Survive and Thrive in eRepublik, Psychogeography

Day 1,670, 06:44 • Published in USA USA • by Silas Soule




The Merry Wanderer



How to Survive and Thrive in eRepublik, Psychogeography and You
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by Phoenix Quinn, a random guy who likes to wander around aimlessly sometimes.


Hi! Today's topic is psychogeography. Mastering this skill will make you a happier, wiser player.



Yes, hello! Please come in. Welcome to eRepublik and to the SFP Academy! Relax. Take your shoes off. Set a spell. Those of you who already have your shoes off, why not put on some nice comfy slippers?





Which reminds me. I once had a pair of super-comfy Marvin the Martian slippers, but my crazy dog Zack went bonkers and bit Marvin's head off.



My slippers before they got mauled

Poor Marvin.




Anyway, where was I? Oh, right...


Today's lecture is the third, and no doubt most marvelous, installment of an intermittent series on "How to Survive and Thrive in eRepublik". The topic for today is Psychogeography. I know, I know. There is no official psychogeography module in eRepublik. Nevertheless, understanding how to "walk the walk", literally, is a key part of finding enjoyment and keeping your sanity intact while playing this goofy game.

In short, it is quite useful to be mindful of this little-discussed part of the game a bit as you embark upon your eRep journey.



Since the eRep wiki seems to lack a page on psychogeography, I suppose some definitions are in order.



A (more or less) scientific definition of psychogeography is:

"The study of the precise laws and specific effects of the geographical environment, consciously organized or not, on the emotions and behavior of individuals"


A slightly more fun definition:

"A whole toy box full of playful, inventive strategies for exploring cities...just about anything that takes pedestrians off their predictable paths and jolts them into a new awareness of the urban landscape"


We are talking about eRepublik, so just substitute "the game world" for "cities" and "the urban landscape" and I think you'll get the idea.



An appreciation for the practice of psychogeography will bring a spritz of enjoyment into your multi-clicking lifestyle. It will add a bounce to your e-step and bring a sparkle to your e-eye. Naturally a proper balance needs to be sought after, as our friend Sluggo discovered...



...else too much wandering about might leave you dizzy and confused. That's pretty much my natural state, so it doesn't bother me in the least. But I've been told it can be disconcerting to some folks.





OK. So here's a few notes on how to be an e-psychogeographer...


1. There are no rules you must follow as you explore the psychogeography of eRepublik.


For example, getting off the beaten path might take the form of:

* a kind of spirit walk or astral projection, which is to say pursuing a mystical inner journey or meditation in which you imagine what e-life is like for other players in other locales, or

* a walkabout, where you seek to find the song-lines of your e-ancestors by tracing their steps through the e-world, or

* some kind of random/brownian motion, where you just see where your e-nose takes you, or

* a systematic exploration of the flora and fauna of eRepublik, like your very own Voyage of the Beagle, or

* it might even embody a specific pattern of wandering, intended to inscribe a particular "message in movement" upon the e-world, something like this one that the rebellious students in Montreal delivered to the police not too long ago:





The key to all of this, from a game mechanics perspective, are those buttons that take you where you have not gone before. These include:

* The location (change) buttons.

* The country selections on your news feed.

* The list of parties, especially the one that shows up during election cycles and reveals all the parties, not just the Top Ten.

* The "discussion area" button located on the Party pages.






These "wanderlust" buttons provide different ways to wander, to get delightfully lost, to get outside of your comfort zone, to see what is going on in places beyond the reflexive walls of your imagining.

I also recommend being pretty liberal with the friend request button. The more friends you have, the more shouts you'll see. The more shouts you see, the more likely you are to get links to fun/interesting articles, ideas, notes, comments, jokes and so on and so forth. Don't feel like you can only "friend" people who agree with you, or who belong to your "circle", or who speak your native language. This isn't frigging Google-Plus-Republik.

eRep makes it easy to connect to player-personalities from all over the world. They are part of the psycho-geographical landscape as much as newspaper articles and so forth.

So Live a little. Spread your wings. I think you'll find that there are creative, fun, interesting, as well as just plain weird and strange people (my favorite!), in every e-country. Drink it all in. Get drunk on it (metaphorically speaking, I mean). You will be richer for it.



The unbearable lightness of being vague


Exploring the psychogeography of eRepublik isn't only about enjoyment in the sense of discoveries like: "Ha-ha, that Serb is one funny dude." or "Jeepers, Brazilians are hawt!" or "Frick, so it turns out that Americans aren't all asshats." No, there is a more serious side to wandering as well, which has two main aspects to it:

1. Training yourself in the important art of letting go. This has to do with learning how to not be stuck in negative emotions like resentment, anger, an overblown sense of self-importance and so forth. It's a good thing to use the game to hone this skill, which will be invaluable to you when exploring other worlds as well.

2. And the opposite side of that coin: becoming an astute observer of how the domination of psychogeographical variations influences people's behaviors and language. By gaining knowledge of and calculating the possibilities for psychogeographical variation, we learn about the human, as well as the e-human, condition.






I was going to go on to talk (at great length, of course!) about how bringing a great warrior spirit along with you while wandering about will make your explorations of the psychogeography of eRepublik even more valuable. But I am working on checking my impulse to write enormously long articles, so I will just end with the following pointers...

As you wander:

* Be generous. This means being both open-minded and kind when visiting an unfamiliar place.

* Be patient. Sure, using google translator isn't always 100% perfection, but it does allow to breathe in some air that you might not otherwise be able to.

* Be persistent. Don't get disappointed if you step on a few smelly e-turds during your walkabout. Just clean off your slippers and keep walking. You'll find the gems too.

* Be lively. Don't just drift around like a hungry ghost. Make friends along the way.

* Be contemplative. It is not necessary to react to everything. Take it in. Let it simmer. Compare and contrast. Build up a new global architecture of eRep in your mind.

* Strive for wisdom. That's the real goal.




That's it. Thanks very much for paying attention. You've been a great audience!










Please feel free to record your thoughts about e-psychogeography in the handy comments section below.



XXX,
PQ