Adventures in AR: It's About Ethics
In my last post, I mentioned that it was unlikely that ARventure would ever see the light of day. Don't get me wrong, I love working on this project and intend to see it through to completion. I'm definitely looking forward to the testing phase, when I can have some friends try it out. Unfortunately, there are a great many problems that a public release would bring.
The first problem probably goes without saying: I don't have the resources to support this game on any sort of large scale. For server hosting, I will probably simply use Heroku or a similar free service, and you get what you pay for in terms of the volume of traffic it will handle. Granted, server hosting isn't that expensive these days, but I prefer not taking a monetary loss on my little passion projects. If I tried to monetize the game, however, that opens up several new cans of worms, such as advertising, security, and necessitating user accounts held server-side to prevent cheating. All this compounds into a bunch of new development requirements that probably wouldn't be worth the time to implement. I'd rather just keep it free.
Life gets so much more complicated when we jump into the world of liability. Foreseeable issues, such as NPC quest markers on the highway or private property may be preventable, but it becomes a lot more complicated when user-created content comes into play. Pokémon Go has faced more than a few issues for its Gyms and PokéStops (and even Pokémon spawn points). I shudder to think the trouble Niantic could find themselves in if their users could place Lures anywhere, anytime. And once again, dealing with this issue will require more work, and automated systems limiting where players can place quest markers could really stifle creativity. Sure, something like a marker in the middle of a lake may not seem sensible, but it could be along of a local ferry route. And even if I tried to limit where quest markers were allowed to be placed, there's still a good chance something would slip through the cracks. We seem to be in the middle of this wild west situation where people are trying to figure out who they can sue for any inconvenience caused by these newfangled ARG's. I'm not so sure I should put myself into the crosshairs.
Most of the issues with releasing the game come down to money. Either spending money or getting sued. But money isn't the only thing that matters. To me, the greatest concern with this game is more of an ethical issue. While my hope is that people would build cool quests that explore their home turf, there will always be people who want to spoil the fun for everyone else. I'm not even talking about the people who try to lure others into a bad situation. While terrible, that probably still falls under the liability issue. I'm talking about the person who puts a quest marker in front of someone's house and writes mean things about them. At first it might seem like a minor issue, but imagine if it's done to someone who really enjoys the game and then every time they boot up the game at home, that marker is sitting there. That's unacceptable. In an ideal world, quests would be moderated, or at the very least offensive quests could be reported for removal. But by then the damage has been done. Like every other issue, dealing with this one would require a whole lot of work, and it's unrealistic to monitor every quest in the long term.
It probably seems like I'm worrying about a bunch of issues that will never arise. And that's probably true. In all likelihood, even if I released this game, it probably wouldn't be massively popular. I may even be able to handle the game's traffic with a free service. If there isn't a large player base, people probably won't try to use it to set up robberies or whatever. And little Johnny will be able to play without worrying about some bully using the game against him. The problem isn't so much that these issues will happen, it's that they could. So I'd have to prepare for them. The game won't gain much traction if 10 concurrent players halts the server and a single lawsuit would easily halt my game dev career. That's not to mention how disheartening it would be if my game became a bullying/shitpost platform. And so, all in all, I think it's fair to worry about these issues.
The first problem probably goes without saying: I don't have the resources to support this game on any sort of large scale. For server hosting, I will probably simply use Heroku or a similar free service, and you get what you pay for in terms of the volume of traffic it will handle. Granted, server hosting isn't that expensive these days, but I prefer not taking a monetary loss on my little passion projects. If I tried to monetize the game, however, that opens up several new cans of worms, such as advertising, security, and necessitating user accounts held server-side to prevent cheating. All this compounds into a bunch of new development requirements that probably wouldn't be worth the time to implement. I'd rather just keep it free.
Life gets so much more complicated when we jump into the world of liability. Foreseeable issues, such as NPC quest markers on the highway or private property may be preventable, but it becomes a lot more complicated when user-created content comes into play. Pokémon Go has faced more than a few issues for its Gyms and PokéStops (and even Pokémon spawn points). I shudder to think the trouble Niantic could find themselves in if their users could place Lures anywhere, anytime. And once again, dealing with this issue will require more work, and automated systems limiting where players can place quest markers could really stifle creativity. Sure, something like a marker in the middle of a lake may not seem sensible, but it could be along of a local ferry route. And even if I tried to limit where quest markers were allowed to be placed, there's still a good chance something would slip through the cracks. We seem to be in the middle of this wild west situation where people are trying to figure out who they can sue for any inconvenience caused by these newfangled ARG's. I'm not so sure I should put myself into the crosshairs.
Most of the issues with releasing the game come down to money. Either spending money or getting sued. But money isn't the only thing that matters. To me, the greatest concern with this game is more of an ethical issue. While my hope is that people would build cool quests that explore their home turf, there will always be people who want to spoil the fun for everyone else. I'm not even talking about the people who try to lure others into a bad situation. While terrible, that probably still falls under the liability issue. I'm talking about the person who puts a quest marker in front of someone's house and writes mean things about them. At first it might seem like a minor issue, but imagine if it's done to someone who really enjoys the game and then every time they boot up the game at home, that marker is sitting there. That's unacceptable. In an ideal world, quests would be moderated, or at the very least offensive quests could be reported for removal. But by then the damage has been done. Like every other issue, dealing with this one would require a whole lot of work, and it's unrealistic to monitor every quest in the long term.
It probably seems like I'm worrying about a bunch of issues that will never arise. And that's probably true. In all likelihood, even if I released this game, it probably wouldn't be massively popular. I may even be able to handle the game's traffic with a free service. If there isn't a large player base, people probably won't try to use it to set up robberies or whatever. And little Johnny will be able to play without worrying about some bully using the game against him. The problem isn't so much that these issues will happen, it's that they could. So I'd have to prepare for them. The game won't gain much traction if 10 concurrent players halts the server and a single lawsuit would easily halt my game dev career. That's not to mention how disheartening it would be if my game became a bullying/shitpost platform. And so, all in all, I think it's fair to worry about these issues.