Up-coming MMORPG Based on Shakespeare's Works 100
Linnen writes "Edward Castronova has received a MacArthur Foundation grant to build a MMOG based on Shakespeare's plays." "Castronova said 'Arden' will launch — it's unclear when, as the game is still in the early design stage — built around the theme of 'Richard III.' That's because the play, set during the War of the Roses, offers historical context, as well as enough political intrigue, secret conniving, deal-making and war to delight any gamer, he said. 'It's a historical Shakespeare play, so that means it's really easy for us to take all the sort of fantasy stuff like knights in shining armor and peasants and woodworkers...and we can just really fit right into 'Richard III' right away.'"
Re:The grind's the thing. (Score:4, Interesting)
That english poets have had such crap to work wth and made such beauty is incredible, it's like you give some guy a shotgun and he carves the statue david.
The only good thing about this might be... (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Shak-who? (Score:2, Interesting)
I consider myself a moderately well read person, and I have read a lot of the classics. I've read a fair big of Shakespeare, and some of his stuff is good, a lot of it is crap. Even the best of it though is often melodramatic and basically reminds me of soap operas. Most of all, a lot of shakespears work, to me, just seems to be sub par when compared to Dante, Homer, or many other classic writers.
That, in and of itself, wouldn't really be bad. People have different tastes and I'm perfectly willing to say "oh, so and so likes shakespear better, but I like dante better" - but people have come up with this thing where Shakespeare is basically defined as the end-all-be-all poet and playwrite. The problem with this is that a lot of people are first exposed to the classics via shakespear, and are lead to beleive that all of the classics of literature are like shakespear and so they never try to read anything else.
I know that personally I was 20 before I ever went to see a play outside of what we shown in middle and high school, simply because all evidence that I had pointed to the fact that they were all shakespearian.
And the works of shakespeare themselves might appeal to more people if someone did a decent modern-english translation of them. In school everyone is exposed to the english of his era, and it is utterly incomprehencable to most people- adding to the layer of contempt for shakespear and most things that are not innately shakespearian- but which people are lead to beleive are (e.g. all plays, classic literature, and poetry).
Basically, I would say that William Shakespear - or at least zealots who preach in his name - have caused more damage to literacy and culture that most people ever realize.
Re:The grind's the thing. (Score:2, Interesting)
Times scenes are played.... (Score:3, Interesting)
Macbeth's sollique = 1 time (your college professor likely had an account).
Out out damm spot = 10000 (Lady macbeth in a slip?)
The problem I forsee is while Shakesphere is a bit baudy, and very clever, he's a writer. His characters move a lot and act out scenes. Will we be watching plays? Will we be part of the excellent fight scenes? or will everything be fighting?
I forsee this having problems but if it's faithful it could be fun... if it's free