I was basically still a kid when I first started playing MMOs, and my first, of course, was the wild west of the newly launched Ultima Online. Completely new to multiplayer games, I rolled up my first character with the fun-sounding tailoring and musicianship skills (no other bard skills — just musicianship, a passive skill that did nothing alone). Clueless, I made money selling dyeing services to equally clueless newbies and wandering the roads picking up left-behind bags to sell for gold.
But what I remember most from those first few days was standing by the East Britain bank watching what I thought were elite mage characters repeatedly summoning ham, eating it, and then summoning more ham, over and over again as they worked on their skills. One of them explained to me that really good mages could cast recall on marked runes and make them disappear. That was the moment I decided I didn’t want to be a hopeless bag lady in this weirdo game. I wanted to be a powerful mage and summon ham and make runes disappear. And that’s exactly what I did.
Looking back now, I realize what a total noob I was; it’s a miracle I survived and eventually thrived in that game all those years ago. But that moment of wonder as I watched those dudes cast In Mani Ylem and eat their sweet, sweet ham repeatedly has stuck with me. I want to hang onto that memory, to remember that I was once an innocent noob, that there are innocent noobs logging into this genre every day, and that something I do might inadvertently influence their gameplay forever. What I’m saying is that ham is serious business.
What’s your most memorable noob moment from the early days of your MMO career?
Every morning, the Massively Overpowered writers team up with mascot Mo to ask MMORPG players pointed questions about the massively multiplayer online roleplaying genre. Grab a mug of your preferred beverage and take a stab at answering the question posed in today’s Daily Grind!
