Futility

Futility.

It is the driving fear of our lives. We learn that it exists when we cannot buy the comic books we want with our allowance, or miss out on a classroom reward because another student was better. We compare what we have or what we can do or what we can realistically become to what we want, and realize it just won't add up. It is in that moment of knowing that we are powerless to achieve our desires, dependent on the intervention of some outside force, that human behavior fragments.

There are two ways for one's desires to be satisfied: have more, or desire less. There are those who seek to downplay their own desires, embracing zen, asceticism, pursuing the path of Siddartha (More power to em, I say). There are those who seek the path of wealth, acquiring relentlessly, till the amounts trading hands could define entire lives of "normal" people. The Buffets, Trumps, Rockefellers... the names are endless, only the degree of celebrity changes. Those can be quite destructive in their pursuit of more, but it's definitely a functional way to live. And then of course there are those who seek outside intervention. Sometimes they get it, sometimes they don't. Some seek donations, or the power of elected office, or grants from governments. Some turn to their various deities. "Some outside force greater than me can give me what I want, what I cannot get for myself" they say.

This then explains our entertainment. Though only two men will step into the ring Sunday, and in all the world we would be hard pressed to find a third who MIGHT be worthy, billions will watch, screaming, laughing, some crying... as two of the world's best boxers demonstrate WHY they are considered the best. All sports are like that. We hold up the ones who acheive, who triumph, who's skill and physique is better. We know we'll never really be that good, that fast, that strong, that beautiful, but they are and we can watch them.

Video game entertainment is a bit different. Yes, there are professional gaming leagues now, and we can watch (and even wager on) people who are playing 'that game I have on my desktop', using "our" characters, but doing it so much more skillfully. But far more often we have the chance to pretend that we ARE those heroes. Just for a little while, distract me from my debts, my age, my shattered dreams. That is the appeal of video games to adults. We may be well off, just looking for a distraction from boredom, or a reason not to clean out the gutters. Or maybe we are not so well off, looking for something that takes us away from the sorrows of life. But that's why adults like video games. It's a place to run free with our imaginations.

What drives adults AWAY from video games? Two things. First the idea that it's immature, or stupid. And second... futility. Back to the old nemesis. When we realize, are coerced... forced even into accepting that the video game is pointless, we stop. We return to our looming finals, or term papers, or jobs, our uncleaned dishes, our leaky roofs. When the bubble pops, and we realize that the game fixed nothing, the fun ends.

And here is my point. Because that realization of futility comes in two flavors. One is temporary. We were really enjoying killing frostwyrms, and then the alarm went off and we went to work. Well, yeah! Of course a sane person chooses to show up to work rather than play another level, the game will still be there next time I want a distraction. And the permanent. "That last patch killed my entire character", "None of my friends play this anymore", "The graphics are so dated"... when the game reaches a point wherein it cannot sustain the bubble. When we are forced to label it as pointless. Futile.

That labeling of the entire game as futile comes when our efforts in the game fail to yield results, even when we do everything right. Our efforts are made futile when we learn all about combat only to find it is a boring rotation, when we seek the best gear only to find that it's that ugly outfit everyone else is wearing, when we build a grand castle only to find that it's precisely as grand as the eight castles surrounding it and nobody ever comes to visit. When we adventure far and wide only to discover that the best places to play are clearly marked by the huge crowds already swarming there, when we work hard to design a great spec only to find that there is a better one posted on EJ.com, that invalidates our efforts. And when we actually DID build something special, something better, and the game gets changed and patched so that our achievement goes away, that's the most futile of all.

We have the time to spend on games, and the interest (why else would you be reading this, dear friend, on a video game forum on the internet??), and we have proven that we have interest in SotA, and the money to fund it. We want a distraction. A shiny bubble. Of course we will be distracted by jobs, sleep, children, and other responsibilities. what remains to be seen is, can SotA provide us with relief from futility?

That's why we want houses, that's why we want gear, guilds, professions... we want what we do in the game to MATTER. We want the fantasy that we can, through our efforts, achieve more in this fantastic world than we do in the real one. We want our actions, our choices, to mean more than mere aesthetics or individuality. Bums on the street are very individual, but is that what we want? We want to achieve. Player owned towns!! Player crafted equipment!!

And player designed combat specs. Because if all we were going to do was to become master builders and designers, we coulda done that in minecraft.

If the system, be it housing, economy, crafting, socialization, magick, or combat forces us to be routine then it has already failed. If I must be mundane, I can do that in the real world, where at least a days's mundane labor brings me a paycheck. Being mundane in a video game gives me an animated picture of being mundane.

That's why I argue constantly for balance, because anything achieved without balance MUST be destroyed when the balance is changed, and is therefore irrelevant, futile. Inevitably, a lack of balance in the system will necessitate a rebalancing. At it's most successful, the rebalancing will actually achieve balance, and in THAT moment progress can begin, for the first time ever. At it's least successful a rebalancing just throws us off in the opposite direction of the previous imbalance, to disastrous results. The cycle of constant rebalancing is a systemic disease that infects and impairs a game quickly and subtly, but ultimately has killed more games than almost any other force, save progress. If we want to BE progress, if we want SotA to open up new doors in the world of online gaming, we need to keep it free of that disease. As soon as possible, as openly and directly as possible, imbalance must be purged. For without balance, success is futile.


Right now many aspects of SotA promise to be extraordinary, and I am thrilled. But I sense that the guiding principle of the game, of the forums, and of the devs has drifted. So I am posting this in "Skills and Combat" where I usually lurk (like some sort of foul spider, yes, I can hear you), and in the town square. I think it's worth thinking about. What will make SotA extraordinary? Allowing the characters in it to be extraordinary. Which allows the players to feel extraordinary, at least until dinner is ready.

 

I could not agree more. But I am cautiously optimistic. I think that whatever happens before launch will he a baseline.

But it also seems like the devs are willing to let the game evolve.

So who knows what is in store a month, a quarter, a year after launch. I like that those people who play have a vested interest in the outcome. It becomes less about me having more and being the best to us as a community having a place to come together and laugh and adventure and die (and laugh about how I keep littering the scene with corpses) and finish the epic quest of uberness together and show off our prize for it.

Every mmo is made or broken by 1 common entity - the community.

When people get nerfed and rage quit, let them, they werent here for us they were here for them.

I remeber having an absolutely unstoppable pk avatar be litterally rendered permanently worthless. But I still play as her and RP and regualr play as her. I have for 16 years.

Why?

For all of us... not because I want to be better than you (the royal you).

I can already see that we have several camps in this game on very divisive topics, but we all share a commonality - we like this game and want to love it (and each other) for years.

Okay its 3 am i need to go to bed. Great post for the end of the day.