MMOs from the Outside In by Richard A. Bartle

Author:Richard A. Bartle
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Apress, Berkeley, CA

Exploit or Feature?

Sometimes players do something that the designer didn’t see coming. Is this an exploit, or is it a feature?

There’s a simple test to determine which: if the designer doesn’t mind its happening again, it’s a feature; if they do mind, it’s an exploit.

Unfortunately, it can be both.

Suppose that players ask that they can breed their pets together to create new pets. The idea is that through selective breeding they could get better pets than the default ones. The designer likes the idea and has it implemented.

Within a week, players have started breeding herds of cattle. They sell milk and meat to NPCs for money. The designer hadn’t seen this coming, but the money they make is commensurate with the time they spend managing their herd, and it’s pleasing that the players were imaginative enough to think of this. It adds richness to the MMO. The designer therefore decides that breeding herds of cattle is a feature.

Two weeks later, players drive 30 herds together and stampede them through a town full of high-level evil cultists. Every last one of the cultists is killed. The players spend the next two hours looting the bodies and rounding up the remaining cattle. The designer therefore decides that breeding herds of cattle is an exploit.

Perhaps a more realistic way of putting it is as follows: until the designer doesn’t mind its happening again, it’s a feature; when they do, it’s an exploit.

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