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The Daily Grind: How realistic do you like your avatars?

Krystalle Voecks — Sat, 19 Feb 2011 08:00:00 EST

Filed under: Opinion, The Daily Grind, Miscellaneous

From the highly detailed characters in EVE Online to the beautifully impressionistic avatars in LOVE, there's a wide variety of avatar types available in MMO games. Whether you use your avatar purely for humorous results as the above EVE Online pilot did, attempt to create a character that looks at least somewhat like you, or are out to create a completely foreign fantasy being to role-play, choice abounds these days. Character creators go from automatically generated with no choice to insanely complex and detailed -- and everywhere in-between.

Nonetheless, with the sheer number of options out there, this morning we thought we'd ask which you prefer? Do you like your avatar so realistic that it's almost bordering on uncanny valley? Perhaps you prefer more middle-of-the-road options like Guild Wars or other games in that general neighborhood -- not too realistic, not too cartoony? Or do you prefer to go as far into your imagination as the character creator will let you with avatars such as the ones in LOVE or World of Warcraft's stylistic, non-human offerings?

Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!

The Daily Grind: How realistic do you like your avatars? originally appeared on Massively on Sat, 19 Feb 2011 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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WoW Code: Better than a pocket protector

Seraphina Brennan — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 09:00:00 EST

Filed under: World of Warcraft, Fantasy, Culture, Humor

If you've ever woken up in the morning and said to yourself, "Gee, I'd like to appear nerdier today," then do we have the story for you! Scare your real life friends and confuse even the staunchest gaming nerd. Use "WoW Code" in your forum signature!

N: Sephare, M:Pa73, Mb: 3/56/5, Mr: Hu, S: Ravenholt-US-RPPvP, G: Twilight Empire, Pvp-, Pve+, Y2005.5, DC, Ori-MC/B, TBC-Kara, WLK-Nexus/B, L++, C-Wl/DK, R-Ud, RP++. :), V0.3

What you see above you, besides a whole pile of utter confusion, is actually a World of Warcraft character broken down into very basic terms using the WoW Code method. Everything from name, to talent build, date joined, and player preferences are included!

We'd take the time to break it down, but TyphoonAndrew at The Eye of the Storm blog has already done that in an easy to read format. Now if you could excuse us, we're going to go break out our Tandys and play some extreme World of Warcraft: The Molten Core on our Atari 2600s..

WoW Code: Better than a pocket protector originally appeared on Massively on Thu, 18 Dec 2008 09:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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MMO MMOnkey: Short Circuiting Social Stereotypes with MMOs

Kevin Murnane — Wed, 09 Apr 2008 10:00:00 EST

Filed under: Lord of the Rings Online, Culture, Opinion, Races, Virtual worlds, MMO MMOnkey

I was playing Lord of the Rings Online one night when a player agreed with something mentioned in general chat by saying "Indeed!" Without rancor or hostility another player laughed at this stilted language and asked whether people really talked like that. Of course the question was answered with a chorus of "Indeed!" but in the ensuing conversation the player who had laughed said that he or she was from an economically disadvantaged area where the use of language like "Indeed" was wholly foreign. S/he was surprised to discover that language differed so radically among different socio-economic groups. And I thought, "Now, this is one of the reasons why MMOs are such interesting places."

People categorize each other based on visual attributes like age, gender, hair and clothing style, and skin color. We also use political, religious, and social ideologies, musical, cinema, and leisure time preferences, and socio-economic class differences to divide ourselves up into different groups. The tendency to categorize and divide has more to do with the basic functioning of the human information processing system than bias or narrow mindedness on people's parts, and it is useful in allowing us to function effectively in the complex, dynamic, and often dangerious environment we call the real world. However, it does have it's drawbacks. It's long been known that people have a marked tendency to identify themselves with a group, identify people who are not members of their group as members of an out-group, and assign negative characteristics to the out-group. Moreover, we tend to spend most of our time with people who are like us. In other words, we hang out with people who look and think like we do and tend to think about people who are not like us in negative terms.

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MMO MMOnkey: Short Circuiting Social Stereotypes with MMOs originally appeared on Massively on Wed, 09 Apr 2008 10:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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