MMORPG Used to Model Real World Disease

Oxygen99 writes "The Times is reporting on a paper by researchers in the US who argue that the spread of 'corrupted blood' in World of Warcraft might provide clues to the way a real world population would cope with the prospect of a global pandemic. In the study, to be published in The Lancet next month, Professor Lofgren of Rutgers University and Professor Fefferman of Tufts University, suggest that: 'If, God forbid, a disease broke out in London, you could see what would happen if people were told immediately of the risk. Would there be panic and chaos, or would it allow them to psychologically accept the danger and act accordingly? What would happen if we made people feel too reassured? These are all things that have a great impact on the number of people who would be affected. They are also things we just don't know, so [virtual games] could be of great value in helping us understand what their true emotional responses would be.'"

Comments

I remember that

[Pojut]

I remember when that shit was going on in WoW...it was insane people were dropping like flies. Very much like the scene in 28 weeks later when everyone is locked in a room and they are slowly overtaken by infection.

You could literally stand on top of the bank in Org and watch the disease spread. It was actually a bit terrifying.

Re:I remember that

[Puff of Logic]

You could literally stand on top of the bank in Org and watch the disease spread. It was actually a bit terrifying. Indeed. It occurs to me that perhaps Blizzard might take what was essentially an oversight and turn it into a world event. A properly designed disease, spread at a reasonable rate and requiring a cure that would confer immunity after that, might be an interesting community event. A slow, constant loss of hp when online might result in healers becoming almost doctors while other classes searched for a cure. Bandages, alchemy, herbs, and so on could have a role to play. Obviously some deeper thought would be required on this, but I thought it an interesting idea.

cheers.

Re:I remember that

[mewsenews]

I love this idea if it could be worked out. My first character was a priest because I wanted to be one of the characters restoring order to the world. There were only two quests I recall that really gave the impression you were helping put things back together:

1) Priest epic staff quest -- involves healing dozens of NPCs while defending them from harm
2) First Aid artisan quest -- involves performing triage on injured NPCs

It seems like 99% of the other quests in the game involve destroying things.

Not quite the same...

[sabt-pestnu]

The MMORG A Tale In The Desert also had a disease event. Due to game mechanics, there were a few differences.
In WoW...

• The WoW disease killed. WoW has an "easy resurrection" system, so it didn't cost players more than a few minutes of inconvenience.
• The cause was immediately known, and the cure (death) while inconvenient, was also immediately known
• Detecting a carrier was easy.
• Being cured of the disease (dying) took little play time.

In ATITD...

• The disease debilitated, eventually forcing a disconnect for a period of time (a coma, as it were).
• The cause had to be discovered by the player community. And even after theories were proven, there were still some cases that could not easily be explained.
• Much like real life, carriers often didn't know they had it until signs manifested... too late for those around them
• Discovering a cure was a separate (community) event, requiring much player time and involvement. Actually getting cured took a non-trivial amount of time and resources on the part of the "sick" player. ... and the character could get reinfected a short period after taking the cure. (A permanent cure was eventually discovered, which took MORE resources...)

Also unlike WoW, ATITD is very much a social game. Introduce, then, something that produces highly negative consequences to social interaction, and you get ... a lot of people leaving a game that is no longer fun.

On the other hand, I expect the reactions by the people who didn't leave were perhaps even closer to those in the real world than in WoW, because of its social aspects.

And for those of you who haven't heard of the game before, I should point out that the nature of the game (no combat) and the social ecology tends to select for cooperative behavior. ... and long attention spans...