MMO's built with Socialist values?

joereed1

It occurs to me that most MMO's are built using socialist values for the reasons below:

1. Food, Health Care, and Accomodation are provided for all no matter how much you play. No characters die of starvation, or exposure and all but death blows can be healed free. Even death isn't actually death and in the majority of cases costs next to nothing.

2. It doesn't matter how good you are, everyone gets paid the same. It doesn't matter what class you play everyone gets paid the same. The only way you get more money is by putting in more hours.

Ironic that the western world has a largely capitalist bias, yet when we log on to have fun it is largely socialist values that rule.

viddster

Pretty much all games require you to buy or harvest food for your character, health recovery in potions and armour degradation recovery cost money or time to collect, rez sickness in most games also costs a fee to recover. Accommodation is extremely expensive and time consuming in 90% of MMO's, the few that actually have it that is.

 

Everybody gets paid the same for quests because everybody does the same quests, tougher and higher level quests have a higher reward in money and items. Sounds pretty Capitalist to me.

NightCloak

Food is not provided. There is just no penalty for a lack of food in most games. But none of the AAA titles I know of offer free food.

Health Care is again not provided for all. Some classes take care of themselves and some don't. Also, it is natural regen that is the common factor. This natural regen is akin to the ability for the body to heal itself. You will still die if the MMO has long-term afflictions that cause damage.

Most of the non-fatal damage dealt is healed free, not by the game(government) but pro-bono from a player(doctor). Again, not exactly socialist.

I would also contend that not everyone is paid the same.

$$ per hour is not fixed in most games. Usually the $$ per hour is variable highly dependant upon skill and action taken.

Examples is that I've seen many players setup businesses in-game with crafting and make more $$ per hour than many players make $$ per week. This is why the wealth distribution in most MMOs mirror that of the capitalist USA. A very large number of players are within a narrow margin of wealth/income and a few players are rich and even fewer superrich.

 

Nice attempt to twist things. But the games hardly have socialist values. They hardly have capitalist values. And most of the successful economies in games are largly capitalist in nature. The gameplay itself is governed by rulesets of what is fun and what is standard.

randomt

My response would be: So?

Socialism, despite what the cold war propaganda would like you to have believed, is not a bad thing.. well unless you are really rich, I suppose.

AutemOx

What if a shamen and a priest both did the same exact quest, achieving the same goal, and the priest got more gold for it than the other?  That would not be capitalism, that would be religious discrimination.

Quests are contracted services in which quality does not vary (you either pass or fail).  if you can complete more quests/contracts in shorter time then you will earn your xp/gold at a quicker rate due to your superior abilities. That sounds capitalistic to me.

angus858

As someone else has already mentioned the amount of gold per hour you earn depends largely on how hard you work and on what advantages you started out with.  That sounds very capitalistic to me, although I'm not an economist.  In a socialist mmorpg some of the loot and gold earnd by level 50 players would go to the many level 1 players so they are all compensated at a similar level.  Never played a mmorpg like that.  Or maybe I'm confusing communism with socialism. 

Maltese

If your idea of a fun and entertaining game is starvation, impoverishment and unequal pay, then it does say a lot more about you than it does about capitalism per se. Frankly, if disliking this sort of shit makes me a communist game player, so be it.

(edited for spelling)

AutemOx

Good point angus.  I don't think you are confusing communism with socialism, although I was a bit...  Afterall, socialism does reward people for working harder, being more skilled, or otherwise starting out with an advantage.  Just not as much as capitalism does.

The thing is, even the most capitalistic countries have some social services, which is restricted only because of its costs.  In a MMORPG, it does not cost the developers anything to 'give the virtual characters food' by not making them constantly hungry.  On the contrary, it would take a lot of time and effort to create a food system that requires characters to eat.  If it were so easy to keep peoples hunger satisfied (or to give people heathcare) in the real world then every capitalistic society would do it.

fyerwall

Originally posted by joereed1

It occurs to me that most MMO's are built using socialist values for the reasons below:

1. Food, Health Care, and Accomodation are provided for all no matter how much you play. No characters die of starvation, or exposure and all but death blows can be healed free. Even death isn't actually death and in the majority of cases costs next to nothing.

2. It doesn't matter how good you are, everyone gets paid the same. It doesn't matter what class you play everyone gets paid the same. The only way you get more money is by putting in more hours.

Ironic that the western world has a largely capitalist bias, yet when we log on to have fun it is largely socialist values that rule.

 1. Most of the healing done is done so by other players. If these players started charging per heal amount, people would just find healers who didnt charge. A lot of the other healing is done based on regen rates or the actual players ability to self heal (Potions, Foods, Bandages, etc).

2. By doing quests, yes, everyone gets the same paycheck for the same amount of 'work' done. Its all a flat fee reward system (though in some cases a few games allow higher level players to get a better cash payout from lower quests in lieu of XP).

But as for everyone makeing the same amount of money in a game as everyone else; Wrong.

Sure quests pay the same per each player/class/race, but a lot of money is made from selling trash loot or playing the merchant systems (AH, Brokers, Trade Channels, etc). Crafters who work at thier trade can also bring in more money than the average 'quest only' crowd.

So basically you are trying to find socialist aspects where they really dont exist. If games started paying each race/class different quest rewards based on thier choices or specs, you would see a lot less of those classes/races/specs being played. Everyone would be pretty much playing the most efficient setup possible which in turn would throw the game out of whack.

Drakynn

Well that's that then.I expect to see a diatribe from Glenn Beck now about how MMORPG's are a Democrat conspiracy to teach oru kids socialist values and let the terrorists win!

shinkan

Funny you bring it up, cause it's so true

I tried the game Roma Victor, think its called that, in the game you could exchange real life money for ingame currency.

The funny part is when you have mechanics like that you will always hear people emo'ing over how unfair the game is since you can buy yourself a headstart.

Guess peeps just want to escape the hardship of real life, and play in a world where they are on equal terms as everyone else.

Drakynn

Originally posted by shinkan

Funny you bring it up, cause it's so true

I tried the game Roma Victor, think its called that, in the game you could exchange real life money for ingame currency.

The funny part is when you have mechanics like that you will always hear people emo'ing over how unfair the game is since you can buy yourself a headstart.

Guess peeps just want to escape the hardship of real life, and play in a world where they are on equal terms as everyone else.

Um well yes...the purpose of games is entertainment and escapism after all.

Comnitus

Go tell EVE merchanteers that there's no capitalism.

Hathi

Originally posted by Drakynn

Well that's that then.I expect to see a diatribe from Glenn Beck now about how MMORPG's are a Democrat conspiracy to teach oru kids socialist values and let the terrorists win!

 

Nah , http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5RDKh_mLts

 

http://www.sodahead.com/united-states/obamas-pre-k-6-menu-plan-for-the-socialist-indoctrination-of-our-children/blog-263353/

nariusseldon

Originally posted by joereed1

It occurs to me that most MMO's are built using socialist values for the reasons below:

1. Food, Health Care, and Accomodation are provided for all no matter how much you play. No characters die of starvation, or exposure and all but death blows can be healed free. Even death isn't actually death and in the majority of cases costs next to nothing.

2. It doesn't matter how good you are, everyone gets paid the same. It doesn't matter what class you play everyone gets paid the same. The only way you get more money is by putting in more hours.

Ironic that the western world has a largely capitalist bias, yet when we log on to have fun it is largely socialist values that rule.

 

Because MMOs are entertainment and everyone pays the same sub fee (at least the P2P ones).

Kyleran

Can't say I really see the parallels, as others have said, I think most MMO's are pretty capatilistic in their design and don't think there's any overt attempt to create a socialist economy.

I've been a member of guilds however that were based on communism (all gold, loot, crafted items went into the guild who then distributed it back, each according to his own) and Objectivism (practically worshipped Ayn Rand's books) but those were player generated systems.

Drakynn

Originally posted by Hathi

Originally posted by Drakynn

Well that's that then.I expect to see a diatribe from Glenn Beck now about how MMORPG's are a Democrat conspiracy to teach oru kids socialist values and let the terrorists win!

 

Nah , http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5RDKh_mLts

 

http://www.sodahead.com/united-states/obamas-pre-k-6-menu-plan-for-the-socialist-indoctrination-of-our-children/blog-263353/

/facepalm

Mardy

It's a game.

Blueharp

Originally posted by joereed1

It occurs to me that most MMO's are built using socialist values for the reasons below:

1. Food, Health Care, and Accomodation are provided for all no matter how much you play. No characters die of starvation, or exposure and all but death blows can be healed free. Even death isn't actually death and in the majority of cases costs next to nothing.

2. It doesn't matter how good you are, everyone gets paid the same. It doesn't matter what class you play everyone gets paid the same. The only way you get more money is by putting in more hours.

Ironic that the western world has a largely capitalist bias, yet when we log on to have fun it is largely socialist values that rule.

 I don't think you understand why certain things aren't in many games.

It's because they're not fun.  Not because of some deep moral philosophy.

Swoogie

O...M....G....

I was thinking of something like this yesterday.

Jacobin

Can't really compare mmo games to any ideology since resources are infinite in gaming worlds. Nodes and monsters always respawn, so anyone who puts in the time can get whatever they want with next to no barriers.

 

If a game came out with perma-death and only a set number of mobs / resources in the world then the players would have to figure out a way to organize things, unfortunaltely this game would fail since most would leave as soon as they can't get wat they want.

theAsna

Originally posted by joereed1

It occurs to me that most MMO's are built using socialist values for the reasons below:

1. Food, Health Care, and Accomodation are provided for all no matter how much you play. No characters die of starvation, or exposure and all but death blows can be healed free. Even death isn't actually death and in the majority of cases costs next to nothing.

2. It doesn't matter how good you are, everyone gets paid the same. It doesn't matter what class you play everyone gets paid the same. The only way you get more money is by putting in more hours.

Ironic that the western world has a largely capitalist bias, yet when we log on to have fun it is largely socialist values that rule.

 

 

First it's just games. Most MMOs don't strive to emulate a virtual economy that resembles the real world economies.



The companies just want to keep elements out of games that will diminish the game experience for players (e.g. players creating monopolies on certain traded goods, player unrest because of prices for certain in-game goods). The companies just want to keep paying customers. You can have a look at history books to see what people may do when they are unhappy. But the worst that can happen to an online game is that the company will loose customers.



Still you have to invest time (or money) into the "game" to get more than your fellow player.





 A little off-topic. But how are things like health care socialist values? People pay for the healthcare insurance in case they get sick and have to rely on aid for the time. No single person can afford to pay the bills or required research alone (unless you are really wealthy). If you're unfortunate to get really sick one day, than pray you have some kind of health care.



There is a nice game for you: Burntime http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Burntime

No security nets. You have to care for your food and water or die.

Malcanis

Originally posted by joereed1

It occurs to me that most MMO's are built using socialist values for the reasons below:

1. Food, Health Care, and Accomodation are provided for all no matter how much you play. No characters die of starvation, or exposure and all but death blows can be healed free. Even death isn't actually death and in the majority of cases costs next to nothing.

2. It doesn't matter how good you are, everyone gets paid the same. It doesn't matter what class you play everyone gets paid the same. The only way you get more money is by putting in more hours.

Ironic that the western world has a largely capitalist bias, yet when we log on to have fun it is largely socialist values that rule.

 

If you think that's bad, read the "Do you believe in Freedom?" thread.

Hint: hardly any of them do

Robsolf

Originally posted by joereed1

It occurs to me that most MMO's are built using socialist values for the reasons below:

1. Food, Health Care, and Accomodation are provided for all no matter how much you play. No characters die of starvation, or exposure and all but death blows can be healed free. Even death isn't actually death and in the majority of cases costs next to nothing.

2. It doesn't matter how good you are, everyone gets paid the same. It doesn't matter what class you play everyone gets paid the same. The only way you get more money is by putting in more hours.

Ironic that the western world has a largely capitalist bias, yet when we log on to have fun it is largely socialist values that rule.

The irony of this post is that by its own mechanics, it even considers Eve socialism.

With those exceptions, Eve is more capitalist than any real world country on the globe.

Ilvaldyr

Originally posted by Malcanis

Originally posted by joereed1

It occurs to me that most MMO's are built using socialist values for the reasons below:

1. Food, Health Care, and Accomodation are provided for all no matter how much you play. No characters die of starvation, or exposure and all but death blows can be healed free. Even death isn't actually death and in the majority of cases costs next to nothing.

2. It doesn't matter how good you are, everyone gets paid the same. It doesn't matter what class you play everyone gets paid the same. The only way you get more money is by putting in more hours.

Ironic that the western world has a largely capitalist bias, yet when we log on to have fun it is largely socialist values that rule.

 If you think that's bad, read the "Do you believe in Freedom?" thread.

Hint: hardly any of them do

This strikes me as a simple case of overthinking.

Games ain't worlds. Attempting to apply the same philosophies doesn't make much sense.

Johnie-Marz

 The only way you get more money is by putting in more hours.

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I have no problem with that value. I think we need more of it in real life. If you want money work for it.