I'm friends with a number of academics and developers who have been eagerly following the emergence and growth of the massive multiplayer online computer game (typically shortened to MMOGs). As a computer gamer since I first laid my hands on a machine (a natural upshot of the fact that I have never been able to resist a game, to the point where I now create little games for myself to get even the smallest amount of work accomplished), I've pretty much played a representative sample: Space Invaders on the Atari; Baseball on the Intellivision; early computer role-playing games on the Commodore 64; Hitchhiker's Guide and Spaceward Ho! on the Macintosh; Ultima, Sid Meier's Civilization, and a sundry host of others on the PC. I can't say that I've played them all--I've had neither the time, money, or piracy skills for that--and I never mastered any one game (was I a child now, they probably would try to diagnose me with Attention Deficit Disorder, when really all I crave is "the new").

As part of the research for my first novel, Darwin's Daughter, I explored the new type of games that were just coming of age at the time: EverQuest and Asheron's Call. One of the characters in that novel was (very) loosely based on Richard Garriott and while the result wasn't quite what I had expected given the research (the book is about the conflict between faith and science, and what I had hoped from the game research was to be able to hold up a mirror to my character's lives by the fictional game described therein) I enjoyed the time I spent investigating those worlds, as well as met some nice people online.

I finished the book in August of 2001 and haven't been following the MMOG world as much of an active participant since, having to rely on second-hand reports from my friends for the most part. I've signed up for the beta-tests of several "second-generation" games such as Star Wars: Galaxies, but only got into the tests of a few, and then really never had much time to spend exploring them (a common complaint of those interested in these persistent-world games, which often reward time spent rather than quality play) . But, given the increasing number of reports like this one by my friend Tim Burke (of the blog Easily Distracted), it may be that such has been a blessing in disguise.

I agree with Tim that MMOGs have the potential to be great--to actually raise the computer game from a hobby or entertainment to something akin to art--but only if people learn from what has gone before. In my brief sojourn through A Tale in the Desert, I thought there was some real potential due to the much closer connection between players and developers through a world-wide voting mechanism but, to my mind, was becoming mired in a combination of poor social tools and the focus on repetitive tasks. Tale may yet become something more, and I may have to look back at it next year, but it seemed to be about carving out its niche rather than changing the world. Another game with potential is Game Neverending, about to enter beta, but until I see what actual game is there (at the moment, it's just a glorified chat room), I have to reserve judgment. And, finally, there's at least one game that understands that some people can't devote more than a hour or so at a time to playing around, and Puzzle Pirates is about to go live after a year of alpha and beta testing. As an alpha tester, I've enjoyed the game, but I'm just not sure that it has the immersive nature that I once enjoyed from planned attack into the heart of Asheron's island. None of these games, however, had the breakout potential that was wasted in Star Wars: Galaxies, and instead have to be seen as isolated beacons of hope in what has become a very dark sea of online gaming.

What does a true second-generation game need, that would bring about the next revolution? Narrative.

Most of the first-generation games, such as EverQuest, contain no storyline other than the ones that players create for themselves as they advance their characters in skills and abilities. I'm not knocking that, because it has proven quite powerful for a number of people and been a financial success for Sony Online Entertainment, but EQ's empire is crumbling, due to a steady stream of players moving onto other games. (One anecdotal account that I've heard is that many EQ players have jumped off the advancement treadmill and engage in quests for the interaction with their friends rather than any game goal.) Sony's answer for this loss of players has been to try and simply open up new worlds and creatures for their players through expansions, but this is simply more of the same--it's interesting to explore and admire the graphics, but there's nothing being added to the gameplay itself.

Asheron's Call (and Ultima Online before it) attempted to improve on EQ by introducing world changing events monthly (or, as the developers called it, free expansion packs) in which the changes in gameplay (new creatures, dungeons, etc.) were the result of the story arc happening around the characters. Unfortunately, these events for any but the most dedicated players were headline announcements rather than anything you were actually a part of, often because the momentous part of these events would occur at off-hours for your particular playing style. The events would change how you played from then on (such as the destruction of a major town that had been host to most of the trading activities until then), though.

Some follow-up games to Asheron's Call promised narrative in the sense of a grand struggle in which players would become cogs in the three warring factions of Dark Age of Camelot, but in the reality of the gameplay it was less of a story than capture-the-flag. I thought A Tale in the Desert was going to build on a world-changing storyline--where the small actions of many would cause major changes in the world--but given the more limited scope of Tale, in that the game mechanics centered around building/crafting entirely and had no conflict mechanisms outside of one-on-one competitive games, the stories that were created weren't the struggle of the great creations but the meta-bickering of players who were attempting to "game" the system.

The one thing I haven't seen tried much (although, once again, Tale came close in their developer/pharoah correspondence, and I believe that some of the major Asheron's Call events had some developer-controlled monsters), is the use of actual actors who interact with the players to create narrative. I like to think of this idea as a visit to the Renaissance Festival (in Texas or Maryland, to mention two that I've gone to), which has both stations of actors (such as the parade through the fair that ends up with the King and Queen observing the jousting in the area) as well as roving actors (Filth and Snot, who provided low-humor at a station at certain hours, but also would do small bits at unexpected moments around the fair). Consider, for example, the power of an actor as general who shows up in the MMOG and tells people that he's raising an army for a battle, or a shopkeeper who runs out because his shop basement just exploded with horrible fire beetles. And then connect it to the storyline--if the general can't raise the army, the town loses its defenses and all those based in that town must find new accomodations elsewhere, or the shopkeeper whose shop is destroyed, forcing players to go elsewhere. In some ways, this is what Asheron's Call was doing--except this has to happen at both announced times (like the parade and jousting, where people can experience both ceremony and large groupings) and random, constant times throughout the day.

Would it solve all the problems of MMOGs? No, but the addition of narrative would certainly increase the immersive experience, and that's the major difference between playing one of these games solo versus playing with massive amounts of people.