My First Post

Since this is my first post, I thought I would summarize what I have been doing since the beginning.

“Since game play is based at least partially on users interacting with other users, does human nature change this medium of social networks into a community?”

Since this is such a broad question, I felt I had to narrow the search down to specific questions of topics and trends facing the largest mmorpg World of Warcraft. Along with the research, I have created characters in the game to immerse myself into this virtual world. I plan on developing these characters in order to associate myself with the higher level players. I would like to discuss with numerous players to discuss why they play WoW. Such questions would be: Do you play to be competitive? Do you prefer to be competitive with people, or work with them and why? I also would like to find one group of players who are in an association (aka a guild) to ask why they play with these certain people, do they know them personally? Also, I would like to ask them if they form friendships with the people they persistently associate themselves with in WoW.

My first character, Andregurd, a Human Paladan, I enjoyed playing him, and probably will get into later on, but I started a Blood Elf Hunter, Undergrad, (yay! name!) which I really enjoy. I wished only I picked a more populated server because I want to come into contact with more people. I think I am going to try and change servers with my character.

I have found it a little annoying with the limited people I have seen, even less of them are responsive. I think it may be attributed to my low character level. I need to work on that.

But what I found that will help me meet people is this:

Rapture

Which was built by the guy who founded Napster. It is kind of a facebook for WoW characters and players. It even pulls information from the Armory, which is the realtime “Wikipedia” for Wow, featuring information on characters, weapons, places in the world, and much more.

The site has only a hand full of people currently using it, so I hope it catches on soon.

Currently, I am noticing the major (and almost obvious trend) of people mainly in the mode to advance their character. Provided the occasional person will come help you if you need it, but in the end, people just want to reach that great number 70. This, I am pondering, is probably affecting the interactions between characters within the game. Without the competition, it basically becomes something like secondlife.

I found this article a good start. This article discusses the popularity and fascination with the game. Some interesting examples are high ranking business men who gather other high ranking professionals to form guilds with top level characters. “…like the one formed by noted Japanese venture capitalist Joi Ito (Level 60, Gnome Mage), are mini-societies with their own Web sites, online forums and private lore.” The article also observes the fact that higher level characters have tendencies “rarely seen in the real world; higher-level players go out of their way to tutor newbies and accompany them on quests”.

The game has become such a huge success, the VP of creative development for Blizzard Software, Chris Metzen, said, "I call it the Technicolor, Americanized version of 'Lord of the Rings'.” Though this article is only mere observation, they claim “Though WOW is a fantasy world, the interaction between guilds and individuals relies on human choices and morals”. The article also alludes to line between real worlds and virtual worlds are becoming fuzzier and fuzzier. This all is quite interesting news.