Dreamscape is a 2.5 D graphical multi-user system in which the user looks at their avatars through a third person perspective and the avatars are also modifiable. An avatar can be created from the 5 given choices of male or female avatars with customizable face or body that can be purchased in the at any [...]

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I was in my other Anthropology class’s lecture this morning when the Professor showed us the following YouTube video, created by an Kansas State university professor and his students. I wanted to post this because it represents what this class is about or at least a common theme I have found, which is the relationship [...]

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My first experience with Second Life was very aggravating. I spent over thirty minutes trying to understand the game and yet, I did not find one single avatar! I teleported a few times, which was a really cool feature, however not understanding where the people were frustrated me. Today, I went in to Second Life [...]

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A Day on Atys After an hour of downloading the game, I was finally able to enter the world. Unfortunately, my extremely old laptop could not handle the graphics and so I was forced to put everything on low quality. Then we were talking! I had to get used to the navigator in the top [...]

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Egregious The Guild references aside, there should be a special hell set aside for the designers of loot tables. How many times have you run an instance, cleared out trash mobs, wiped, paid several gold in repairs, spent hours of your life, and when you get to the big boss, the guaranteed drop doesn’t happen. [...]

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I started out playing on MUDS, MUSHes and even a MOO or two. I used to co-host something called the Hallowe’en Ball about, oh, 16 years ago, which was a MUSH that I and a friend designed, consisting of a big space dome on Bradbury, Luna (i.e. the moon) with beautiful and creepy rooms, and [...]

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Obviously when we look at games of various kinds, including MMOGs and whatnot, ethnographically, we attend to the reflexive moment, what the players and designers have to say about the worlds they participate in or create.   A lot of what is ‘social’, what we want to describe in our ethnography, is not just what the [...]

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