Asheron’s Call

By PETER ELEY

The seemingly mild-mannered senior executive of a major international company was telling me that in another life he was a renowned axe warrior.

But then that's the nature of Asheron's Call, a subscription-only online game that creates a virtual world run from a bank of servers somewhere in Seattle.

The joke is that in cyberspace no one knows you're a dog. In Asheron's Call, no one knows that this bloodthirsty warrior is Ross Peat, New Zealand marketing manager for Microsoft.

The game runs from Micro-soft's Game Zone, so you could expect Peat to be enthusiastic. But when he lets on that his sons Nick, 15, and Julian, 13, also have online alter egos in the game, you suspect that this enthusiasm is based on more than corporate loyalty.

A little sheepishly Peat tells me that Nick is his patron, or overlord, in the game. Julian is getting good, too, Dad says with a hint of pride. And Mum? She's the one who tells us when we've been playing for too long.

Asheron's Call is one of the killer online games, up there with Electronic Arts' Ultima Online, a similar role-playing fantasy epic.

Like the idea or not, living an alternative fantasy life in cyberspace is becoming increasingly popular, and a big moneyspinner for software companies.

At any one time, about 20,000 are logged on to the Asheron's Call servers. Even more play Ultima Online, which has been going for longer.

Both games cost about $20 a month, on top of the $80 to buy the software.

That may seem expensive, but these games can go on forever. And Peat says that as long as the revenue comes in, Microsoft will refine and upgrade the gameplay.

But running an online world isn't easy. One location became so popular that it threatened to overload the server.

Microsoft's solution was to blow it up, killing its inhabitants in the process.

The chatrooms ran hot for a while after that, says Peat.

And a recent bug created a valuable artefact — a platinum scarab at random.

Players lucky enough to find one suddenly found themselves enormously rich and it created a huge inflation problem.

Microsoft had to roll the entire game back for 24 hours, effectively stopping online time, and restart the game with the bug fixed.

Acquiring wealth and managing it play a big part in the game but some people can't be bothered to do it the hard way, and try to buy other players' artefacts and attributes with real dollars.

A quick browse through eBay.com found more than 780 Asheron's Call items and 1700 Ultima Online items for sale, ranging from a couple of US dollars for small artefacts to several thousands for advanced cyber personas.

E-mail: peter_eley@nzherald.co.nz