Political Theory

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

DanielMuff — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 20:20:21 GMT

Back in my advanced web projects class in high school, we would spontaneously order ourselves to play Tribes over the LAN. We would spontaneously combust once teacher caught one of us playing. Our teacher would ask why we weren't working on our projects. We would respond, "yo, we been finished with that like two weeks ago."

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

Andrew Cain — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 18:00:43 GMT

AJ:
My brother who is wayyy into MMORPGs tells me that the economic system is the most important aspect of MMOs (but almost no developers do it right). Maybe there would be demand for some kind of Economics for Game Designers paper or book. A niche filled by Austrian economics, or praxeology-based ideas. If even one major game implemented the ideas, they would then spread (indirectly through experimentation and in-game trends) to the general population as MMOs get more sophisticated and realistic, to the point where the economic situations that unfold in the game start to give people insights into the real world. At last, that'd be cool.

I can imagine it now. The WoW players complaining about how their blue epic broadsword was worth 150g yesterday but today it is only worth 85g.

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

AJ — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 17:56:50 GMT

Conza88:
The game developer was economically illiterate.

My brother who is wayyy into MMORPGs tells me that the economic system is the most important aspect of MMOs (but almost no developers do it right). Maybe there would be demand for some kind of Economics for Game Designers paper or book. A niche filled by Austrian economics, or praxeology-based ideas. If even one major game implemented the ideas, they would then spread (indirectly through experimentation and in-game trends) to the general population as MMOs get more sophisticated and realistic, to the point where the economic situations that unfold in the game start to give people insights into the real world. At last, that'd be cool.

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

Andrew Cain — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 17:43:12 GMT

Conza88:
No time for games anymore.

Blasphemy!

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

Conza88 — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 17:07:13 GMT

AJ:

Interesting. Are there user-created governments? If the modeling of certain aspects is realistic enough, it could provide some interesting case studies for economics and libertarianism. Particularly things like currency wars and central banking.

I used to play a game called bootleggers.us , mafia styled thing - online, role playing game..

The game developer was economically illiterate. Inflation was a constant problem... part of the reason is people would create new accounts just to do missions, so they could get easy money, then transfer it back to their main account.

More importantly though - Central bank - 5% interest rate. You put your savings locked away for 24hrs, 5% earned. lol, continue & repeat.

No time for games anymore.

Btw, that office clip is hilarious.

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

AJ — Tue, 09 Mar 2010 16:09:23 GMT

Interesting. Are there user-created governments? If the modeling of certain aspects is realistic enough, it could provide some interesting case studies for economics and libertarianism. Particularly things like currency wars and central banking.

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

Jackson LaRose — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:35:27 GMT

Andrew Cain:
'Second life isn't a game. It is a multi-user virtual environment' - Dwight Schrute

LOL, touche...

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

Andrew Cain — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:24:17 GMT

AJ:

Yeah, anyone know if there are in-game businesses in some MMORPGs?

'Second life isn't a game. It is a multi-user virtual environment' - Dwight Schrute

(Please visit the site to view this media)

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

Jackson LaRose — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:20:46 GMT

AJ:
Yeah, anyone know if there are in-game businesses in some MMORPGs?

Yes. Second Life has businesses, and its own currency, with a real, fluctuating exchange rate with the dollar.

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

AJ — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 21:18:18 GMT

Yeah, anyone know if there are in-game businesses in some MMORPGs?

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

Andrew Cain — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:45:36 GMT

Jackson LaRose:
Aren't the MMORPG titles an even greater example of this (guilds can be huge, right)?

Good point. Things like World of Warcraft. Don't they have like 13 million users?

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

The Late Andrew Ryan — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:44:27 GMT

Kind of a bad example because all actions in MAG are either set up by th computer or by the commander who I thought was chosen by the administrators.

I like Jackson's example much, much more.

Re: MAG and spontaneous order

Jackson LaRose — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 20:26:16 GMT

Aren't the MMORPG titles an even greater example of this (guilds can be huge, right)?

MAG and spontaneous order

Andrew Cain — Mon, 08 Mar 2010 19:57:34 GMT

I don't know how many gamers are on this forum but they those who are may have heard of a new game coming out called M.A.G. which is a PS3 military first person shooter. Now getting over the overt militarism in the game, MAG actually has a 256 multiplayer system. That means that 256 people are coordinating for a like minded goal playing from locations across the world without even meeting face to face. This is pretty amazing. Yes its a video game but its apart of mass culture.

Dear Playstation: MAG Funny commercial

MAG website