A MMORPG is a RPG (Role-Playing Game) that is played by a large number of players in a virtual game world. The player assumes the role of a character normally made by him or her, and they then take control of the actions of that character, MMORPG'S are different from other games, they are hosted by the publisher of that game and the game world exists and evolves even when people aren't playing.
The phrase MMORPG was invented by Richard Garriott the creator of Ultima Online the game that started the craze of MMORPG'S back in 1997. MMORPG'S are popular all over the world, worldwide revenues for MMORPG'S exceeded half a billion dollars in 2005. The main revenue for MMORPG'S are subscriptions, normally a price set out by the publisher that requires players to pay a monthly fee to play the game, some MMORPG'S are free but to experience the full potential of that game requires upgrading to pay a monthly subscription.
Although the MMORPG craze started back in the early 1990's, all MMORPG'S can be traced back to the earliest multi-user games which sprang up in the 1970's, the first of these was Mazewar a simple game of players moving an eye ball through a maze, the 1980's saw a semi-graphical multi-user game called Islands of Kesmai. But the first truly graphical multi-user RPG was seen in 1991 and was called Neverwinter Nights and was a turn based player vs player game, it saw many guilds (lots of players forming into a group) battling other guilds through tournaments to reach the final championship and was six dollars an hour to play, but it proved to be very popular.
In 1995 the internet was more accessible to game developers, which paved the way for massive titles,
the first success after this point was a game called Meridian 59 which also featured first-person 3D graphics, although at the same time a game was released called The Realm Online and may be credited with bringing the genre to a wider player-base.
In 1997 Ultima Online was first released and first popularized the genre, although it was Everquest that brought the mainstream attention to the gaming community in the west. The most popular MMORPG to date was launched in 2004 and is Blizzards, World Of Warcraft it was the firsts Warcraft game to tackle online play with Warcraft: Orcs and Humans a real time strategy being released back in 1994. Blizzard estimated that World Of Warcraft sold more than 240,000 copies on the first day alone, and it currently holds the most players of any Online game at an outstanding mark of 11 million.
The interactions between players on MMORPG'S are real even if the environment is virtual, this has got many psychologists and sociologists very interested in MMORPG'S as tools for academic research, Nick Yee has surveyed more than 35,000 MMORPG players over the past several years, recent findings suggest that 15% of players become a guild-leader at one time or another but find it to difficult and thankless. Many players find their emotions while they play MMORPG'S are very strong, to the extent that 8.7% of male and 23.2% of female players have had an online wedding. Other research has found that the enjoyment players feel towards an MMORPG has to do with the social side of it, either that be one to one social interaction or the social interaction of being in a large group or guild. A study by Zaheer Hussain and Mark D. Griffiths found that one in five gamers preferred socializing online to the real life, they also found that 57% of gamers had created a character of the opposite gender. In World Of Warcraft a temporary design glitch attracted the attention of psychologists and epidemiologists across North America, when “Corrupted Blood” disease of a monster began to to spread unintentionally and uncontrollably into the wider game world. The Center for Disease Control used the incident as a research model to chart both the progression of a disease , and the potential human response to a large scale epidemic infection.
The future of MMORPG'S is very promising with more game developers jumping on the band wagon and creating MMORPG'S, and MMORPG'S already on the market upgrading and bringing out expansion packs, the future looks to be set for more intense more social and more intreasting MMORPG'S.
My Essay
