Altruism

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8 March 2005

by Mike Rozak

A recent discussion on Terranova got me thinking about altruism and its role in virtual worlds, particularly how it pertains to the world vs. game nature of a virtual world.

However, before I discuss altruism, I will spend some time "boiling down" linear fiction, single-player games, and multiplayer games into their fundamental constructs...

Boiling them down...

At its most fundamental, a piece of linear fiction (aka: story) does the following:

1. Provide a setting and "laws of physics" that govern the world. Does the story take place in the 18th century or the 25th century? Is there magic or warp technology?
   
   
2. Get the reader to like one or more non-player characters (NPCs) in the fictional world.
   
   
3. Have the "liked" NPCs make interesting choices and undertake interesting actions. The choices and actions aren't necessarily interesting for the NPC though; they are designed to be interesting for the reader.
   
   
4. Have the world, NPC, or other NPCs change in interesting ways as a result of the NPCs actions. Again, the change must be interesting to the reader.
   
   One of the ways to make the change more interesting is to make it believable but unexpected. A good story teller never gives the reader exactly what they expect.
   
   
5. In a story, all the changes lead the "plot" to its final conclusion. Those choices and changes that are not needed to reach the conclusion are generally removed from the story.
   
   
6. Each story has a theme, which is the ultimate message of the experience, such as "You walk though history and are part of future histories." The theme permeates the work.

The fundamental elements of a single-player game are:

1. Provide a setting and "laws of physics" that govern the world. This is the same as with a story, although setting and physics seem to be more important in a single-player game than a story... Could this be because the other elements (see below) aren't handles as deftly by contemporary game designers? Or, are world and physics inherently more important to a single-player game?
   
   
2. Get the player to identify with his player character (PC).
   
   Unlike linear fiction, games do not usually try to get the player to like any NPCs; Artificial intelligence isn't sophisticated enough to make likeable NPCs. At best, cut scenes or other pre-programmed scripts are used to make NPCs likeable, but the effect pales compared to linear fiction.
   
   
3. Provide interesting choices and activities for the PC to undertake. The choices and actions are mainly designed to be interesting to the player, not the player's character.
   
   An activity might be interesting in a game but not a story: Real-life hiking is an interesting activity to partake in because it requires mental concentration to avoid slipping, tripping over rocks, and being bitten by snakes. It is dreadfully boring to read about though.
   
   
4. The world, PC, and NPCs change in interesting ways as a result of the PC's actions. Generally, changes occur only after the PC correctly performs a specific action, like pressing the correct button, killing a monster, or saying the right phrase to a NPC.
   
   
5. Single-player games have conclusions and plots, just like stories. The player's choices, activities, and their results are designed to lead to this conclusion.
   
   Players make an unwritten agreement with the author that they won't try to subvert the built-in plot (too much) if the author provides them with an enjoyable experience. Of course, in most games, it's impossible for a player to subvert the plot beyond refusing to advance it.
   
   Occasionally, a single-player game allows for several different conclusions, letting the player's choices affect the outcome. There are never more than a few possible endings though, so in reality, the player has very little choice in the matter.
   
   
6. Some single-player games have themes, although most are the same chiche, "You too can save the world."

Multiplayer games are like single-player games, except that other players perform some of the roles that NPCs do linear fiction. A multiplayer game does the following:

1. Provide a setting and "laws of physics" that govern the world. Setting and physics seem all-important to multiplayer games. Again, could this be because virtual-world authors don't know how to use the other elements? Or is it a fundamental difference?
   
   
2. Get the player to identify with his own PC and to make friends with other players. Again, NPCs are not yet sufficiently intelligent enough for players to like them.
   
   
3. Provide interesting choices and activities for the PC to undertake.
   
   
4. The world, PC, other PCs, and NPCs change in interesting ways based on the players choices and actions.
   
   Change that results from player to player interaction is believable, and often unexpected. Change resulting from PC to NPC interaction is sometimes unbelievable, and usually too predictable. Thus, the changes brought on by player to player interaction are (usually) more satisfying, and have fewer pre-programmed limits. However, "interesting" also implies "appropriate to the world", which is unlikely, since most players don't role play.
   
   
5. Multiplayer games don't seem to have plots, at least for the moment. This is a strength and a weakness.
   
   It is a strength because some players don't like making an unwritten agreement with the author. It's a weakness because many of the player's choices and actions lead to naught. In a story or a well-written single-player game, all choices and actions have a purpose.
   
   I suspect that as multiplayer games try to attract a more mass market audience, they'll need a plot. See The End.
   
   
6. Theme? What theme? Most multiplayer games don't have a real theme. Themes are particularly difficult to maintain over long periods of time and with thousands of players trying to subvert the theme. Does this mean that virtual worlds can't/shouldn't have a theme?

You may be reading some of the observations I made about multiplayer games and thinking, "That's wrong. They don't really work like that!". You're right. A typical MMORPG divergs from my predictions:

1. Setting and physics are everything, to the point where most MMORPGs seem to have little else.
   
   
2. MMORPGs don't do enough to get players to meet other compatible players. This is easy enough to remedy.
   
   
3. They provide very few choices, and very few varieties of activities. See Choice, Choice2, and Virtual World as Platform.
   
   
4. The player's character and other player characters can be changed by the player's choices and actions, but the world and NPCs are generally static.
   
   
5. Contemporary MMORPGs include quests, which are "mini-plots". Personally, I like quests, but I don't know if they work well in the grand scheme of things. I sometimes wonder if quests are vestigial remains from single-player games.
   
   Example: Early written fiction was often written as epic poems. Poetry was used in bardic tales, the precursors to written fiction, as a memory aid and because music was played with narration.
   
   
6. Themes, if they exist at all in a MMORPG, are incorporated into the quests.

Altruism and NPCs

From the "Boiling them down" section, it's obvious NPCs are necessary for linear fiction and single-player games. Without NPCs there would be far fewer interesting choices and their effects, and little plot or theme. Without NPCs all you have is a world, and the laws of physics that govern it.

However, a multiplayer game (theoretically) doesn't need NPCs at all. Everything that a NPC does can be accomplished by a PC, but much more intelligently and believably. After all, NPC AI is so poor that NPCs are limited to mindless roles like cannon fodder.

NPCs are not replaceable, and provide a vital role in multiplayer games:

1. They always stay in character, adding to the believability of the world as a whole. Very few players role play.
   
   
2. A NPC works 24/7. Players are only logged on an average 20 hours a week (with more mass-market players on for less time). While it's possible to get players to work in shifts to fulfil a role, they each bring their own personality and knowledge to the role, making for an inconsistent experience... "Why are there 18 different shop keepers for one store?", or "Why does the shop keeper have 18 different personalities?"
   
   
3. NPCs are designed to be altruistic. Some players are altruistic too, but most are self-centred...

Most players make choices and undertake actions that are fun or beneficial for themselves. Some will uncaringly destroy the enjoyment of other players just for their own enjoyment. A few will purposely destroy another player's enjoyment.

NPCs are designed by the author to be altruistic and make the game fun for the players. Even in cotemporary MMORPGs, where NPCs are incredibly stupid, NPCs are still designed for the players' entertainment. A monster is designed to be easy to kill, and not to run away to save its own life, nor to call in all its buddies within shouting distance.

A virtual world can be created without NPCs, but there are consequences:

1. If few players are logged on, a NPC-less world is desolate and boring. This causes players that log on to quickly log off, which ultimately creates a feedback cycle that produces an empty world.
   
   
2. The virtual world becomes very dangerous, with self-centred players running around in groups killing one another. NPCs could do the same, but their altruistic programming forces them to stay in a portion of the world appropriate to their level of difficulty.
   
   
3. To make the world less dangerous, authors provide rules of engagement and safe zones at the expense of allowing players' actions to have interesting effects. Dark Age of Camelot only allows PvP combat in certain areas and only against official enemies, creating a everlasting battle with no possible victory and no real consequences. World War II Online has official enemies, but doesn't limit where the combat occurs, creating a more dangerous game where players' actions have consequences. World War II Online has fewer players than Dark Age of Camelot... Is this a consequence of the heightened danger?
   
   
4. A virtual world can be designed to completely eliminate danger and (hopefully) attract mostly altruistic players. I believe this is what A Tale in the Desert does. In the game, players try to cooperatively build a civilisation. There is no combat, and (as far as I know) no sanctioned PvP of any kind. A Tale in the Desert doesn't attract many players though... Is this because it's designed for more altruistic players, a rare breed?

World War II Online and A Tale in the Desert both attract a small but enthusiastic group of players. I suspect the reasons for this is that they also allow players to change the world, something which other MMORPGs do not allow. Most players don't seem to care if they can change the world, but some do, enough that they're willing to accept a higher danger level or to exist in a world where they must cooperate with one another to achieve anything.

Interestingly, neither game relies on NPCs for entertainment, contrary to most MMORPGs. Does this mean that the more NPCs in a world, the more static it will become?

The opportunity costs of NPCs

NPCs are beneficial to a virtual world because they're altruistic. However, their existence lead to static worlds, which means that players' choices and actions ultimately come to naught.

The reasons why NPCs result in a static world are obvious:

1. Interesting NPCs (quest givers, shop keepers, etc.) are a lot of work to create, and authors can't afford for their work to be lost just because a player decides to kill them or otherwise make the NPC irrelevant.
   
   For example: It takes a bit of work to create a NPC that hands out a quest to "kill all the orcs on the other side of the hill" to players. If the quest-giving NPC is killed, then players may never know to attack the orcs on the other side of the hill. If the orcs are all killed, then the quest-giving PC is out of a job. Either way, the world can't afford to change.
   
   
2. Uninteresting NPCs (monsters) are easy to create, but must still be spawned. Ideally, players should be able to make a concerted effort and kill all the orcs in the world to be rid of them, permanently changing the world. However, if all the orcs are killed, what do players do for entertainment?
   
   MMORPGs prevent all the orcs from being killed by continually spawning orcs in one area of the world. Unfortunately, this leads to a static world since nothing the players can do will eliminate the orcs. The orcs' altruistic programming that prevents them from leaving their spawning region makes for an even more static world.
   
   
3. Quests (which are a by-product of NPCs) also ensure that a world is static. They too take effort to create, and authors don't want to waste the effort once the quest has been completed by just one player.

I have heard of several solutions to this problem:

1. Get rid of NPCs altogether. World War II Online and A Tale in the Desert do this.
   
   As described previously, removing all NPCs has its own problems.
   
   
2. Improve the artificial intelligence behind NPCs and the code that creates NPCs. Make sure that if all monsters are about to be killed off, at least some manage to escape. Allow non-monster NPCs to react to their environment and make intelligent decisions. Furthermore, let NPCs create their own quests based on their goals and needs.
   
   Even though AI can be improved beyond what is seen in contemporary MMORPGs, AI has its limits. The world will still be static, but on a higher level of abstraction than contemporary MMORPGs. The NPCs and quests will appear to be dynamic, until players realise that the same quests and NPC templates keep reappearing in different disguises. Furthermore, the AI must be designed so that it's "altruistic" but not a pushover, however one does that.
   
   I haven't seen this implemented.
   
   
3. Hire human GMs to continually tweak the world, spawning NPCs where they see fit, and providing some higher-level intelligence for NPCs. Unfortunately, this can become very expensive.
   
   Volunteer GMs would work too, as long as they remain altruistic. Giving ordinary players power over NPCs poses a problem, since the controlled NPCs would lose their altruism and fail to fulfil one of the reasons they're in the world.
   
   A major problem exists with human GMs: The players must believe that the GM is impartial. As soon as the GM shows favouritism the players will revolt. The same rule applies to AIs, but it's easier for players to believe that an AI is impartial.
   
   Wish was going to implement such GMs, but it was cancelled during beta, citing low player numbers. Again... Does the mass market player want to change the world?
   
   
4. All of the above. An author can reduce the number of NPCs (per player) to create a more dynamic world but more dangerous world. AI can be improved. Payed GMs or altruistic volunteers can guide the AIs.

Encouraging altruism in players

Despite all I've written, player's aren't completely self-centred. Virtual worlds often try to encourage altruism:

1. They encourage players to become altruistic role players, by guiding them towards acceptable behaviour and rewarding them with experience points or loot. Most MMORPGs do so already by handing out experience to players that kill monsters, but their efforts might be directed more effectively.
   
   
2. Multiplayer games provide tools so that altruistic players are welcomed and provided more influence. These include constructs such as guilds and mentors.
   
   
3. Some virtual worlds award role-playing points (related to altruism) for players who are doing a good job role playing.
   
   
4. Another possibility is a world-design that attracts altruistic players. I'm not exactly sure how to accomplish this.

A quick summary

To sum up what has been covered so far:

1. A virtual world without enough altruistic PCs and NPCs becomes dangerous, and attracts a smaller audience. Free-for-all PvP MUDs don't have too many players.
   
   
2. The danger can be removed or reduced with hard-coded rules, but then players are left in a less-interesting world that is often static. Ultima Online originally had open PvP, but was ultimately forced to impose PvP restrictions. In Dark Age of Camelot, the PvP restrictions produce a more static world; none of the three realms can ever win the PvP war.
   
   
3. Although altruistic players are rare, altruism can be encouraged with the proper tools and using appropriate rewards. Role-playing points, guilds, and mentors are a common technique.
   
   
4. NPCs, which are (always) programmed to be altruistic, can counteract the PC's self-centred-ness. Interactions with NPCs are pale imitations of interactions with real players though. Furthermore, the more NPCs in a world, the more static the world.
   
   
5. Improving NPC AI can reduce the amount that NPCs constrain world change and make the world less static. Improved AI also makes the NPCs more interesting to interact with.

Consequently, a safe and interesting (mass-market) world that doesn't rely on altruism is static. (Such as World of Warcraft or Everquest II.)

So what?

What's the big deal if NPCs aren't intelligent and a virtual world is static? Most players don't seem to mind not being able to change the world; Everquest (I & II) and World of Warcraft own much of the US market. In all three worlds, players run around, undertake lots of action, and pretend that they are changing the world even though the static nature of the worlds is obvious.

Obviously, I can't argue against the fact that most players don't seem to mind static worlds. A few thoughts do arise though:

1. Players didn't mind sprite-based graphics when their computer could only produce sprite-based graphics. They got "spoiled" by 3D-accelerators and now expect more. They might do the same for static vs. dynamic worlds.
   
   
2. Mass-market virtual worlds may be able to get away with a static environment, but niche worlds might require dynamic worlds to compete. The trend already points strongly in that direction.
   
   
3. Applying Richard Bartle's player model: Achievers and explorers, who are more world-oriented, are also more interested in dealing with altruistic NPCs. Socialisers and killers would rather interact with players, who are more interesting than NPCs. Socialisers are altruistic, while killers are self-centred.
   
   
4. Looking at the player pyramid in this light reveals that players at the bottom of the pyramid are happy with existing AI, while those at the top require more complex, human-like AI. As AI improves, players at the top of the pyramid will have less and less need for players below them.
   
   
5. Damion Schubert's response to the player pyramid is a version where altruistic players occupy the top layers. My player pyramid assumes more self-centred players would impose their needs on players below, requiring that players at the top of the pyramid financially subsidise the experience of those at the base, if they wish to attract any players to be a base. If altruistic players could be found to fill the top layers, the altruistic players would actually improve game-play for those at the base and a different business model could be used.