Monday, September 14, 2009

the forums: popping your community bubble

"spigsnoggling, spafflewhacking bastards!" - infernal travesty

when it comes to any mmo, there are usually two distinct yet occasionally overlapping communities:

first is the community that any given player belongs to- his or her corporation, alliance and whatever friendlies he or she accumulates along the way. these relatively small collections of players form their own cultures, have their own relationships and operate in a fairly self contained manner. since trade and combat can be rather impersonal in eve, these communities are like tiny bubbles, isolated almost completely from each other by the vacuum of space

the might stay this way, if it wasn't for the forums

the forums are the second community in any mmo. they provide a means and location for these otherwise isolated communities to interact with each other in near (or not so near) real time. in theory, one could lead a happy, fun and complete game experience without ever visiting the forums... and many people do. however, those that choose to participate in the dialogue pass information and make and break friendships as well as reputations just by their contributions to the noise levels

my point in bring any of this junk up is simple: i've been reading the eve-o forum for pretty much the first time this week and whoa. i have learned a lot about the history of several organizations, game culture, and the doing and happenings of all sorts of eve celebrities... most of which i would have never heard of otherwise

at the end of the day, most mmo forums are full of garbage, ego stroking, propaganda campaigns and absolutely insane drivel in the form of "memes" which are usually just silly jokes that are made once and then repeated with impunity

i'm still trying to decide if i've been missing something by not reading and posting more, or if it's better for my psyche to have missed out on all the rabble

No comments:

Post a Comment