Scotty, beam us up!
- And it costs money to play, even after you bought it?
I watched my friend, disbelief clearly showing. He was telling me about this latest game he was playing called Dark Age of Camelot (DAoC).
My friend had secured me this great job - a night watch position - while I patiently waited for some of the billion job applications I had sent out after I finished Uni to produce a dream job. The night watch gig was fantastic and if it had paid just a bit more money I would still be doing it. It consisted of making sure that 4 authistic people slept.
In reality it meant I had about 45 mins of labour each night and the rest of the night I could play computer, watch tv, read a book or steal whatever I could find in the fridge.
My friend was sitting in the building next to mine and we often spent hours sitting talking. Of course he also showed me this ‘absolutely amazing’ new game DAoC.
Today I know that many people loved this game, not the least for its revolutionary Realm-versus-Realm aspects - but I wasn’t really impressed at the time. I watched my friend play for hours and he always seemed to just be on a horse going from one place to another or sitting by a forge repeating the same process over and over and over.
And he paid money to do it.
I remember I told him that it would be a very cold day in hell and I would have a spa in my living room before I would ever pay to play a game I had already paid for once!
Not many days would go before I had to eat those words.
My friend didn’t play DAoC for too long. In Autumn 2003 a new game was launched and this game took place in one of my favourite universes: the Star Wars Universe. Again I would watch my friend play but this game really caught my interest: you could visit the planets from the movies, meet the famous characters, but most importantly - you could tame a host of animals, they would follow you around and you could teach them tricks and even have them fight enemies for you. I was hooked and before I knew it I was playing my first ever MMO.
My friend had begun playing on the US server Eclipse so of course I also started here. He had much more skill points than I had (there were no levels in the original Star Wars Galaxies (SWG)) so after teaching me a few tricks and get me started we didn’t really spend that much time together.
It didn’t matter much - I had found my calling: I was a Creature Handler…