Games and the Real World

Dr Richard Bartle presented at GDC Online last week(Slides available here) where he discussed MUD(Multi-User Dungeon) ,the first virtual world, predating World of Warcraft by over 2 decades. In it Richard talks about how they created the physics of the world first and this allowed them to then know what would be possible within the game. They used the principle of mimicking reality whenever there was no reason to differ from expected norms. When talking about modern virtual worlds he had this to say:

Sadly, however, although the principle of mimicking reality was carried forward, the reason for it was not. This has inevitably led to its dilution.
Here are some modern phenomena that would Perplex the MUD
players of 20 to 30 years ago:

• If the goblin was carrying a sword, why was it hitting me with a stick?
• You can dye armour but not paint it? But you can paint the walls of your house? But not any other walls?
  
• I can build a snowman in a fire, and neither is affected?
• Why don’t those foul creatures come to assist their allies? I can see them, can they not see me? Does this axe have a silencer?

Now I don't play World of Warcraft but in most modern shooters you get shot 50 times and your avatar isn't visibly affected, you can place a grenade beside a wooden door and the grenade blows up with no damage to the door and you can jump up on a box but not on a pile of rubble that is the same height beside the box. These are simple things, that should at least be explored in games, in fairness Bad Company 2 has a lot of room for the player to interact with the physics of the world. Its something about modern games that's a bit disappointing, it seems like the worlds just got better looking since Quake and Doom and haven't advanced in terms of player interaction within the world.

Maybe Black Ops. will try some new things this November...