A Pacifist Plays Darkfall

This week I managed to purchase Darkfall. I say "managed" because the publisher, Aventurine, has made the unusual and somewhat controversial decision to limit the number of subscriptions it sells in the online game's first weeks. The idea, as I understand it, is to prevent the game's single server from buckeling under the stress of tens of thousands of players logging in at once. Most developers of "Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games" (MMORPGs) would have done similar testing and adjustments throughout their closed beta testing, possibly capping it off with an open beta period just before launch. Then again, few such games have launched without account management and server issues anyway, so maybe Aventurine has hit on something.

Besides, the game's development hasn't been exactly conventional at any turn, so why start now? Announced roughly two weeks before the World Trade Center got ganked (for the second time) and the US economy looted (for the first time this century), Darkfall has seen a long and rocky life while in development. That, combined with the independent developer's ambitious feature list and its fans' rabid boosterism, made the game something of a running joke among those gamers who follow MMORPGs. Many thought it would never launch. In that, at least, Aventurine has proved the naysayers wrong.

But the question for today isn't really how I came to be playing Darkfall, but why. The game, since the very beginning, has been a Holy Grail for those who prefer a particular style of PvP (or Player v/s Player) conflict that they style "hardcore" and others describe as sadistic. Hardcore PvPers, like the rest of us, vary in their intensity from those who simply crave the danger and challenge of matching wits and skill with other human players...to those who don't enjoy a game unless they're ruining somebody's day. Darkfall allows PvP combat anywhere in the game's expansive world. Although there are consequences for attacking allies, there's nothing preventing you from doing so. There's also nothing preventing a highly experienced character from killing an absolute newbie, or five characters from attacking one, or any situation, really, where most gamers would say the match-up is less than fair. Hardcore PvP isn't meant to be fair. The game is also "full loot," meaning that when a character is killed, anything he was carrying can be taken by anyone standing around, while the character is ressurected, essentially naked, at a distant "bind point." It's not for everyone.

Most gamers don't like this style of play, and I'm one of them. People play MMORPGs for all kinds of reasons, but few of them include getting killed and looted by a squad of higher-level characters or getting killed over and over again by the same character whose out simply for the lulz. Early in its lifespan, Ultima Online figured this out and split the world into mirror images of mostly-lawless and mostly-safe. The hardcore PvPers have never been happy since, and Darkfall offers a chance to return to their own twisted Garden of Eden in which anyone can kill anyone else anywhere at any time...and take their shit.

I was ecstatic over the introduction of Trammel, UO's "safe zone." In games like Everquest II, City of Heroes, World of Warcraft, Lord of the Rings Online, Age of Conan, and others, I've stuck to those games and servers that offered consensual-only PvP and mild, if any, penalties for dying. This, by the definition of the hardcore PvPer, makes me a "carebear." So be it. I enjoy playing MMORPGs, both in solo mode and grouping with others. I like to explore and see what the next quest holds. And I pay my monthly tithe to the gaming gods like everyone else. I like what I like.

But I also played Shadowbane, the hardcore PvPers previous Holy Grail. It had some safe areas, but was mostly open PvP. It wasn't full-loot, IIRC, but you did drop whatever wasn't equipped on your character. And the game had its share of PKs and griefers. Even in this game built for conflict, I played a healer and a scout, support classes not really designed to "own" at PvP; a carebear in a world of wolves. But I loved the politics, the rising and falling empires, and the sense that there was something at risk in all the warfare. I found a place within that world where I could fit in, and for a time it was good.

That's what's attracted me to Darkfall, the idea that there may be some greater stories to experience in and amongst the dickweeds, griefers, and d00ds. There's also the challenge of being a nonagressive person is an aggressive world. Although people have done it in World of Warcraft, the choice, to me, seems to have little meaning in a game that's essentially on rails. But in a sandbox world layered in violence and ass-hattery, how do you make a place for yourself if you just want to explore and experience? To call myself a pacifist is a bit of hyperbole. I have killed PCs and I will kill PCs. But what else does Darkfall offer? I'll let you know.