An MMO, or a massively multiplayer online game is a video game that is conducted in a multiplayer setting and is capable of successfully supporting a large number of users for playing simultaneously. An element of MMO is that they are played over a regulated network, such as the World Wide Web. A massively multiplayer online setting usually has one world that is persistent, however, it is also important to note that some games differ. Such games can usually be found for the majority of platforms that are network-capable. Such platforms include video game consoles, personal computers and mobile devices/smartphones.
MMO games usually give players the capabilities of competing and cooperating with one another on a large scale in which there are often meaningful interactions with people from all around the world. They will usually include a variety of game playing setting types, each of which usually represent many different genres of video games.
After doing a quick keyword search, you will find that the most popular type of massively multiplayer online gaming realm is the role-playing type, also known as the MMORPG. It originally descended from university mainframe computer MUD and games that are in the genre of adventures. The MMORPG type games usually predate the Internet and commercial gaming industry. There are other persistent worlds and different elements of massively multiplayer online games that are still utilized today.
The very first graphical MMORPG and a milestone in the first creation of the specific genre was the multiplayer combat simulation of flight games. Such interactive games enable player(s) to experience the mechanics of combat simulations in a virtual type of realm. In the late 1980s and earlier years of the 1990s, commercial MMORPGs gained recognition and acceptance. The genre was initially pioneered by a series called GEnie and was the first game that included graphics, which made its debut in the year of 1991.
As the developers of video games applied the massively multiplayer online game ideas to other video and computer game genres, newer acronyms began to develop. MMO is an acronym that became recognized as a generic term to classify this specific evolving class of games.
Within the majority of today’s developed MMO games, there are virtual currencies in which players have the opportunities of earning and accumulating money. The specific uses for such virtual currencies are certainly numerous and happen to vary from one game to another. The economies within a virtual realm that were developed within MMO games have often blurred the lines that lie between the virtual and real worlds. The results are often seen as unwanted interactions between virtual and real economies by the users and providers of the virtual realms in the gaming platforms.
Economy interaction is a practice occurs often in this specific genre of games. There is an importance of having virtual economies that work within the MMOG and continue to increase throughout their developments. MMOG is a gaming platform that has changed the way people view playing games in an online setting at a drastic rate. Till date, the most popular MMORPG games in 2017 and 2018 are undeniably World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy 14 and Guild Wars 2. Not only has the genre seen a vast array of development throughout the years, there is still a great amount of potential for future instances of growth.