With the advent of MMORPGs, the digital social structure does reflect a real life situation somewhat – especially when it comes to the issue of public health safety. For instance, Star Wars: The Old Republic has introduced an in-game character virus (known as the Rakghoul plague) which easily infects another player, killing your character in the process – albeit in doing so, you do get your fair share of goodies as well in the form of Rakghoul DNA items which are useful if you want to trade them for exclusive lightsaber crystals, companion customizations and even a mini-Rakghoul pet.
With most humans preferring to take the path of least resistance, so too, does this train of thought follow in real life, as instead of actively going out to infect others, groups of players are now huddling together in a bid to get infected, before they are finally blown into smithereens. “Plague parties”, as these are called, is definitely something which the real world can learn from, where reward is great and effort is minimal, there will you find a bunch of similar minded folk hanging out.
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