this kind of thing? Why would anyone lead people on like that? And for what means? And do you know what the worst part about this whole thing is? Paladin Schmaladin was a great resource and excellent WoW blog that a lot of people enjoyed and depended on. Why it needed to be masked by someone else’s pretty face is beyond me, really. If you don’t like the way you look or want some privacy, don’t post a picture. End of story.
The word you’re looking for here: busted.
Hi! I'm NOT Ferraro.
But of course, it’s entirely possible that Sarah Townsend, when not hitting up trade shows and microblogging and posting Flickr shots from parties raids in WoW. Or… OK, maybe not.
UGH-some creep on WoW named Ferraro has been using my photos?
Well, that’s that, then! Ferraro’s first response was to hide her entire blog, with a note on her soon-to-be-deleted Twitter feed that “stalkers are cool”. Her Paladin character disappeared as well, most likely due to a server transfer.
Then, a short time later, Paladin Schmaladin was updated with a mea culpa of sorts. You see, there were many Ferraros. Many, many Ferraros.
Ever wonder why her voice in the podcast “interview,” her Ninja Rap, and her Mods and Addons Tutorial post sounded nothing alike? Different Ferraros.
Ever wondered how she suddenly started working for Blizzard out of the blue? That’s ’cause I actually do, and when I took over this this blog, it was the perfect avenue for me to share insider information while remaining safe behind a 5-year-old moniker.
For those of you who spoke with a Ferraro in Vent, did her voice change one time? It was a different girl.
Have you sat back and saw this blog’s writing style differ over the years? Now you know why (the 4th Ferraro was particularly ah, emotional).
How did she have an internship at the CIA, as well? Also a different Ferraro.
Think about it: Could anyone really level all those different Paladins of different races and factions and raid in different guilds on different servers and get them all to end-game status? Obviously not.
And if Ferraro didn’t get on Vent during your raid, it was likely when one of the guy “Ferraros” were in charge. Or it was during an author switch.
Each were world-class Paladins and experts at the game – just completely different people at one time or another.
Well, that clears it all up, doesn’t it? I mean it’s just an innocent case of, um, account sharing and appealing to multiple nerdy desires of most of WoW’s userbase simultaneously (OMG I AM TOTALLY RAIDING WITH A HOT JACK BAUER). Yeah. From Ferraro’s latest post:
I’m not even sure the original Ferraro keeps track of this blog anymore, and no one’s reached her yet (although she’ll probably hear about this by week’s end). Maybe she knew Sarah Townsend? I dunno. Probably not. The original Ferraro is actually very attractive though, so maybe she just chose it to… hide behind… while still… being… pretty? I don’t know. I’m just assuming. But the first Ferraro had a problem with stalkers. *shrug*
And from Ferraro’s interview a week ago:
Ah, the pictures: the double-edged sword. It’s funny: if I post my picture next to articles — you know, the way millions of other authors do in magazines, newspapers and blogs around the world — some people yell and scream that I’m an attention whore. But then if I take down anything that has to do with me as a person, like pictures or personal posts, then I’m hiding from the trolls and not being myself and get mocked for being weak. There’s really no way to make everyone okay with it unless I magically morphed into a guy — in which case no one would mind if I posted pictures, humorously enough.
I think it’s unfortunate all the hurdles female players so often have to jump through just to be accepted in this game by its male counterparts, let alone be accepted as one who excels at it. So I stopped playing by the hypocritical rules and adopted the saying, “Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter won’t mind,” and haven’t looked back. I’m just going to be myself and post and say what I want, and if you don’t like what I write, then just close the window or scroll up. I’m gonna be me no matter what.
I’m sure the actual women who play WoW and post entries to the Internet and occasionally are fairly attractive really, really wish Ferraro was “gonna be me no matter what” right about now. Because this is a classic, almost pristine example of attention-whoring, down to the breathless “inside the velvet rope” references whispered from almost every paragraph of Ferraro’s interview…
To put it simply, I do internal testing with Blizz (not “for” — there’s a big difference). I think I’m treading on thin ice saying this, but I essentially raid with a team in one room. We pull up numbers, discuss things and make hefty reports and send them to … ah, “important” people. I think that’s all I can say without heat coming down on me.
(I would be very, very surprised if Blizzard actually did this, considering that it would be far easier to simply collect metrics and observe actual raids in progress on live servers. Without the overhead of paying people who then promptly give interviews to WoW Insider.)
I moved from Virginia to Southern California a few years ago, so I’ve made friends from coast to coast with people who have played this game (no, nothing romantic). I’ve gone to the beach with a guild I was in, went to a server BBQ, and met a bunch of fans at last year’s Blizzcon. You do have to be careful when you meet up with people, though (there’s no bubble-hearthing in the real world), so I almost always bring a couple friends with me.
“Hi, I’m totally available from afar, but also very, very cool. You better step up your game, scrub!”
So where does this all end? Probably with the player formerly known as Ferraro starting a new blog shortly. WoW Insider, no doubt embarrassed as hell for not spotting the Twelve Danger Signs Of The Drama Queen, posted a handy recap which also disclosed via the magic of IP tracking that Ferraro’s mea culpa isn’t all that culpa.
We’ve investigated, and have determined based on IP address records of comments left by Ferarro on WoW.com between July of 2008 and May of 2009 that the comments all came from the same small subnet of IPs, and are all geographically very local to one another. This means that unless “Ferarro #1″ through “Ferarro #7″ live within a few miles of each other, they’re the same person.
So, someone who made an Internet reputation based largely on lying… lied. Imagine that. From Ferraro:
How do we know all of this isn’t a lie? That would be akin to coming clean and admitting to stealing a car, then robbing a bank, murdering policemen and civilians, and taking off with millions of dollars… and then in court swearing you had your seat belt on. Lying is kinda moot at this point.
Honestly, if anything it probably would be easier to say, “Yup, that was all me. My bad. Anyway, moving on…” But I figure since we’re coming clean, it might as well be in total.
You’d think. Then again, habits can be hard to break, and plenty of posters really want to believe that there is, out there, their dream of an attractive blood elf being paid to raid.
Really, a good dose of misanthropy is the best palette cleanser for this whole sad sordid tale. Gevlon the Greedy Goblin is here to save the day! (But surely, not out of altruism, that would be an ape subroutine or something.)
Don’t trust in people. Trust in facts, systems, maybe even ideas. And just because you meet someone often (or read him often) don’t think you know him! You don’t. When something comes up that does not fit into your picture, it’s not his fault to disappoint you. It’s your fault to have expectations from him.
In that vein, I have a confession to make: I actually am a sultry draenei woman who works for the FSB. Sorry, but it seemed best to come clean. I know, everyone was comfortable with the thought of my being an overweight forty-something game designer, but I’m gonna be me no matter what now.
Hi, boys!
Harrumph!
Apr 16th
Been fairly busy fending off vultures this past week, but had to denote this one: George Will, in between bemoaning the American public for eschewing spats and top hats for comfortable jeans, had this witty rejoinder in today’s column:
Seventy-five percent of American “gamers” — people who play video games — are older than 18 and nevertheless are allowed to vote.
Gee whillickers, Mr. Will, we let women and brown people vote, too! Soon the Whigs may see their time in office threatened.
No, really. It’s actually an encouraging sign when the paragons of the old order recognize the threat of the new.
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