Sharon's Muse.... Let's chat over coffee while I ponder some things
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Sharon's Muse.... Let's chat over coffee while I ponder some things |
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Name::Sharon Cullars
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Monday, September 04, 2006 New citizen of Runescape  So I joined the world of Runescape, a free online fantasy/adventure interactive game (although there is subscription membership that provides more perks). Although I have played adventure games before, they were usually solo pleasures. This is my first time on an interactive game involving other players. And we're talking about a million or so people who log in. The fantasy world is set in medieval times with all sorts of creatures including goblins, giant spiders and wizards. There are woods, farms, deserts, islands, castles, dungeons, and of course, danger. If you knock off a goblin, demon or spider, hell, even some human players, you earn combat points. You get stronger, sometimes richer. Then there are the skills you need to build: magic, runecraft, mining, crafting, cooking, woodcutting among others. After only a week, I am on my way to full addiction. Because there are also quests to be done and there are several lands you must traverse in order to set about your varied tasks. I have literally sat up until three in the morning trying to get through some of these quests (still trying to kill this big red demon). There're even some irksome features called random events where unexpected things happen to you out of the blue, as it happened to me. I was in the middle of killing chickens (or were they goblins), when someone called my name. Turns out it was some game character named Niles who took offense from my not answering him timely; he teleported my behind to the wizard's tower and I had to trek all the way back to Lumbridge (my home town). But here's another deal - outright sexual harassment. Understand, you select your avatar among the templates, and of course, I selected a dark skinned warrior with pig tails and chainmail (which I got off a dead goblin I killed). She's a cool looking chick. Understand though, she's an animated character. Still some folks don't seem to understand that. You wouldn't believe the male players salivating over the chocolate wench. I get followed (one dude kept following me so much, I selected the option to follow him, which had us going back and forth, back and forth; he finally tired and left me alone), propositioned ("hey, I’ll give you a 100 coins if you do it with me" or "can I be your bf (boyfriend)?" - one chick asked if I needed a girlfriend), remarked on ("look at those breasts and oohh yeah, the butt"). I saw a conversation between two characters where he asked her to come back to his place and she said OK. And I had to wonder, do these people not know they’re in cartoonland? What the f*ck can two cartoon characters do? I mean seriously, the controls only allow you to examine a person personality wise; there are no buttons for shedding the clothes and doing a horizontal breakdance. And exactly what would I have had to do for the 100 coins? A hand job? I read an article a few months ago about women players in other games who impersonate males with men's names and how there's now some voice altering device to make them sound like men; obviously for games with player voice audio capabilities. Trust me, if you don't want to get harassed as a woman, these make sense. Either that or a cartoon electric cattleprod (not available yet). Still, I'm loving the game and highly recommending it. But I have a feeling that down the line, I'm going to need some major intervention. Wonder if they have therapy groups for Runescape addicts? UPDATE (9/18/06): I've come to the disturbing realization that Runescape is populated mainly by kids. Which means the harassment is being done by the middle-school set. Fortunately, there are other adult players, but we are in the minority. As I feel less comfortable in a world populated by children with adult avatars (akin to being an adult invitee to a pre-teen's party), I have fortunately found another game called Entropia which has been described as the Runescape for adults. This game supposedly has real world cash supporting it, which a player can withdraw. The game takes place on a colony on a distant planet. There is worldbuilding and skillbuilding, which sounds up my alley. I will blog about it later after I've joined and played for a bit. So, will I give up Runescape? Not likely; it's too much fun with skillbuilding and accumulating wealth. But I will have to get some of these pesty kiddies told.
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