Tuesday 24 July 2007

Pic of the day: There is nothing wrong with being a little furry, as long as you're not a perv about it. Raccoons, for instance ... some of my best friends are raccoons.

Namir Deiter & cultural exchange

"We have different servers: Sherup, Durri, and many other places! We did this so you won't have to deal with people who are too different from yourself. If you have friends in another country and want to play the game with them, you can't. If they won't move to your country, they're probably not very good friends anyhow."

From the imaginary documentation to the imaginary game Final Battle Adventure On-line, part of the Namir Deiter online comic continuity by Isabel and Terrence Marks.

Yes, a part of my sustained delay is due to catching up on Namir Deiter. Surprisingly this is one of my favorite online comics. It is well drawn, and despite some punchlines it is decidedly story-oriented, weaving a continuous story of a group of young people over several years. Except the people are furries. Animal people. The way Isabel draws them, and with their well developed personalities, it is easy to forget the fur and think of them as just people. And this way she does not need to assign them one of our ethnicities, triggering pointless prejudices. In America not least, this is a big point. [Edit: After writing this, I checked her FAQ and yes, that is one of her reasons. I think that is awesome.]

This brings us to the other point. While "Final Battle Adventure On-line" is almost certainly based on Final Fantasy Online, I have found the same trait in other MMORPGs. Even City of Heroes has a European and a Korean cluster of servers that are separate from the American ones, although in those cases (and with Dark Age of Camelot as well) it may have to do with it being translated into local languages. But I don't think that is the only reason. After all, the European server clusters also have English-language servers. And in Guild Wars we did not even have different servers, and yet players were shunted into instances of the towns that were populated by people from their region.

I fear Marks hit the nail on the head: We are saved from the need to deal with people who are too different from us. After all, if they insist on staying in an inferior country, they can't be very good friends. It is a question whether they are even really human. Probably they are, but not as human as us. That is why our newspapers only have one small paragraph on page 7 when an Asian ferry sinks and hundred people drown, but a full report when one of our own gets bitten by a dog. Who would want to play online games with people worth so little?

But you know what? The fact that people are noticing, changes everything. In the past, we simply took it for granted. Now, we watch Japanese cartoons and read Korean comic books before we go out to eat some Thai food, unless we take home some Chinese food instead. While I'm actually not an all-out multiculturalist - I think the modern European civilization is objectively superior to some degree - I still think cultural exchange will improve the life and the thinking of all involved. Much like free trade make both sides objectively more affluent, so also exchange of thought and art will make the soul richer.

Then again, so does Namir Deiter. There are years of comics here, but I don't regret spending a few evenings going through them. Girly goodness indeed. Not too much of that in my life these days! ^^