Jeff Davis said:
The Inequitable Equity of MMOs
Sometimes a digital life can feel more rewarding then real life.
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(Possible error: Housing in SWG was
not instanced. In fact, that's what made it so fantastic.)
I'm with you 100% on this game (at least, as it was "back in the day"). I was pretty unhappy at work, and had no family or friends in the town I had moved to for the job. And I had even tried other games, trying to steer clear of a subscription. But when I finally tried it, the feeling of a virtual
world took hold quickly.
I loved having a house that I could decorate, and that people could visit
while I was offline. I had a presence even when I wasn't present! I loved finally finding a game in which "gameplay" didn't have to mean "Killing things in one of several ways." I was a smuggler and a weaponsmith, and happy not to be fighting stormtroopers or krayt dragons or any of that.
It's not just you and I that have changed, though. MMOs are very different. Gone are those world-building aspects. A completely player-driven economy, an incredibly robust resource/crafting system,
full time non-combat play options, and still the best player house/city setup I've experienced.
(But I will say that I really feel I wouldn't have the time to dedicate to it anymore, anyway, so it's probably for the best...)
Even now, when the job is in one of its Hell periods, I come home and spend the first hour parked in front of a video game. It's not avoidance, not specifically. It's coming home from a job in which no project is ever really complete, and no problem is ever really solved, and where I have to always fight with one hand tied behind my back... and sitting down to a problem that I
can solve, or a project that I
can complete.
It's not always video games. For awhile, it was modifying Nerf blasters, or even designing a still-in-progress zombie survival horror pen-and-paper RPG. But just giving my mind a brief feeling of both power and resolution made a huge difference in my ability to rest...