Maximor
Spartan Industrial Manufacturing
SMASH Alliance
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Posted - 2008.06.03 12:55:00 -
[1]
This is not the first time this subject has been broached, and it certainly won't be the last. For me, at least, part of the allure of Eve is that there is no "Ban Stick" safety net.
In every other MMO that I have played, there was always a set of rules that provided a safety net for the player base. In most games, the mechanics and rules didn't even allow for something like piracy to exist. At worst, someone traded you an item that looked like another, much rarer and more expensive item, and made off with your cash while you got stuck with a cheap imitation of what you really thought you were buying. In most cases, you could petition that transaction and get your money back.
In the virtual realm, rules can be forced upon players through software. You can hard code something into the code of a game that the player cannot circumvent. If you don't want them to be able to steal from another player, you can insert code that prevents it. In essence, you remove their choice, for the sake of game play.
In the real world, no such barrier exists. For example, there are laws and rules that say scamming is illegal. But that law, in and of itself, doesn't physically prevent the act of scamming. Anyone who chooses to do so, can engage in the act of scamming. And while there can be consequences to that act, there is no physical barrier that prevents someone from scamming. Reality does have a basic set of rules though. Things like gravity. "What goes up, must come down." Things like physics. "If you want to go up, and stay up, you have to be able to exert an equal or greater force that opposes gravity."
Eve is a sandbox. Just like the real world. And just like the real world, basic laws exist. You must use a jump gate or jump drive to move between systems. POS's use a set ammount of fuel, every hour. Minmatar must use a quantity of duct tape that is equal or greater to the inverse square of the mass of their ships.
Okay, so the last one isn't quite true, but you get the idea. Eve allows you the choice to do practically anything. And while those choices may come with unpleasant consequences, you are free to make them.
If you hold a unix shell up to your ear, can you still hear the c: ? |