The Evolution of Gamer: Chronicles
I was introduced to the MMO world by my sons. There's more that a bit of irony in that, as I spent most of their adolescent years begging, pleading, cajoling, and occasionally raising my voice in an attempt to get them out of Everquest. I had no success whatsoever.
Without going into all the whys and hows (another story) I started playing with them after they'd both moved out. It was fun to meet up every night in Planteside or City of Heroes and though I won't claim I ever became a great player, I gradually became competent with their help. I have no problem asking for help when I don't know what I'm doing. Newbie and proud of it.
When Lineage2 was in beta, I briefly followed them there. Turned out I liked it a lot more than they did, and by the time they moved on I had become very invested in Evanor. If you've ever gotten a little over involved in an MMO you know how that can be. Let's just say I played with dedication and enthusiasm, and made a ton of friends from all over the world. This meant a lot to me on many levels.
When I met the man who was to become my husband he found my MMO world more than a little weird, and since he makes films, he said "Wouldn't it be interesting to travel around the world and film Evanor meeting up in real life with all these people she's met in the game? What a great documentary." I thought so too.
But when I began proposing this to my online friends I was very surprised that no one wanted to be filmed. While some liked the idea of meeting, I was frequently told "NO MOVIE." During this process my husband and I had started doing more research into the MMO phenomenon as the whole Warcraft thing had taken off, there was Gi Jing and the goldfarming documentary, exciting things happening in all areas of VR development...and lot of people were talking about "game addition."
Nick Yee and Gi Jing were gracious enough to spend time with us, and before we knew what we were doing we'd flown across country to meet with other people recognized as experts in MMOs. The vision for the project expanded...and expanded...and continues to expand. Neils Clark has recently offered enormous insight and help in sorting out what the heck is really going on.
There's always more we want to catch on film...new books coming out, papers being published, and people in the news. At some point we have to wrap it up though and at least capture things as they are for now even though we know nothing will stay the same for very long.
It's been great and we're looking forward to meeting more friends in person at the Game Developer's Conference in March.
