Thread: Real Virtual MMORPG

I don't know if this is the right place to post this or if the same thread has already been post, anyway...

I been playing the game .hack series, and read manga and novel about online RPG (like 1/2 prince, yureka, Sword Arts Online, etc), and I have been wondering if the real deal happens in our world (the invention of Virtual MMORPG), I would really want to try it and experience what the character in the game/manga/novel experienced.

What about you guys?

Could you explain that more clearly? I have no idea what you are asking.

Have u ever play .hack series game? or read 1/2, where you login into a game and role play as a character like a swordsman, mage, etc. If such game really exist, would you play in it?

You mean have I ever played an MMORPG?
Yeah, I used to regularly play Guildwars, I've also trialed World of warcraft and FF11 and several other lesser known download only games.

If you want to role play the character itself, you can do that in any game. Infact if you google role play guilds you can many of them in many different games. As far as I'm aware though there are no games entirely for character role playing. If you want that, the closest you will ever get to that is EVE online (a space game where you are your own coporate entity in a fully fledged real economy. So most people play as their characters) or Second Life where the idea is that you live a secondlife through your avatar.

So, don't you want to be the character itself? I mean, you would be the one 'in' the character that 'play' the game. Rather than the character you control, you yourself is the one inside the game, playing that role and trying to 'live' that character in that game world. Don't you?

You need to look at it the other way around. The character is the avatar of the player and represents them in the game. I also think you are taking the character portrayal in the .hack series too seriously. In .hack they were trying to represent how the player takes on a class and plays as that class. Even in .hack there is a sort of disconnection between players and characters (they keep talking about their real world lives) and although some of the characters have roles in the game world itself (subaru in //sign), they don't role play them in the traditional sense.

To sum it up in .hack:
The real people play the game and take on a character class and play as that class. any character role playing takes place partly because of the immersion they have in the game (3D mind control visors FTW) or for a bit of fun. There is no real compulsion for them to actually role play the character and in most situations they don't.
A good .hack to watch is //sign.

In real MMORPGs, most players don't role play because of the disconection of playing through a keyboard and using a chat interface (voip is still not very common). There are those who do roleplay, but they tend to be close knit communities (or EVE where roleplaying is actually pretty normal and prolific). In games most role players stick with other role players because their interactions usually aren't returned by the majority of players who don't roleplay. When playing guild wars a roleplayer once tried to interact with me and I had no idea how to respond. While he had clearly created a character for himself and was looking for a social interaction in the character of the game, I was just being myself sat infront of my computer worrying about my avatar's skill set. He didn't get the interaction he was looking for and I felt awkward for not knowing how to respond without ruining his roleplay (I just stayed quiet and pretended I was AFK. lol)

If you want to roleplay you really should look up a roleplaying guild, but unless you play EVE, you will probably not find many games with very large roleplaying communities.

I see. Thanks for the education insight to MMORPGs.

I still wish to be in the Virtual World though....

The other option here is to simply redesign your reality to match whatever virtual world you'd like to be a part of. You'd probably be institutionalised for the rest of your life, but you'd be happy.

Well the fact is, that by using the internet as you do now, you are actually kind of roleplaying as they do in "the world".

.Hack's theme explores the way we interact in an online usinverse and how we portray ourselves through our online avatars. In //sign the main character Tsukasa is unable to log out and becomes part of "the world" itself. This explores the question where does one persona end and the other begin? When online we create a character around our username.
For example 98abaile is a complete online persona that the real me displays my personality through without the restraints of our local society. 98abaile is far more vocal, bold and outgoing than the person behind the keyboard and you could almost say that 98abaile is a character that that person is playing. You could even say that kazenohirameki is a character that you are roleplaying right now without even realising it (how different is your online persona from the real you?).
This theme is explored in .Hack and especially in //sign where tsukasa plays a male character, acts like a male and even belives s/he is male when infact the player behind the visor is a girl.

If we read between the lines, "The world" could be considered to be an analogue for the internet today (remember this was before the rise in social networking and comunicating through our real identities), and several comparisons can be drawn e.g. eCommerce, anonymity, online persona, underground networks, using addresses to reach world spaces.

Haha, seems like I've been lecture for trying to escape from reality.