Persona Issues

When people sign up to virtual worlds, they will have a number of preconceptions as to what they can expect to happen to their characters and what they can expect not to happen to them. This may come from publicity, from what friends have told them, or from a general sense of what “this kind” of product is like. If they know the virtual world is “about” combat, they can expect their character to kill things in it. If they don’t know initially, but in the character creation system discover that there is a wide range of combat options available, then they should read this as a warning that nevertheless there is combat in this world. If they don’t like the idea, they don’t have to play ¹.

If something happens that could not be reasonably expected, that’s of course a different matter. In many cases, it will be a surprise—possibly even a pleasant one—but not an issue. You didn’t know this Victorian Science Fiction game incorporated a race of troglodytes, but hurray, you do now. In other cases, it will be less pleasant but not emotionally damaging (for example, forcing players to make their characters use the lavatory). In some instances, though, it could be hurtful. The classic example of this is rape.

As I explained in Chapter 6, there are occasions when players are immersed to the extent that an assault on their character feels like an assault on them personally. If they knew this was a possibility before it happened, then no matter how bad it feels when it does happen they can blame only themselves. If I sit in the front row at the sea lion pool, I shouldn’t be surprised if I get wet; if I play a virtual world with PD, I shouldn’t be surprised if my persona gets killed. In either case, I should be surprised—and possibly deeply injured—if I were raped. It doesn’t fit the context; it’s not something I signed up for. Even if it did fit the context (plenty of wars in the past involved rape and pillage, so a brutally realistic historical world could perhaps justify including it), an explicit warning would be a good idea: So few worlds implement the concept of rape that it would come as a shock to find that one did even if it made perfect sense in the milieu.

Other real-world effects can also be disturbing. If you were to chop off some character’s leg in combat, a reasonable result might be that they couldn’t walk. Similarly, if you threw boiling water in their eyes, you might blind them. Some people are disabled in real life, and they could well play in your world. Is it right to show their disability in a negative light like this? What if their character suffers the same disability as the player? It’s tiresome being deaf in real life ²; why should anyone have to put up with it in the virtual world, too? It’s not like virtual deafness gives any great insight into the condition, so education is no grounds for inclusion.

What about illnesses and diseases? If your virtual world includes cigarettes, it might seem fun to give characters that over-indulge lung cancer. Hey, it’s responsible, too, encouraging people not to smoke. That’s not going to cut much ice with a player whose grandmother just died of lung cancer, though. Poisons also have to be handled thoughtfully: The sensibilities of people whose relatives went to Nazi death camps must be respected. I should point out that it’s by no means impossible to incorporate these themes into virtual worlds; the difficult part is doing so responsibly.

There are further examples of seemingly innocuous things in virtual worlds that can have real-world effects on people. In MUD2, there is (among other things) a piece of ham that characters can eat to restore lost stamina. Should a real-life vegetarian allow their character to eat the ham? Am I, having put the ham there, hurting the feelings of vegetarians? Should I remove it? Was I wrong ever to create it, knowing that it might offend vegetarians ³?

The problem with looking at the effects on players of virtual events is, of course, that people can be affronted by practically anything. Plenty of people in the real world are frightened of spiders, so should there be no spiders in virtual worlds so as not to alarm them? What about those people in the real world unlucky enough to be afraid of oranges? They do exist: Should their concerns not be given equal weight?

Personally, I take the view that the only morally consistent approach is for designers to be true to their own beliefs. Do what you want to do: If players don’t like it, they can stop playing. General content warnings, like film classifications, can

be used to forewarn people of what range of material they can expect. Beyond that, though, it’s up to players to decide whether they want to visit your world. Developers should not have to take out product liability insurance for content any more than publishers should have to for books. It’s for players to weigh the odds of participation, not for designers to second-guess them.

Morality: Another candidate for inclusion in a critical aesthetic?