Recently, Verbatim ran a piece by Erin McKean entitled "L33t-sp34k" about the typographical games played with words by hackers, warez d00dz, and other online lowlife although open swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys coders will of course complain that "hacker" should be used in its original sense, meaning a programmer of astounding skill, rather than in the popular, degraded sense of an online vandal.
The piece touched on the language used by online gamers--some of whom, particularly in the world of first-person shooters--adopt hacker terminology. McKean defined fragging killing another player, from Vietnam era soldiers' slang and gib from giblets, the bloody goblets left in the playing field after a player or monster is killed.
But first person shooters FPSes -- games in which the player sees the playing area as his character would see it first person view and plays mainly by shooting weapons at others--have produced rich terminology. To bunny hop is to leap rapidly about the game world to make yourself a more difficult target. A rocket jump is a way of exploiting a swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys of a FPS game's physics model by jumping into the air and detonating explosives on the ground so the blast causes extra lift and lets you jump higher.
Strafing originally mean "moving sideways while firing," the derivation from the military term being clear--but has come to mean moving sideways even when not firing. To telefrag is to kill someone by teleporting into his location, which usually results in mutual death. Once you kill an opponent, you often taunt him--sending a line of text celebrating your victory, although some games allow you to play a sound file on your enemy's machine as another form of taunt.
A low-ping bastard or LPB is a player who has a really fast Internet connection and low "ping" times to the game server, giving him an advantage over better players with slower connections. Contrariwise, a high-ping bastard HPB has such a bad connection that the player is often frozen, offering no help as a teammate and not much challenge as an opponent.
A llama is a player without swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys skill--probably derived from "lamer," itself hacker slang for a swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys hacker who is basically an idiot. A boomstick is a shotgun; a BFG from "big fucking gun" was originally a weapon in Doombut has come to mean any weapon capable of inflicting truly awesome damage.
A bot is an artificial, computer-controlled character resembling a player character, used to make a multiplayer FPS game playable in single swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys mode; it's a shortened form of "robot.
This is a form of cheating, and will get you kicked ejected and banned from the game's server if you're caught. Shooters are not the only game style to produce interesting vocabulary; massively multiplayer online games, like EverQuest and Ultima Online, are another rich source, perhaps because interplayer communication is so important in these games.
A PC or player character is one controlled by a live player, and an NPC non-player character is controlled by the computer. All these terms are borrowed from tabletop roleplaying. Monsters are often called mobs possibly from "mobile object". A train is a whole group of mobs, which together are far more dangerous to PCs than a single mob; when someone nearby yells "Train!
In verb form, to train is to lead a train, that is, flee ahead of it--this is usually due to misfortune, but sometimes a character will seek to lead a train into a group of waiting comrades, as a means of ambushing the mobs.
Thus "That guy is training the skeletons" doesn't mean he's seeking to improve their skills, but instead leading them a merry chase across the landscape. To kite is to train but in a way that makes it unlikely that you will be harmed by the mobs. The idea is that your character has appropriate buffs or skills so that it's trivial for him to get away from the train. Kiting means leading a train, getting a substantial lead, turning to cast spells or use ranged weapons to attack them, then fleeing again before the mobs can close enough to fight you, repeating the process as needed until the train is dead.
A buff is a spell or other game effect that temporarily increases a character's abilities; to debuff is to cast a spell on a character that adversely affects his or her abilities. In an online game roleplaying generally means speaking consistently in character, e. Dost thou address a lady thus? Player 2 is roleplaying; Player 1 is not. Some games have separate gameworlds devoted to roleplayers and to power gamers --those who play primarily to become more powerful in the game world and can't be bothered with such fripperies as pseudo-Elizabethan chat.
Power gamers seek to power level, increase in ability in the game quickly--often with the help of a more powerful character who provides buffs to allow the character to gain experience rapidly.
This practice is called twinking --gaining quickly in power or level in a semi-illegitimate fashion through assistance from a more powerful character. The term is obviously derived from Twinkie, but the association with a sugary snack is not obvious--I surmise that the usage may come from gay slang, in which a "twinkie" is a cute young man with an older lover.
To gain a level in the game--improving your character's ability--is to level up. PKing player killing is killing another player character in a game world--generally this is frowned on, and some games prohibit it.
Some games allow both PvP player versus player gameplay as well as player versus environment play which, curiously, is never abbreviatedmeaning going out and hunting mobs. One way to hunt mobs is to camp their spawn point, the place in the gameworld where a particular type of mob appears from time to time; camping means hanging out near that point and waiting until the mob spawns, then killing it. Camping is viewed as morally dubious, since you're hogging this particular hunting ground; however, turtling just standing around not doing anything carries no negative connotation.
To zone is to move from one area of the game world to another, triggering a big download of gamestate information that will take a while. However, being in the zone is being totally focussed on the game and playing it like a master. Sometimes a player figures out an exploit, a way to use some aspect of the game to produce results the game operators did not expect and don't find appropriate--for instance, an Ultima Online player discovered how to swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys almost unlimited amounts of game money very quickly, causing massive inflation in the game.
Exploiters are banned barred from returning to the game ; the game operators then nerf the game system, preventing others from using the exploit. More generally "to nerf" is to reduce game power; e. To group is to join cooperatively with others for a short period of time "Hey!
If you want to join a more permanent group, you join depending on the theme of the game a guild, clan, or squadron collectively called microcommunities by game developers.
Some clans persist beyond a single game, and will move en masse from one game or server to another. A mule will water ski, meaning it will automatically follow the main character about, like a boat pulling a water skier. A brick is a powerful fighter, usually devoid of magic or other powers.
The implication is that bricks wall off more vulnerable members of a group from dangerous mobs by interposing themselves between swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys two. A newbie or noob or n00b is a new player who's just learning the ropes.
A guide is someone in the game world, usually a volunteer but sometimes employed by the game provider, whose job is to help newbies and resolve problems during play. If the guide can't solve a problem, he kicks it upstairs to a gamemaster, which in a MMORPG is like a guide, but has higher rank and access to software tools that lets him modify the game world--tools sometimes used to produce custom quests or events for players.
Another task for guides and gamemasters is dealing with griefers --people playing only to interfere with the experience of other players. In the case of shooters and massively multiplayer games, the language is the product of gamers, the people who play the games. More generally, game developers and gamers together have developed a varied vocabulary to describe the many different game styles on the market and the way people play them. A gamer is someone for whom games is a primary leisure-time activity.
Gaming is playing a game--and gamers are generally swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys that the gambling industry has absconded with the term and used it as a euphemism for their repulsive exploitation of the statistically challenged.
Gameplay is a nebulous noun that means something like "the feel you get from playing a game. In Germany, that tradition persists; a game designer is a spielautor.
The term videogame originally meant arcade and home console games, excluding computer games many of which, in the early days, were text-only ; it is still sometimes used that way. In the industry, the term is rarely used; people instead distinguish between PC personal computer games and console swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys.
Sometimes, console games are called platformers, but the word is also swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys used to refer specifically to 2D sidescrollers like the old Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog games. A wargame is a game of military conflict.
Because MMORPG is such a mouthful, developers are currently experimenting with alternative formulations-- massively multiplayer game MMG and persistent world being examples--but none have yet achieved widespread usage. The implication swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys "persistent world" is that the gameworld persists even with a player is offline--that's by contrast to games such as Quake or StarCraft that have no persistent, ongoing nature.
The term tabletop RPG is a back-formation to distinguish the earlier, paper, variety from the modern digital variety. Although MMORPGs derive partially from the tabletop variety, they are technically an evolution of MUDs pronounced as you'd expect; it's an acronym for "multi-user dungeon" or "multi-user domain".
The first MUD, MUD 1, was developed by Bartle and Trubshaw at the University of Essex in ; they're text-only multiplayer networked games with roleplaying elements, generally although not always run non-commercially. A plethora of words have been coined to describe computer game categories. An adventure is a game that depends on story-telling and puzzle-solving; the style derives from the academic game Adventure aka Colossal Cavewhich predates the commercial game software industry.
Text adventures have no graphics e. Confusingly, the Game Manufacturers' Association, a collection of small hobby game publishers, collectively refers to its industry, which includes publishers of wargames, RPGs, and collectible card games, as the "adventure gaming" industry--even though their games bear scant resemblance to software adventures. Sim is used in two different senses; there are flight sims or more swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys, vehicle sims in which the player controls a single craft; and there are sims swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys the sense of "simulation," such as SimCity, Roller Coaster Tycoon, and The Sims.
A sneaker is a game like a first-person shooter in which you're encouraged to gain your objectives by stealth rather than combat Thief is the canonical example. A fighter is a game like Soul Calibur in which you control a swordsman, boxer, kung fu fighter, or other combatant in one-on-one combat with a similar opponent. Similarly, a dancer is a game in which the player must manipulate the controls in a set swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys in time to music, frequently but not always controlling an onscreen-character that responds by dancing.
In some arcade versions, the player stands on a pressure-sensitive area, and controls the game by stepping or dancing on different parts of the platform. The Hackers' Dictionary uses the term "dance-o-matic" for dancers, but I've never actually heard anyone use that word in real life. A real-time strategy game or RTS is real-time because it is not turn-based; all players and computer-controlled "AIs" perform actions continually and simultaneously, instead of taking actions one turn at a time, round-robin -style.
Action is swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys word with multiple senses; an action game is a game, generally but not always from a first-person perspective, in which a player controls a single character, and his or her success in the game is based on player skill --the ability to manipulate the interface accurately and precisely--rather than character skill --game abilities gained by the character in the course of play.
Thus, shooters are a subcategory of action games, but the term also encompasses games like Tomb Raider, in which avoiding traps and overcoming physical challenges are more important to gameplay than simple combat. An action-adventure game is like an adventure game in that story and puzzle-solving are important to play, but unlike classic adventures in that they depend on player skill.
Console skill-and-action games are less often first-person in perspective, but always dependent on player skill. Snotty gamers who prefer more cerebral styles of gameplay deride these as twitch games.
A 4X game is a game of space colonization and combat; it stands for eXplore, eXpand, eXploit, and eXterminate. A god game is a game in which the player controls a whole empire or civilization; Civilization is the canonical god game.
In the arcade, a redemption game is a game where play is mainly motivated by the desire to get little paper coupons that can be redeemed at the counter for cheap prizes.
An LBE or location-based entertainment is a large, generally expensive and often multiplayer game, often in an arcade setting but sometimes in a theme park. Miniatures games are played with little metal figures arrayed on a table; collectible card games or CCGs are played with cards, purchased in starter decks and booster packs like baseball cards, swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys a player building a deck from among all the cards he owns before playing with others.
An online game is a game played over a wide-area network--at present, the Internet, but previously, the commercial online services. A massively multiplayer game is online, but one in which swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys or thousands of people play in the same game world this is by contrast to non-massively multiplayer games, involving a handful of players at once.
A persistent world is a massively multiplayer game which is always online and available for play, with characters or game positions retaining their characteristics from one play session to another. Games, according to gamers, almost always either suck or rock; there doesn't seem to be a middle ground. A game that sucks is a coaster --the implicating being that the game is so bad that all the CD is good for is setting your drink down on. A patch is a software update, usually available for free download--gamers don't like them "Man, they patched that game practically before it shipped--it must be swarm bot at maker faire 2008 grammys as hell.
A cheat is a game feature, purposefully built into the game by the game developers, that lets a player gain power or abilities, or unlock special game features. Cheats aren't usually described in the game manual; instead, the publisher usually reveals them in a mildly secretive way mentioning them in an online chat, sayencouraging players to seek out websites that describe the cheats.
Some cheats put the game in god mode, which renders the player invulnerable. Easter eggs are hidden features included by the developers, usually without their boss's knowledge, that don't help players in any particular way, but are sometimes amusing, and sometimes designed to boost the developer's ego.
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