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IP: Markoff is God (or maybe Will Wright is)
From: Dave Farber <farber () cis upenn edu>
Date: Thu, 27 Apr 2000 06:53:19 -0400
Date: Wed, 26 Apr 2000 21:53:38 -0700 From: Rob Glaser <robg () real com> Subject: Markoff is God (or maybe Will Wright is) What a cool story. http://www.nytimes.com/library/tech/00/04/circuits/articles/27sims.html ----- Something Is Killing the Sims, and It's No Accident A Game Designer Secretly Releases a Virus That Plays Havoc With His Own Game, for Fun By JOHN MARKOFF Imagine a computer game in which you follow all the rules, but your characters still die, because someone has introduced a virus into the game. Not only that, but the person who invented the game is the one who is distributing the virus. Exactly that is happening with Sims, the most recent creation of Will Wright, the Sim City game designer. When Sims was introduced earlier this year it immediately became a best seller. Mr. Wright's earlier games had focused on planning cities and then watching them come to life -- and frequently run amok. Sims operates on another scale. It zooms in on the people, allowing players to create individual characters, build families, furnish their homes and watch over a dollhouselike suburban world on a PC. Only this time Mr. Wright, who co-founded the design company Maxis, secretly decided to push the interactivity and realism of the game one step further. Soon after the game was released, the Sims Web site began offering components intended to enhance the homes of Sims. Party balloons, plants, a pet guinea pig, a moose head to hang on the wall, a cuckoo clock, wall lights and slot machines could all be added to the game. <snip>
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- IP: Markoff is God (or maybe Will Wright is) Dave Farber (Apr 27)