In the youth of online gaming there were limited options, inadvertently creating rich and diverse communities. Not only did we explore these virtual worlds and the creativity of their designers, but we could explore the interesting personalities that inhabited them. However, as more options presented themselves, gamers gravitated towards specialised titles, segregating the market and the diversity was eventually lost.

Virtual worlds tend to rely on diversity. They are made up of many roles working together to acquire common goals. In the canonical example roles are divided by combat, crafting, and gathering; and then further into sub-categories. Each role attracting specific personalities. The user experience for these games, which had to accommodate each of these roles, became complex, unintuitive and overwhelming for new gamers.

As time passed games were streamlined to appeal to a specific audience, increasing user enjoyment and consequently sales. However this was at the cost of the diversity that enriched them in the first place, and their dynamic beauty faded.

We can reunite gamers without abandoning the wisdom acquired over the last two decades. We can do this by continuing our process of creating specialized games that can be aimed at specific audiences, but uniting them behind the scenes. Allowing a son to build a city--a city that is fed by the crops farmed by his father--whose farm is protected by the warriors trained by the boy’s mother. Each of them playing in separate games tailored to them. This allows various tailored experiences to unite, sharing experiences and returning diversity to an increasingly sterile social space.