You know an area of interest has hit the mainstream when one of the “Dummies” series of books is published on that topic (Massively Multiplayer Games for Dummies by Scott Jennings (2006)). In recent years a number of books have been published that examine various aspects of the virtual world experience, some of general interest while others take a more academic approach. Having previous experience in one or more worlds will certainly provide a more meaningful context for your reading, but it is not required. In some cases the books may encourage you to explore virtual space. Here are two books that I found of particular interest as starting points:
1. Play Money (2006) by journalist Julian Dibbell reads like an adventure novel as it documents his attempt to make “play” his full time job for a year. For that year he sold virtual coins and objects that he acquired while playing the MMO Ultima Online for real money. In the book he raises a number of thoughtful issues regarding the nature of the virtual worlds and their relationship to real life. Here’s an excerpt from his blog that was written prior to the publication of the book:
For me, I think, what this project has been about is the relationship between play and work. I began my involvement with Ultima Online as a player, and I took up this enterprise wondering if it might not lead me to an El Dorado I have looked for all my adult life: a place where work is play.
It didn’t, of course. Not exactly. It took work to make Play Money, and the work was hard, and more to the point, the work did not fit any definition of play handed down to us by tradition. It was not simply a diversion from the path of life; it was the path itself, for a time, and just as fraught with existential care as that path ever is.
The funny thing is, though, that more and more nowadays this curious confusion of entertainment and existence is the definition of play. The games we choose for our amusement are becoming so complex, so involving, that the line between gameplay and career, between gameworld and society, begins to blur. … I also encountered ethical dilemmas, questions of economic justice even, that would never have troubled me as they did if the economy in question were merely a game.
What this says about the culture we are building, and about the strange promise of the technologies that increasingly shape that culture, I’m not quite certain. But you can rest assured that if the book Play Money ever gets written, these will be its central questions.
2. In Play Between Worlds: Exploring Online Game Culture (2006), sociologist T. L. Taylor provides a more academic look at virtual worlds via participant-observation field research in the the virtual world Everquest. Taylor is Associate Professor in the Department of Digital Aesthetics and Communication at the IT University of Copenhagen. Her ethnography covered a four year period in the online role playing world. As a former Everquest player I found a lot of memories were rekindled in the process of reading the book. The chapters on women gamers and power gamers were particularly well done. Gender issues in gaming is a fairly hot topic in gaming studies and her interviews with female players and observations were informative.
