Encouraging Desirable Behavior

It is not enough to discourage undesirable behavior ”we would also like to reward players for exceptionally desirable actions. Here are some examples of behaviors we would like to reward:

• Politeness and diplomacy

• Competence and knowledge

• Drama

• Heroism

• Role-playing

One interesting approach to creating an online community is the notion of a "web of trust," which is an automated system that tracks trust relationships between individuals (see www.advogato.org for a robust example). By allowing players and system administrators to assign a level of trust to their relationships (and allowing that trust to be repudiated as a deterrent to bad behavior), not only can abusive or trusted individuals be profiled and identified by the number and strength of such linkages, but also the system offers a holistic deterrent to abusive behavior. In other words, part of the game becomes "about" gaining trust. The social discourse of a game based on trust relationships would most likely revolve around ethics and trust.

Of course, this "web" would be part of the game and conceptualized in game terms. Mapping the concepts of the trust web onto the game milieu is a challenge for the designer.