Robot Chickens and Zombie Deedlitt

Deedlitt has arrived at the Ogre Camp! The half orc presiding over it looks like serious business too. O_o

The Ogre Camp

Good thing I'm there to do some work for them then. My first order of business was to track down a lost robotic chicken homing beacon for a goblin who was using it for research on some Yetis. Yep, the story is as absurd as it sounds. Why a robotic chicken as a homing beacon you ask? Because why not? Derp.

The Robot Chicken

Moving along, my next objective was to test another goofy device that shrinks larger beasts so that they can be placed into a container. Interestingly while doing this quest my client bugged while I was trying to loot a corpse and Udderwin used the device on it at the same time. The animation got stuck and Deedlitt now looked like a zombie running around the jungle.

Deedlitt need brainnnsssss...

It turns out that other ogre clans don't like the fact that some chose to align themselves with the Horde, so our next task was to teach the Gordunni Clan a lesson.

Ogre Slaying

Our final quest for the day took us back up toward the northern end of Feralas where another Yeti cave was hidden in the mountains. It was in someone's interest that we collect some hides of these Yetis for them. While on the way there, we got a good laugh when Udderwin jumped off a steep waterfall and died, failing to land in deep enough water in the pool below by only inches.

Trekking Down the Waterfall

Before logging off, I decided to mention to my guild that I was actually playing this game for a class project. The general reaction was that they thought it was pretty awesome. Other friends of mine that I have told about it have remarked that it seems silly and absurd. Not unexpected reactions given the nature of the project.

Speaking with Rehab

So the big question this week is how closely does behavior in World of Warcraft correspond to that in real life? Well, as mentioned before, it can differ greatly from real life due to a number of factors. First is the anonymity provided by the online environment, which tends to make people less inclined to care about being courteous to each other whereas they otherwise would make more of an effort in real life. Second, you have the gameplay environment that's based around a medieval fantasy universe, so you're dealing with a lot of problems and challenges that are of a completely different nature than in real life. Most people in the real world aren't concerned with working together to collect swords and armor pieces for themselves. On the other hand, there are aspects which very much relate to real life behaviors. The auction house economy for example functions and fluctuates much like real world economies do. Supply and demand will significantly affect pricing. If an item is very abundant, its pricing decreases; if it is scarce then its pricing increases. Also, the cooperative aspects of WoW's gameplay to some extent offset the social problems created from anonymity. Because certain items and objectives can only be obtained through cooperating with other players, there are advantages and incentives to making friendships as you would in real life.

That is it for my gameplay recap and analysis this week. Stick around for my final week of WoW blogging! That's right folks, the project is almost over already. See you next time. ;)