Her parents found out, freaked, and pulled her from the game.

Designers should be more careful with mixing metaphors with game mechanics.

Sometimes marriage is JUST a quest…

Cameron mentioned that there is a wide gap of maturity between the two age groups.

Not always.

I know 11-year-olds that have been literally and honestly mistaken for 20 years old or older. In fact, there was one 16-year-old I knew on an MMO who was going to a kid for advice on her own virtual relationship. The 16-year-old though the kid, a 10-year-old, was at least thirty.

The thing about MMOs is that you can never tell how old the person you’re talking to is. Children, especially mature children who want to be aged based on their maturity, don’t tend to tell people their ages. In response to “How old are you?” questions, people, both adults and kids, say things like, “Old enough to play this game.”, “I’d rather not say.”, “I don’t know you well enough to tell you my IRL age.”, or “Why do you ask?” Sometimes, children simply ignore these questions as well.

Cyboring should be outlawed. It is disgusting and entirely wrong. Children shouldn’t be exposed to this or read this mess enough to know “how to do it.” But I think a virtual marriage between a mature adult that agrees that cyboring is wrong and an exceptionally mature child over the age of 10 is not entirely wrong. Sure, it’s wrong if the adult starts to be suggestive and the child takes the hint, but if it is an innocent virtual marriage I see nothing wrong. Of course, these exceptionally mature child would be responsible enough to go to their parents and calmly ask and explain. They would request their parents permission first. And that is where the parent could say, “No way.” if he or she wished.

But the children we need to worry about are the ones that are not exceptionally mature, see nothing wrong with cyboring, and don’t ask their parents before a virtual marriage. Other than those types of kids, a virtual marriage can be an enriching virtual exprience as long as the child and the adult/other child know to keep this whole relationship virtual and completely separate from an IRL thing. That way, the adult or the child doesn’t end up falling in love IG and IRL.

Just my two cents. =)

Of course, the issue then isn’t marriage at all… it’s that you have 11 year olds and 40 year olds in the same game space, which is unavoidable and undesirable for many games. Segregating players by age is difficult and adds an additional level of complexity to registration, and it’s built on the assumption that parents know what their kids are their using credit cards for, anyway. When I was in high school my mom paid for my Ultima Online account, but at that time she had very little concept of what an MMO was and just knew that she was paying $12/month for a game I wanted to play.

So ultimately, I agree with Adele. This is an issue of parental involvement and responsibility. It’s our duty as parents to at least familiarize ourselves with our children’s interests so we can make informed decisions about what’s in their best interest, and then apply appropriate controls.