D&D Online questions

Over the years, I've known many an individual who would list Dungeons and Dragons as one of their major or minor hobbies. So I have a passing familiarity with how that particular and somewhat unique style of tabletop gaming works. I have had occasion to watch weekends worth of gameplay and have noticed the social interactions that occurs fluidly throughout, as the gamers manage their game roles and outside selves seamlessly.

Now, Wizards of the Coast, the owners of the D&D franchise, are in the final stages of delivering an MMPORPG that is supposed to be true to the tabletop game. In a discussion with Kelly about this last night, I enthused that it will be an interesting study to see how it gets integrated into the habits and hobbies and affections of hardcore D&Ders who've managed until now to abstain from MMOs, even those rather blatantly based on the game. Kelly rightly brought me down to earth and pointed out that the game universe may well be doomed to failure and ultimately to strong disappointment or disapproval from tabletoppers because the game is anticipated to be one of the next big releases, causing existing online gamers to flock to it in droves, bringing along with them their blithe and open disregard for the traditions of D&D itself, looking only for an immersive gameplay experience that replicates and conforms to existing MMO conventions. We both wondered also to which market Wizards of the Coast will market - their existing rabidly loyal tabletopper base or the arguably larger online gamer base?

In thinking more about this today while reading a political science piece on the elite engineered political movements in Europe, it got me thinking about the whole concept of the "elites" as it will/would apply to D&D Online. Certainly the existing tabletop gamers, some who have played conventional D&D for as long as 30 years now, will have definite expectations too of the game and will consider themselves the "real" or "true" elite. When they meet the online gamers, many of whom come from a completely different gaming tradition completely tied to computer games, goals and values and identities will clash. Both will see themselves as the "true" elite. According to my readings, any power clash of elites will return as the winner the group that is best equipped materially and culturally to handle the power presented. But in this new MMO, that power is nebulous and still undefined. And in a digital universe, what could be considered the material or culture that is best suited to this game? With dual claims to elite status probably coming from both sides, it will be up to Wizards to manage the schism and unite the world, a daunting task.

Teens do the darndest....

File this one under S for stupidity or B for brashness...not sure which.

CNN reports two british teens are in critical condition after trying to create homemade light sabres using flourescent light tubes and "petrol". They were filming the stunt when they lit the tubes and one of them blew up.

Competition or cooperation?

While taking a break from studying Canadian constitutional politics and the 1982 Charter of Rights and Freedoms (POLI 204 exam tomorrow worth 30% eek!) I was meandering the net, looking up info on my latest board game obsession, Settlers of Catan.

Found this editorial on the Games Journal -- it's about raising children to be gamers and thought its take on whether or not kids should play competitive games interesting. I know some of my fellow GameCODE-ers are interested in just this issue when looking at digital games.

Mobile blogging

First files, then pictures, now Blogger through its parent company Google is letting bloggers blog using mobile devices.

Nuances of the digital divide debate

While I too am occasionally guilty of going a bit binary in arguments or ideas I put forth here, generally I strive to be more thoughtful and less absolute when addressing issues of interest to me.

One such interest is the entire concept of the digital divide. The problem with the way it is normally addressed is that it is presented as a have/have-not debate, with little gray area or conceptualization of reasoned thinking.

So it was with a sigh of relief that I read this interview in the Digital Divide Network. Finally, a more careful and nuanced view.

Summer session 2005

A thrill of foreshadowing tickled the back of my neck this afternoon as I drove onto the island of Montreal and headed down the Decarie expressway towards downtown. Sun was out, spring finally felt present and I was heading to class.

Okay okay so that doesn't sound necessarily special, but to me it was. You see, I had taken the afternoon off to go to the first of my summer session classes. And they aren't night classes. I'm taking classes in the afternoon for the first time in a very very long time. I only have 4 more days of work to do before I turn into a full-time academic with no other gig to support me. But my thoughts yesterday were turned towards the idea of being in class during daylight hours, of feeling the vibes and energy that is so different on campus during the day.

As it turned out, the vibe and energy were definitely missing. Things were quieter than I had expected. Several of the on-campus concessionaires and cafes were closed up for the season and the students I saw all looked relaxed and unharried.

Still, there I was, on campus, in the middle of a weekday.

I have four classes in total during this six week summer semster, but with two of them being online courses, that leaves me to to attend in person. One is a sociology course on Social Change which looks like it will be fun and illuminating (studying Weber and Cooley and Mead - how can it be bad?) and the other is another political science course, this time an introduction to Canadian politics.

That latter course showed me once again how absolute people can be when making arguments. I heard all kinds of wild accusations and theories, which, if they had been presented as possibilities, would have been fine. But when they're presented as an absolute fact, as indisputable and self-evident, there I have problems with it. I tried to help the prof shift the debate to more nuanced areas of power and agency and the Canadian context, but the rest of the class kept dragging the discussion into a binary debate on the "goodness" or "badness" of Canadian politics and politicians vis-a- vis Quebec and the US.

When class ended around 4:00, I exited, climbed down the four flights of stairs from the Hall building to emerge into the sunlight. Wow. Sunlight. After class. What a novel concept.

Sunlight and nothing scheduled for me, other than eating dinner and reading political and social theory.

I could get used to this.

Letters from Canada

I wonder sometimes at what it would be like to study someplace that isn't Canada, in which the first language isn't English and few people speak either of my languages (the other being French).

I also wonder what others truly think of Canadians, others being non-North Americans, of course.

New culture, new ideas. The need to adapt. How does it make you grow as a person?

Canada's International Student of the Year Award submissions gave me a taste of what it would be like in reverse, if I weren't Canadian and yet had come to this huge country to study. I smiled and shed a few tears as I read the submissions.