Hype and MMOs: A Historical Perspective

Let's go ahead and take a gander at the Revolutionary hype engine for America known as the United States Declaration of Independence.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.

Pretty fucking awesome, am I right? I mean, let's check that out bit by bit. First off "We hold these truths to be self-evident", in other words: we will not backslide on this stuff, because it just is. "That all men are created equal" it helps to know the slang of the time, so men wasn't XY men, but humanity men, meaning that we're going to have some fucking amazing class balance, right out of the box. "Endowed by their Creator" selling to the male audience for sure with that phrasing. "Certain unalienable Rights" vague, but that's marketing, and the capitalization means business: these rights are yours. "Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness" Wow, what a way to finish on a strong note.

Who could possibly think this would not be the best country ever? I mean, check that shit out. Life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, equality, endowment from a Creator. Wow.

Then it actually ships and we're stuck with these shitty Articles of Confederation. Remember those? Of course you don't. They sucked. Every state did whatever it felt like and in general not much got done. The economy was a total mess with in-game currencies being all over the place, restrictive, and useless for most of what you wanted to but, only made bearable by them being tradeable, but at horrible rates.

So then after six years they right this Constitution. It was supposed to be a huge patch that would fix it all up and what does it do? Oh somehow it goes live without a Bill of Rights. That had to be thrown in a little bit later and we all know how vague those patch notes were. We're still figuring out the theorycraft on that. Don't even get me started on ranged weapons.

But even when it was fully going, this Constitution patch didn't quite match the hype. At all. Remember that all men being created equal part? Thrown right out the window with all sorts of restrictive mechanics based on race and class. The entire female population had no representation. The first set of restrictions took almost 100 years to figure out at all and the game practically died from the fixes.

Still, it did eventually get off the ground and despite ups and downs, has had a steadily growing population. Though it was followed by a few dozen Breaking Away From the British Empire clones. Right, as if we needed yet another England-killer.

What I'm trying to say is that hype and disappointment are an eternal part of life, from the governing of my country to the many disappointing presents of socks. Except for one year that I asked for socks because my feet were cold. That worked out well. But that was more than balanced out by the year that I realized that I would never again get legos as a present. Everything was downhill from there.

So, where's the next Old Republic trailer?