Constructed Identity

Social dilemmas in multiplayer games

Multiplayer gaming, like most human interaction, involves situations or dynamics that seem both unintended and unwanted by the involved parties. While conflict is endemic to the enjoyment of most games (being intended) certain types of conflicts are detrimental to that very same enjoyment.

To be more precise about this distinction we must introduce two perspectives that are unfortunately all too often confused: We must distinguish between the game as rule system and the gaming situation(see also Hughes 1999).

In the former case we approach any game formally, directing our attention towards the reward structures embedded in the game rules. By doing so we are considering the game as an abstract system bracketing for a moment the actual experiences of concrete players. This analytical activity corresponds roughly to classifying novels by genre or to attempt to tease out the intended (or preferred) reading of a text. Under certain conditions such an approach can be extraordinarily problematic (see also Taylor Forthcoming), while in others it is merely a way to be analytical about the structure of the artefacts being studied [2].

When focusing on the gaming situation, on the other hand, we are specifically acknowledging that this corresponds only loosely to the formal properties of a game. The experience of playing a game cannot be determined (at least not fully) by an examination of the game rules, no matter how rigorous. It is determined in part by the culture surrounding the game, the concrete gaming context and the experience and personality of the player. At the extreme end of the spectrum a game may of course also be entirely “subverted” as players exploit a game structure for playing entirely different games or for artistic expression. When, for instance, Anne-Marie Schleiner worked within Counter-Strike to achieve the provocatively peaceful phenomenon known as Velvet Strike[3] she was using the game system in ways afforded but not intended by the game designers. These different levels of analysis are exactly that – each is appropriate to the study of certain game-related phenomena but neither can answer every relevant question we may have. It is the responsibility of the game researcher instead to be clear about his or her level of analysis and to be acutely aware of which game elements are obscured by the choice of perspective.

Following this advice, we can note that whereas the game rules (as stated, for instance, in a Chess rulebook or in the code of Pong) set the scene for conflict, to actually engage in an enjoyable gaming situation the players must collaborate on upholding a large number of implicit rules. Pong (Atari, 1972) players, for instance, must agree (tacitly at least) not to push each other physically, to share the expense of playing the game etc.(Sniderman 1999). In other words: Pong as rule system is a non-collaborative activity while the gaming situation surrounding Pong rests upon mutual coordination and the goodwill of the players. If we don’t normally consider it in this way it is merely because coordination and mutual trust is so relatively easy to achieve in physical settings like arcades.

Trust formation in darkened arcades is largely out of the game designer’s hands. For online games requiring players to form teams and find opponents, however, this is decidedly not the case. In fact, since the matching of players preceding the actual clashes in online games largely takes place within structures fashioned by the game developers (or their subcontractors or partners) we can consider these structures part of the game rules. Or we can at least acknowledge that they fall squarely under the responsibility of the developers.

In the following I will show that three conflict-heavy aspects of multiplayer gaming (cheating, grief play, and responsible participation) may be understood as social dilemmas.

Cheating as a social dilemma

Many online gamers go to great length to tip the scales in their favour. As one design manual dryly puts it: “It may seem weird that a significant portion of the player base is willing to do anything to win, but that’s the reality of the situation” (Mulligan and Patrovsky 2003). When such activities take place outside the original game rules or outside the generally accepted implicit rules of a game, it would fall under most dictionary definitions of cheating. The cheater herself, of course, might not always share our opinion. Or she might consider herself a cheater while not agreeing that such behaviour is morally reproachable. She is, she might argue, merely playing a different game than the rest. No matter what she thinks, however, cheating is often reported as a problem by players and developers..

Accounts of cheating in games almost always invoke the eloquent example of Blizzard’s Diablo (Blizzard Entertainment, 1996), among the first truly successful commercial online games. It is generally acknowledged that the gaming experience was seriously affected by the amount of cheating apparent among many participants. In a somewhat informal survey conducted by the gamer magazine Games Domain (Greenhill 1997), 35% of the Diablo-playing respondents confessed to having cheated in the game (n=594). More interesting, however, were the answers to the question of whether a hypothetical cheat and hack free gaming environment would have increased or decreased the game’s longevity and playability. Here, 89% of the professed cheaters stated that they would have preferred not being able to cheat. This response distribution clearly tells of a social dilemma. Arguably, the players queried are tempted to cheat but understanding that this temptation applies to other players as well, would prefer that no-one (including themselves) have full autonomy.

More formally, each individual realizes that mutual honesty is the most rewarding strategy one can hope for (in an ideal world, of course, each individual would be the only one cheating) and express their wish for structural circumstances that support this choice of strategy. The existence of cheaters sparking a desire for structural changes can be witnessed on many game forums. In a thread on an Age of Kings (AoK) discussion board[4], for instance, a resurgence of cheating inspired a victim to urgently contact the game developers to have them put a stop to the undesired activities through technical means. Many sympathised. One player supported the original poster by declaring that “it’s scum like them that make the Zone [where AoK players go for online play] a miserable place to be. Hacks can be used to give yourself inordinate ratings… This makes me feel like hitting someone.” Apart from the request for a technical fix, two other solutions were suggested. One was to write down the names of cheaters to avoid facing them again and to warn others of their low moral fibre. The other was to play people who are clan members or only play against friends. In other words: Do not interact with strangers unless they have institutional backing (a third party vouches for them).

We must acknowledge, however, that cheating is anything but an unambiguous term. First of all cheating comes in different forms. The easiest form to categorize is cheating that works on the code level. When a code-savvy player modifies a client application against the explicit rules of an end-user-licence-agreement or other document his behaviour is somewhat comparable to a chess player moving his pieces into a more favourable position while the opponent is distracted. This is a violation of the original game rules.

Other forms of in-game activities invite more discussion as to their classification. A player may discover an aspect of the game which, although unplanned for by the developers, grants him an advantage. If non-destructive to the gameplay experience such features are often considered signs of sophisticated game design in single-player games. In multiplayer games, however, such creativity is sometimes labelled “exploits” and often considered unfortunate if not downright punishable[5]. An exploit then is an activity aimed at intentionally achieving an advantage afforded but not intended by the game design. Notably, though, the player is working within the framework of the game code and arguably cannot always determine if a certain phenomenon is intended or not. This ambiguity is obvious from many virtual world discussion boards as well as from official administrator statements. For instance, the official Star Wars Galaxies Knowledge Base states:

“A Good General rule of thumb is: If you are doing something that gives you an uneven advantage over a MOB a player or the game system. You are most likely exploiting.

Knowingly exploiting is a serious offence and can cause disciplinary action to be taken against your account up to and including banning.” (Sony 2004)

Clearly, this leaves room for interpretation. Arguably, a sensible combat tactic is to attempt to gain any and all advantage over MOBs or other players (and it is hard to imagine an ‘even’ advantage). And the word “knowingly” obviously leaves even more room for discussion[6]. Since exploits are game mechanics unintended by the designers the verdict of “exploitation” requires an impressive act of two-way mind-reading. The player must somehow guess what the designers indented and the administrators must decide if the player acted “knowingly”.

While less than clear-cut which actions should be categorized as cheating we can understand the heart of the problem. Cheaters, by unbalancing the game, may ruin games based on competition (but not for players who do not engage in competition, of course). Thus, the collective good in question is the even battlefield and the social dilemma builds on the temptation to cheat. We should note however, that cheating is often not a “pure” social dilemma, since the case where “everybody does it” might just lead to an alternative game (i.e. one that is still even). Often though, it will destroy much of the game’s appeal, particularly if the game relies on carefully balanced units and game terrains such as many real-time-strategy games.

Grief play as a social dilemma

In the physical world some types of behaviour are considered deviant and destructive to a community. Smoking in meeting rooms would often fall into this category, as would damaging the environment, be it by littering in city streets or dumping chemical waste on playgrounds. Such behaviour may not always be technically illegal but would nevertheless often lead to sanctions by other community members. Of course, such sanctions are not necessarily just by any external ethical standard. For instance a community might react repressively towards someone expressing an opinion which runs contrary to some conventional wisdom (e.g. Galileo advocating a heliocentric cosmology in a highly religious environment). Thus, we should not accept any community verdict as inherently “good”, but neither should we ignore that some types of behaviour can be destructive to a community or a collective resource.

Deviant behaviour in multi-player games is often referred to as “grief play” (Foo and Koivisto 2004; Foo 2004). Definitions vary, but usually grief play refers to behaviour which is intentionally harmful to others without resulting in direct personal gain for the “griefer” or which seriously (and with intent) violates an implicit community rule. Thus, killing an armed player character in combat is not usually considered grief play (since the killer is working within the game to maximize his score) whereas the case of a high-level warrior preying on inexperienced newbies would qualify (as this usually does not increase the high-level character’s score). An example of an implicit rule violation is the phenomenon known as kill-stealing. Here, a player will make others expose themselves to danger and hardship by taking on a monster (for instance) and then – just before the monster perishes – jump into the fray and “steal the kill” by dealing the final blow thus getting experience points or other rewards. This example highlights a long-standing ambiguity of MMORPGs. For while the player group whose efforts were taken advantage of may well feel cheated, the kill stealer could make the case that his behaviour was perfectly consistent with his character’s background and motives. Thus, he could argue that playing an explicitly evil thief, he (the player) cannot be blamed for acting immorally in the game world. Such arguments reveal a conflict between player attitudes and usually result in agreements (or compromises) that the player character can or should be punished, as opposed to the player.

Grief play exists in other genres as well. Many shooters, for instance, have been plagued by team killers, players who do not play the “official” game but rather see it as their goal to eliminate their team mates. For players looking for a competitive game based on skill, such behaviour is clearly destructive. However, since the game admin is typically involved in the game himself, team killers are usually given short shrift. Also, team killing in shooters is far more manageable on the code level than many types of MMORPG grief play, and shooter players can choose game settings that suit them the best (for instance they can disable the possibility of shooting one’s allies)[7].

Grief play can be seen as non-cooperative behaviour. The collective good in question is the enjoyable game environment and the social dilemma rests on the temptation to not spend the effort needed to maintain the value of the game. Again we see that if all caved in to the temptation the collective resource would not necessarily be destroyed. There would be no kills to steal however, and if all chose to be team-killers a Counter-Strike battle might have all the attraction of a soccer match were players did their best to place the ball in their own goal and did not care for the score assigned by the official game rules (which could be entertaining but which tellingly hasn’t emerged as a popular pastime).

Irresponsible participation as a social dilemma

Different game genres are affected by different social issues. A special problem is shared by games in which actually playing involves a large time investment and where one player’s behaviour directly affects everyone else. Both are true for real-time-strategy games. Let us return, then, to the case of Age of Kings. Imagine that you have an important appointment later but would like to play one game first. Your appointment starts in 90 minutes and you know that a game usually takes anywhere from 30 to 90 minutes, sometimes more. If you choose to participate knowing that in case the game drags on you will be forced to quit at a certain point you’re arguably exposing allies and opponents to an unpleasant experience. Particularly if a game is evenly matched (and thus interesting) one player quitting will tip the balance rendering the game more or less inconsequential.

Or imagine a somewhat different situation. After 30 minutes of playing you throw most of your resources into a bold strategy to eliminate your opponent. He repels your attack. You estimate that you are now in a somewhat weaker position than your enemy. The situation isn’t hopeless but chances are that somewhere down the line you will pay for your failed strategy. You resign.

In an important sense there is nothing immoral about resigning. It corresponds to knocking over your king in chess. The winner of the Age of Kings battle, however, is likely to consider it a cowardly move tied to your desire to control the game (if you can’t have it exactly your way, you’re not even going to play anymore). Age of Kings players look for competition and are often looking forward to the actual battle phase of the game rather than taking pleasure in the careful construction of their nation. To many players, then, you have just violated the implicit rules of the game [8].

In both cases you are not cooperating to make the game entertaining and pleasant for all involved. The temptation here is towards personal gratification or mere selfishness, which runs counter to the interest of the other players. The collective good is again an enjoyable gaming environment and here it is clear that if all chose to ignore the norms for responsible participation the value of the game would be greatly diminished.

Solutions to collective action problems

In the previous section I have outlined three social dilemmas which affect multiplayer gaming. The motivation was two-fold: To argue that multiplayer gaming, with certain qualifications, is comparable to real-life social interaction and to enable the problems identified to be framed as social dilemmas which have been studied explicitly for decades and less formally for millennia.
In the following I will discuss the solutions developed in the literature on cooperation to social dilemmas. Subsequently I will discuss these solutions as they apply to games.

How could the commons be saved? Was there any way to counter the alleged tendency for collective goods to invite tragedy? Although rarely formalized with the rigor displayed by Olson, we are in fact now touching upon a core concern of centuries of political theory. This should not surprise us, since after all, one rather notable solution to this problem is the state itself. The state (or government) solution has been advocated by those convinced that a powerful neutral party was a requirement for constructive social relations (e.g. Hobbes 1997 org. pub. 1651). This neutral party, the state, would eliminate the temptation to exploit the contributions of others by means of surveillance and punishment. Those who felt disinclined to contribute freely (say, by paying taxes) would simply be threatened to do so. And those who did not wish to contribute unless everybody else did, could now rest assured that no-one (or very few) could unjustly enjoy the fruit of the labour of the righteous. Hardin himself sympathised enthusiastically with this approach.

Another influential solution to the larger problem of social order has followed the thinking of Adam Smith, arguing that given certain conditions the market (mainly through surplus value derived from specialization) could govern itself. In a capitalist system, even the selfish contribute to the general wellbeing since, as the famous example goes, the baker (wanting nothing but your money) will produce bread the purchase of which will serve your own interests. This solution, however, is not directly compatible with the special circumstances surrounding collective goods. Here, as we have seen thanks to Olson, individual rationality may run counter to the greater good. In this tradition the solution to the problem of collective action is rather radical: Abolish the tragedy-inviting commons by privatizing collective goods such as roads, fisheries or even the environment. In the case of Hardin’s commons a private owner would have no incentive to over-graze and in case others could make more efficient use of the land, the owner could merely rent or sell. The market, the theory goes, creates incentives for the maintenance and construction of privately owned goods compatible with the interests of the larger public (the slogan being ‘Everybody’s property is nobody’s property’).

Finally, what might arguably constitute a third way has been proposed[9]. Political scientist Elinor Ostrom notes how many observers describing collective action problems wish “to invoke an image of helpless individuals caught in an inexorable process of destroying their own resources” thus ignoring the possibility of “an adequately specified theory of collective action whereby a group of principals can organize themselves voluntarily to retain the residuals of their own efforts” (Ostrom 1990). In other words, under certain conditions, people are able to govern themselves. Scholars who have taken the time to study real-world communities have found that even the much-feared-for fishing grounds can be managed in such ways as can common farming or lumber grounds. Ostrom and others have identified a number of criteria that are usually fulfilled in communities able to arrive at durable solutions. Of these a certain degree of permanence, the possibilities of monitoring the actions of other community members and the prospect of future interaction stand out as essential.

Studies of the self-organization of natural resource management are informative. However, as we are concerned with games, let us briefly examine a few more closely related phenomena as way of examples.

Imagine, first, a hypothetical website offering tools for trading objects between users. A would-be buyer is merely put into contact with a would-be seller and the website provides nothing more in terms of features. Potential buyers asked to pay before receiving their goods might not feel totally secure. The same goes for sellers asked to send their goods in advance. It is telling at least that the world’s most successful trading website www.ebay.com, offers significantly more than our hypothetical example. Ebay makes use of a reputation management system, allowing traders to rate each other in the wake of each interaction (e.g. Resnick and Zeckhauser 2001). Ratings and reviews are attached to user profiles to be browsed by future would-be interactors. This radically changes the dyadic relationship between buyer and seller as both can consider the other person’s history of honesty (or dishonesty) and are able to affect that person’s future potential within the system. In our first example, each person is likely to feel insecure as there is a temptation for the other party to cheat. Not so on eBay (which also has other measures to the same effect). Thus, to the extent that the system works as intended, eBay users effectively govern themselves.

This is not too dissimilar from the social life of www.slashdot.org. On this largely user-organized news and community site, users contribute news and comments to the news items. Others are then able to rate other people’s contributions and the average rating determines the prominence of the post and affects the “karma” of the poster through what one commentator has called “a pricing system for online civics” (Johnson 2001). The result is a self-governing system in which community-destructive behaviour is strikingly difficult and where the tasks of central management are quite modest.

Now, neither eBay nor Slashdot are user-generated systems at their structural level. Thus, they are not cases of individuals coming together to settle upon the very core rules of communal existence. But when comparing to the “natural” communities surveyed by Ostrom this is not so much a difference as a question of the level of analysis. Even the most self-organizing real-life community does not control the ground rules of gravity, visibility of nearby space or the sound-carrying capacity of air so any assembly of people will be working within a structure which is not for them to decide upon or radically change.

Features facilitating the emergence of swift trust (Meyerson, Weick, and Kramer 1996) such as the ones described here can clearly be remarkably conducive to constructive social interaction in systems otherwise vulnerable to free rider problems. In the following, I describe solutions to social dilemmas as they apply to games.

excerpts from “Tragedies of the ludic commons – understanding cooperation in multiplayer games” by Jonas Heide Smith