Icarus Studios News

Do you ever feel like you’re being watched? Well, that’s because you are. (Especially when you’re in an MMOG or Virtual World.) But don’t worry; it’s actually a good thing. And, in my own meandering, stream-of-conscious way, I’ll eventually explain why.

Once a game world has been created, populated with creatures, modified with structures of civilization, and embellished with interactive objects and special effects, the only thing left for a game designer to do is monitor the people who visit their creation—ah yes, that creation born of blood, sweat, tears, bribes of chocolate, and sacrifices to the server gods. At Icarus, we monitor our virtual venues with the help of a tool called System Watcher.

System Watcher enables visual monitoring of in-world traffic and provides a wide variety of services, such as marketing research. Real-time graphs with user-defined alert thresholds can quickly point out any suspicious activities among players. Run-time information can be edited on the fly, allowing for quick, in-world responses to any unwanted situations. This ensures that our online games remain fair, friendly, and free of griefers (players who harass other players).* So, the first and foremost priority of something like System Watcher is to provide a stable and secure environment for user-generated content, in-world social activities, and machine configuration support. Think of it like a constant, invisible EKG—we get twenty-four-seven, instant feedback, so any glitches in the game world can be fixed as soon as possible, which will prevent hardcore gamers from having unnecessary heart attacks.

The second reason a tool like System Watcher exists is to offer sponsors of virtual properties various opportunities for diverse revenue models and in-world marketing endeavors. In plain English, if we designed a world for Company X, and every so often there would be a banner or streaming video or gaming object inserted into the world that advertized Company X’s products, we could track the number of hits and purchases those virtual products generated (or even ask players to take a quick survey about them); then we can tell Company X what was popular among the masses and what tanked spectacularly. This way, Company X can test-drive its products in a secure platform before spending lots of time and money getting actual products on the physical market.

But that’s not all. System Watcher allows for really detailed and multilayered data mining. Data mining provides real-time access to players’ demographics and behavioral choices. Searches based on profile information—like players’ ages, music preferences, genders, or even actions within a game (such as the use of instant messages or what’s popular among their virtual purchases)—can then generate in-depth surveys about the online community’s operation. Not only is this a marketing dream for companies eager to have their own virtual space, but the data collected from programs like System Watcher will ultimately help to shape the future trends in gaming and collect and verify hard-facts so desperately needed by those who wish to publish analyses of the online gaming industry. In short, Big Brother is watching, but only to protect players and provide professionals with a deeper understanding of what players really want.

* I want points for my subtle and fantastic use of alliteration in the previous sentence, folks.

-Kara Stambach, Virtual Worlds Team