To Tell The Tale...

One of the things I continue to explore with the MMORPG environment is the ability for individuals to use the world's environment to tell a story. This could be a character story, a group's story, or even a story that features the environment itself. For instance, Rusty's journey to the Mainland posts which stretched over several weeks last year or, more recently, his entrance into City of Heroes' Paragon City. The environments are dynamic, the characters available to interact with, player as well as game driven, are almost uncountable, the role-playing table is open 24/7, and, in the case of some MMO's, the world holds a rich store of material from which to draw.

I'm utterly fascinated with the creative human drive, perhaps instinct, to take a combination of experiences and combine them into a coherent piece of expression. I would almost dare say it is a form of art. My love of it began early on in my life when I used tabletop RPG's as a springboard for character and story creation with my own writing. I continue to look towards the MMO as a tool for doing the same thing.

For instance, take a look at Virtueverse.com. This wiki site is a collection of characters and stories which have been created on one particular server for the game City of Heroes. The Virtue server has become the unofficial role-playing server. What this means is that the majority of the players there have come to that server to engage in not just a drive towards the next level or the perfect combination of character skills and abilities but, instead, have come to tell an interactive story. The Unofficial Handbook of the Virtue Univers is a fan run wikis and is modeled after the Marvel Comics produced Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe which was originally put out in the eighties as a handbook for the huge amount of Marvel character. (Of which, I am a proud owner of several.) The Marvel books would take individual characters from the Marvel universe and devote at least one page to description, history, and essential information about the character.

Virtueverse does the same thing except players create their own entries for their own characters. Each page is an homage to a player's favorite character. A small digital collection point for that person's creative buzz. Some, both on Virtueverse and a score of forum boards scattered over the internet, have created stories, whole cloth, from their adventures and encounters within the confines of the game.

Do yourself a favor when you have some time and click on the link in the left bar of the Virtueverse website titled "Random Page." Wander around and take a look at some of the amazing (and, granted, not so amazing) stories which are being woven everyday.