Gameplay Magazine - Featured Personality: HEM

Forum |Dispatch

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Featured Personality: HEM

Our guest today is the formidable, HEM who founded one of the longest running UCR regions Europeia. I first met HEM in a region we are no longer part of and was a bit scared of him then. Since then I think of HEM as a player to go to when needing perspective on a particular issue and particularly admin related issues.

How did you learn about NationStates? How long have you been playing NS?

I’ve been playing Nationstates since July 2007. I was trying to find more real time strategy games in the mold of Age of Empires and kept googling like, “games where you control a country”. Nationstates kept popping up and I ignored it for a while because it wasn’t really what I was looking for, but then I took the plunge.

What is the significance or story behind your nation's name and flag?

My nation’s flag has (usually) just been Europeia’s flag, which was made by Tweedy in 2007. My nation’s name was only significant in that I founded Europeia as “HEM” which was an abbreviation of my original Nationstates nation and name “the Holy Ekaj Monarchy.”

Tell us about your early career in NationStates and the significant things you did to lead you to where you are today?

I did nothing significant!!

I was a serial regional founder, but also loved the thrill of politics in highly active, and political regions that were around in 2006 and 2007. In parallel to running “The League of Dictatorships” (wayyy before they were associated with facist ilk) I built careers in Empires of Earth and The Land of Kings and Emperors. The LKE of the day is really where I took inspiration for what I wanted my next region to be after the League of Dictatorships fell into inactivity, and I founded Europeia as a constitutional monarchy in March 2007.

Europeia remained my side project to rising political in the LKE where I was eventually elected Prime Minister. My premiership was a train wreck and I fell from grace in the region, ultimately embittering me and leading to more focus on Europeia

What region are you currently a part of? What do you like best about this region?

I’m still in Europeia over twelve years later! I like that it’s my thing that I created, but it’s not at all under my control anymore. I wish I had the column inches to just share the history of Europeia with your readers, but they’d probably get bored so quick.

Needless to say, I set the foundation for something and put the energy into it to grow, but now it’s its own thing. At the end of the day, there are probably players who had a greater impact than I ever did. That’s cool, and shows what a community project can really become.

You've founded a region, some would say one of the longest running active UCRs in NS. At one point Euro had considerable power in the GCR sphere as well. How did the idea of Europeia begin and what it did it take for you to develop it? What should newer players, trying to found their own regions, do to ensure some level of success for their region?

I mean, I'd push back against the idea that Europeia still doesn't have considerable power. But power has evolved into something different than it was in say, 2012-2015. In a world where gameplay was dominated by writing the most persuasive megaposts, arguing big ideology issues, forging coalitions with really tangible goals, that was an environment Europeia's strengths really shone. Today we still see those things sometimes, but now we have social currency and personal relationships carrying more weight.

That being said, some growing pains we experienced in 2018 definitely caused us to face more inward for a while as we figured out a political structure that would set us up for success. Today though, we're getting 50+ votes in elections with some of our tightest citizenship requirements of all time, and can rally 20+ military pilers within 24 hours. I think in many ways we are more sustainable than we were in 2017-2018 where it was obvious the game was changing and we weren't quite changing with it.

I haven't been politically active\aware for some time now so I might not just be seeing it. I'm thinking when I entered the game in 2013, Europeia was a clear force of power and was everywhere which has changed considerably since then.

I've made the comparison to some that maybe the Europeia of a few years ago was the Roman Empire, and maybe the Europeia today is more like the Byzantine Empire. Still one of the bigger kids on the block, but in a political environment that is much more complicated with a lot of different actors — many of them not playing the game or gauging success the same way we would traditionally.

What are your thoughts on the various gameplay venues (forums, Discord, gameside\RMB)?

Oh god, I’m the LAST person you want to ask this question to.

Listen, I am very nostalgic for the days before Discord but...in reality, everything is different and everything is the same. Through the game’s history we’ve always cycled through different tools that enrich the experience here and increase communications. Always. Remember when regional website were big? Or regional wikipedias? Probably not, but they were!

I do think Discord makes it easier to not have forums, and as time goes on I really see the true value of “threaded” environments over instant chat both in participating in a political process, but also in reducing toxicity and moderating off-site areas. I have real concerns about regions that are essentially institutionalized social cliches that make it extremely hard to tell where politics ends and harassment begins. It’s a huge moderation problem.

That being said, Discord more accurately represents how people communicate outside of NS, making integration easier and allowing our ancient game to amble on despite the actual in-game product not evolving that much.

I thought this point was interesting, "I have real concerns about regions that are essentially institutionalized social cliches that make it extremely hard to tell where politics ends and harassment begins. It’s a huge moderation problem." There are several regions this could apply to in different ways. How can you more clearly delineate IC and OOC - would that help in some way? Is it possible to even have a handbook or manual or etiquette guide that helps people play the game (a political game that reflect much of real world politics in good and bad ways). Currently, I feel the game has been neutered to a point where it is really impossible to play competitively anymore. This also, at least from my pov, has led to inactivity, the rise of the below average and players trying to find something to do and struggling. Your thoughts on the current state of NS?

I don't fully know. Forums aren't quite in vogue anymore, which I think is part of the problem. Non-threaded environments are a lot easier to quietly blend OOC/IC, whereas in a thread it's much more clear if someone is like changing the topic to make a personal attack or whatever.

Communities are slowly responding to it, The Nationstates Gameplay Discord now has an IC-only area as an experiment, which is essentially a no RL area. I think that's a good idea.

As to its effects on the game, yeah I think it's lead to a very weird paralysis. Good people don't want to "attack" anyone, out of fear that it's abuse. I know as an admin, I've had to deal with reports of abuse that were really textbook gameplay. But it's hard because a lot of times as a player, the feeling can be the same as someone saying you are a shi**y Cabinet official, as to saying you're ugly IRL. So it's not easy to decipher internally and have that self-awareness of what should stay in the game and what is moving into RL abuse. It's a lot easier when you're playing games not based on politics (i.e. interactions of people)

But there is a clear difference between saying, "You're a shi**y cabinet official" as compared to "You're ugly IRL." One is clearly IC and one is clearly OOC (although in itself not "abuse" as the word is defined in most contexts). It seems to me that players are using the former to deal with possibly real life mental health issues they have about the latter and that is not what NS, or any game is a space for. No one on NS is a licensed therapist or functioning as a psychologist. People who are having mental health issues should be finding specialists\free help lines to help them not actually foisting their problems on people trying to play a game. We're usually playing a game to destress or enjoy and someone being selfish and cruel enough to try to use their mental health to harm other people's space for enjoyment is truly a level of narcissistic that I can't comprehend. That's a kind of ugliness in the game now that is hard to actually play around.

Some of the bad mentality that forces players to feel paralyzed would pretty much end gaming, sports and anything competitive since all games have some of this aspect of interactions. Taken to it's extreme, it leads down this road of "If you win, that's causing me mental anguish so you should be punished for winning or not allowed to win." Which is to say I've heard people use that kind of logic to justify some bizarre garbage thinking in this game. I've heard people talk about toxic positivity and it feels like some sick appropriation of that with Harrison Bergeron vibes. It's not just on NS, it's on other social media spheres as well.

What has been your favorite historical moment in NS?

Ugh, too many to share, and many would be very Europeia-centric. But a few that come to mind…

2006 - the “Great War” or “World War” between a group of invader-aligned UCRs and the RLA & others. Honestly, this might be the closest I’ve ever seen to “raider unity” or anything resembling a governing alliance between invader regions.

If you were Max Barry for a day, what would you do?

Factions, baby!

What do you do for fun when you're not on Nation States?

Uh. Sit by the pool, going to the beach, sleep. To be honest, Nationstates has been my default hobby for over a decade, which is probably why I’ve found it so hard to leave...

The West Wing is an American political TV series that looked at the behind-the-scenes lives of the president and his staff. Interestingly, the West Wing of the White House houses the Presidential offices including the Oval Office, the Cabinet Room, the Situation Room, and the Roosevelt Room.

The West Wing, definitely.

Favorite book(s)?

Oh god, I don’t read books nearly as much as I used to or should. I loved all the Star Wars Expanded Universe books (now defunct), the Harry Potter series (un-controversial opinion), and the Inheritance Cycle books (controversial opinion).

Favorite music?

Today’s top pop + movie soundtracks

What is a game (outside of NS) that everyone should play?

None. We need to all focus on this game only!

Uh, I don’t play new games. I’m still playing the original Rome Total War.
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So you wake up one morning and receive the delegacy of any region you choose. Which would you choose? And what would you do as delegate?

Definitely a feeder right? I mean, it’s hard to not want to declare yourself God-Emperor and rule with an iron fist, but how much staying power does that have? And isn’t it kinda overdone at this point?

I once burned through a lot of different feeders, particularly The North Pacific, with this idea that feeders would be better if they had delegates “for life” who essentially acted as a founder but ceded most practical power to an elected government. Essentially re-creating UCR dynamics in the feeders. So that’s definitely what I would’ve done eight or nine years ago, now I’m not too sure how well suited that model would be. I also feel like my reputation has been built on “being a good guy” these days, which makes the whole “bow before me” evil regime thing hard to pull off.

What is one change you would make to NationStates to help improve the game experience?

As above, definitely factions.

Even though this whole controversy has calmed over recent months, I also think having an in-game staff that is more actively involved in punishing offsite offenders would make the game more safe. We do seem to be in a lull where nothing insane has been uncovered recently (as far as I know) but this is a flame I’ll never let completely die out.

Thanks to HEM for the interview!