A DOS attack on Sunday, 3 June caused the moderators of the MMORPGs
EVE Online and
Dust 514 to shut down the server cluster that hosted both games. The games were offline for most of the day and into the following morning, having just recently been restored. The COO of EVE's parent company, CCP, described the situation this way:
What we can now confirm is that a person was able to utilize a vulnerability in one of the back-end services that support the operation of the Tranquility server. This vulnerability has now been secured and thoroughly tested.
We would like to stress that at no time was customer data compromised or accessible in any way.
The effort of returning the complex server structure of the EVE Universe and associated websites to service in a methodical and highly-scrutinized fashion began hours ago and Tranquility has now been brought online (at 10:13 UTC). Our teams will monitor the situation carefully in the coming hours to ensure that our services are accessible and that all customer data remains secure.
CCP also took the precaution of shutting down the games' websites, and so communicated with players via
Twitter ("Your patience has been legendary and appreciated.") and its
Facebook page.
[more inside]
posted by Gelatin
on Jun 3, 2013 -
40 comments
Okay: In the role playing game known as The Real World, “Straight White Male” is the lowest difficulty setting there is...
As the game progresses, your goal is to gain points, apportion them wisely, and level up. If you start with fewer points and fewer of them in critical stat categories, or choose poorly regarding the skills you decide to level up on, then the game will still be difficult for you. But because you’re playing on the “Straight White Male” setting, gaining points and leveling up will still by default be easier, all other things being equal, than for another player using a higher difficulty setting.
Likewise, it’s certainly possible someone playing at a higher difficulty setting is progressing more quickly than you are, because they had more points initially given to them by the computer and/or their highest stats are wealth, intelligence and constitution and/or simply because they play the game better than you do. It doesn’t change the fact you are still playing on the lowest difficulty setting.
MeFi's own
John Scalzi provides an excellent, relatable metaphor for explaining the realities of race and gender without invoking the dreaded word "privilege".
[more inside]
posted by Jon_Evil
on May 15, 2012 -
368 comments
It's All Games Now: The Convergence of Games and Social Media (video, 61 minutes), is a talk given by Raph Koster, one of the lead designers of the MMO Ultima Online, at the 2011 Game Developers Conference Online in Austin Texas. In it he looks at how digital games have changed as a social experience from MUDs to World of Warcraft, where they are going in the future, and the bleed between games and the real world. Koster has posted a summary
here on his site.
[more inside]
posted by codacorolla
on Nov 7, 2011 -
15 comments
According to the
Global Extinction Awareness System (GEAS, by the Institute For the Future) - a simulation based on "the worlds’s first massively multiplayer forecasting game" - by the year 2042 AD there is a potentially terminal combination of five so-called “super-threats” which represent a collision of environmental, economic, and social risks. Acting together, the five super-threats may irreversibly overwhelm homo sapiens ability to survive. Spokesperson for United Nations Secretary General “We are grateful for GEAS’ work, and we treat their latest forecast with seriousness and profound gravity.”
[[press release]]. The game runs from Oct.8 to Nov. 6,
players wanted.
posted by stbalbach
on Oct 8, 2008 -
31 comments
The record has finally been set for an Onion article
(video, actually) to turn into
real life. It's now a real game. You can download
it. It's free.
time: about 1 day.
The subject is MMORPGS (pronounced 'more pigs') and how popular they are.
(more inside for descriptions)
[more inside]
posted by Miles Long
on Jun 11, 2008 -
26 comments
In this way, Lu Yang became one of the "RMB gamers" she disdains. More than 10,000 RMB was quickly and nearly imperceptibly spent. In the game, the "queen" possessed fearsome power. She carried out vengeance for herself and her friends, she accepted entreaties, and she protected the caravans of the kingdom. At the same time, she went out with the heroes to invade other kingdoms. Her reputation spread far and wide. [...] "Long live the Queen!" People bowed to her in submission. That was the high point for Lu Yang on ZT Online, and for that one fleeting moment, she felt that the time and money she had spent was worth it.
The System is a translated Chinese article examining ZT Online, an MMORPG that has taken fleecing gamers to a new level.
posted by Kattullus
on May 6, 2008 -
34 comments
Second Skin [is a documentary that]
takes an intimate look at computer gamers whose lives have been transformed by the emerging genre of Massively Multiplayer Online games (MMOs). [more inside]
posted by Dave Faris
on Jan 31, 2008 -
29 comments
"What are they talking about?" Was it just an April Fools' joke? Are they really gonna end
Red Vs. Blue: arguably the most successful
machinima series ever? Will Blood Gulch be silent of one-liners and snide comments once more, or is this a blatant attempt by
Rooster Teeth to drum up interest in their 100th episode? Considering the fact they started it four years ago
on April Fools Day, it's really hard to tell.
(surprise! no youtube links!)
posted by ZachsMind
on Apr 3, 2007 -
11 comments
Raising for Ryzom. Saga Of Ryzom's parent company is having some sort of undisclosed trouble, and a group of users are raising funds to purchase the source code and art assets. So far, they've raised 60k in euros.
posted by ®@
on Dec 1, 2006 -
3 comments
A little over a year ago, the Guiding Hand Social Club issued a stunning press release - after months of infiltration and planning they had fulfilled an assassination contract on the CEO of a major corporation and ransacked the corporation's hangers, stealing almost 20 billion ISK, worth over $16,000 USD at the time. See PCGamer's excellent detailed description of the event: pages
1,
2,
3,
4. As
synthetic worlds like
Eve-Online and
World of Warcraft gain popularity, what should we make of this kind of behavior?
Eve's own players respond. Also, a
response with a little more perspective. And what's going to happen
when the IRS catches on?
posted by heresiarch
on May 14, 2006 -
58 comments
The Endless Forest is a strange piece of software (that can be a screensaver), where you control a deer in a, well, endless forest. And so do a bunch of other online players. And you can interact all you like with them - with the minor caveat that deer can't talk.
posted by DataPacRat
on Apr 27, 2006 -
46 comments
NSFW MMOrgy: No more logging on and feeling sheepish 'cause you wanna know where the bordello is first. No more endless search through horrible shops finding implements for you and your fiancee who's 3000 miles away to have fun with.
NSFW
posted by signal
on Dec 22, 2005 -
25 comments
Anti-Japan War Online "The game will allow players, especially younger players, to learn from history. They will get a patriotic feeling when fighting invaders to safeguard their motherland"
The background for "Anti-Japan War Online" is the Japanese invasion of China during World War II, from 1937 through 1945. Nothing like a good MMORPG to foster a little patriotism.
posted by bigmusic
on Aug 24, 2005 -
20 comments
Flashy Cars, Flashier Avatars: Each project looks remarkably similar, but the differences are enough to provide hours and hours of fun, be those hours in the combat-oriented venue of Sherwood, the rodent slaughter of the Ratinator, the sparkling conversations and fast cars of Marian's World, or what have you. Enjoy. [Incidentally, it's hard for me to imagine this hasn't been posted yet, but I looked, really I did, and I didn't see it.]
posted by hank_14
on Nov 20, 2004 -
8 comments
It's like EverQuest...only pink. Well, maybe not
exactly like EverQuest. But Sanrio
is entering the world of online gaming with their new MMORPG, Hello Kitty Online World. Preliminary views indicate that it's going to be a fully-realized 3D world where players can control both their own
avatar and an "
angel," which seems a little bit like a witch's familiar. The Sanrio characters are, of course, NPCs - you can't make Hello Kitty punch Spottie Dottie, because that's just not what Kitty-chan would do! There will be countries, populated with player homes (you can decorate it with a Titanic poster!), and you can also adventure, train, and form alliances.
posted by etoile
on Nov 5, 2004 -
10 comments
Policing Virtual Reality. Wired reports on
Sociolotron(NSFW). A MMORPG that allows gamers to rob, rape, and kill other players. Being a gamer, I understand that actions in an MMORPG aren't "real" but how far can you take it?
"Lord Foucault is an admitted rapist. He does it on impulse -- for the thrill of it and for the feeling of control he has over his female victims."
Is this any different than running around and killing dwarves?
posted by jopreacher
on Jun 29, 2004 -
50 comments
"Then we realized that somehow an insane god had taken control of our world and was out to kill us all." Subscribers of the multiplayer online game "Shadowbane" were in for a shock Tuesday evening when they realized the game system had been hacked, and the rules fundamentally altered, and not in a good way (unless you happen to like mayhem). While this ended up being a "no harm, no foul" scenario, as everything was eventually set right, it was breaking new ground in terms of the uses of hacking. In a world where characters in these games are sold via EBay, and nearly half a million people subscribe to Everquest, how long before legitimate (non "fun and games") version of what just happened occurs?
posted by jonson
on Jun 1, 2003 -
17 comments
'A Tale in the Desert' seems to be shaping up into a rather interesting game.
Not just another MMORPG, it's based upon the ancient Egyptian 'Seven Disciplines of Man'. From the FAQ:
It contains no combat: no monsters, no player-killers, no swords or armor. Your character advances by completing, participating in, or leading large projects. Negotiation and politics play a very large role. The game has a plot that unfolds in response to player actions, and when the story is over, the game ends.
posted by GriffX
on Jul 16, 2002 -
1 comment
"Massively Multiplayer Online Entertainment." Our own AdrianHon has posted an interesting article to his weblog, dealing with this budding genre. Last year's AI movie web game tie-in was the first of a new breed of online interactive fiction, attracting thousands of players world-wide. Mr. Hon takes a look at the genre and puts forth some interesting ideas about where it could go. (more inside)
posted by SpaceBass
on May 19, 2002 -
7 comments
The ultimate online community: a massively-multiplayer online
sex game. Be a dominatrix! Experiment with whips and chains! Sleep around in a place where everyone is beautiful and willing and there is no disease! Pick your own body: you can be the stud or babe of your dreams! Ah, the virtual life for me. (Why are all the samples heterosexual?) (Via
Lum the Mad)
posted by Steven Den Beste
on Jul 22, 2001 -
19 comments
