Richard Bartle (2003). Designing Virtual Worlds. Indianapolis: New Riders Publishers
Richard Bartle é um veterano dos mundos virtuais, envolvido no campo desde as primeiras experiências com MUDs – ambientes de chat e aventura baseadas em texto. Neste livro, apresenta uma estratégia de criação de mundos virtuais que envolve a definição de um tema (analisando a recorrência de temas de FC e Fantasia nestes espaços), implementação de uma infraestrutura, escolha de audiência alvo e cuidados de design, interactividade e manutenção/criação de regras sociais virtuais.
Termina o livro com observações sobre o potencial artístico dos mundos virtuais – como ambientes 3D que requerem conceptualização, criação de modelos, ambientes, narrativas.
Citações:
Virtual worlds are implemented by a computer (or network of computers) that simulates an environment. Some—but not all—the entities in this environment act under the direct control of individual people. Because several such people can affect the same environment simultaneously, the world is said to be shared or multi-user. The environment continues to exist and develop internally (at least to some degree) even when there are no people interacting with it; this means it is persistent. (p:14)
It is important to note that virtual worlds are not the same as virtual reality (VR), which has a much more specific meaning. Virtual reality is primarily concerned with the mechanisms by which human beings can interact with computer simulations; it is
not especially bothered by the nature of the simulations themselves. People who visit virtual worlds may some day benefit from research into visors, data gloves, and beyond, but the fundamental attraction for them is what awaits when they enter a virtual world, not the means by which they do so. (p:14)
Creating virtual environments is in itself a fun activity. (p:54)
Computer games and education have an uneasy relationship. Computer games are fun, education isn't. Educationalists figure that by marrying the two, education can be made fun; unfortunately, all too often computer games are made unfun instead. It is this precedent that puts off many game-style virtual world designers from looking at educationalist virtual worlds. This is something of a shame, because there is a lot of very interesting work going on in the area. (p:330)
