Wikipedia is a sequel to the game Nupedia, an encyclopedia-themed MMORPG in a hack and slash and "article roaming" style. It was released for the World Wide Web by the Wikimedia Foundation in 2001, and was developed by the community.

This is a humorous essay. It contains the advice or opinions of one or more Wikipedia contributors and is made to be humorous. This page is not one of Wikipedia's policies or guidelines, as it has not been thoroughly vetted by the community. Some essays represent widespread norms; others only represent minority viewpoints. This essay isn't meant to be taken seriously.

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This page contains material that is kept because it is considered humorous. Such material is not meant to be taken seriously.

This page in a nutshell: One theory that explains the addictive nature of Wikipedia and its tendency to produce Wikipediholics is that Wikipedia is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). The following article explains how Wikipedia shares many characteristics with MMORPGs.

Quick Facts Developer(s), Designer(s) ...

Wikipedia
Developer(s)	Wikimedia Foundation, you,
Designer(s)	Jimbo Wales, Larry Sanger, Hatsune Miku, Steve Jobs, Dan Houser, John Smith, Jonathan Huang, Paul Allen, Stephen Colbert, John Seigenthaler, Mr. Burns, ClueBot NG, Donald Trump, India "Willie" Bush, Spongebob, Elmo, Santa Claus, George W. Bush.
Series	Wikimedia
Engine	MediaWiki
Platform(s)	World Wide Web
Release	WW: January 15, 2001[1]
Genre(s)	Fantasy, MMORPG
Mode(s)	Multiplayer, online

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Wikipedia has an immersive gameworld with 47,267,320 players and 6,813,580 unique locations, including 59,251 undiscovered secret areas, 39,527 fully excavated dungeons, and 6,473 legendary dungeons. Magical items and powers can be found scattered over these locations, whose navigation is aided by maps of the game world. Some of these locations, as well as items and powers, become problematic and unbalance the game world. Players will generally dislike these, and Game Masters respond by removing them or, if they are heretical, by vaporizing them.

The in-game universe can take several years to explore completely, with several regions to explore. Dungeons within the game vary greatly in size. Some are so large that they can take hours to explore, whereas some are so small that players can see the entire dungeon at a glance.

Players can accumulate experience points (EXP), allowing them to advance to higher levels and climb up the ranking ladder. Some players focus too much on increasing EXP and, despite their extremely high levels, they are not valued in the community. A special fairy always tracks EXP. Players develop a unique distribution of statistics, and can choose between a number of classes, such as Gunner, Spy, Wizard, Sorcerer, Archer, and Priest, or can choose to be multiple classes at once. Players can choose from one of several races, such as gnomes, ogres, dragons and imps. Other players can forgo choosing a race, and may instead be just a regular person. In some cases, a player may choose to play with excessive summons, or play with multiple warriors at the same time. This provides an additional challenge, because they must avoid being caught by Bounty Hunters, who are tasked with rooting them out and destroying them. The in-game currency (WikiMoney) has largely fallen out of use, and most players prefer to accumulate collectables given by others, including stars, question marks, green medals, and even legendary bronze stars. Players can take on quests, fight boss battles, enter player versus player battle arenas, and even take class change trials to become Game Masters. It is also possible to stumble upon random encounters that allow for fights with vicious monsters.

Non-player characters (often abbreviated as "NPCs"), or minions, can also be found in the game. Wikipedia differs from other MMORPGs in that ordinary players may design their own NPCs, and submit them to be approved for inclusion in the game world. NPCs can be seen throughout the game world, doing tasks such as slaying monsters, cleaning up taverns, and other helpful tasks.

After acquiring ten EXP in four days, gamers gain additional powers, such as the ability to change the names of caves, bypass weaker magic chains, and import art into the game world. After acquiring 500 EXP in 30 days, gamers unlock the ability to bypass boosted chains and undergo trials to become Game Masters.

Every unique location in the gameworld has a tavern where players have the opportunity to interact with any other player in real time. Players often become friends with other players, and some have even arranged to meet offline. Players may even build their own houses with furniture and receive messages from other players. On the darker side, some players become addicted, unable to leave the game, and spend all their waking hours on the site. It is often the most experienced players who end up spending the most amount of time in the gameworld.

Players with similar ideals will group together to form guilds, and raids may form to tackle exceptionally difficult quests and adventures.

People tend to play a given MMORPG for six to eighteen months at a high level of involvement; a similar pattern has been noted in hardcore Wikipedia players.

Trolls are one of the most common enemies in the gameworld, and often turn up in skirmishes. Orcs, the natural enemies of the Trolls, fight their enemies using methods which are equally unethical or destructive (such as baiting).

Weapons such as swords are used normally, but handguns and heavy artillery can be used to defeat an undefeatable enemy. Many players also carry a shield to help protect dungeons they are guarding. Often, players will monitor dungeons that they are (or have been) involved with special cameras, which are connected to a private area which belongs to that player and that only they can access.

Weapons can be used for purposes other than fighting enemies, but breaking the three hit rule may result in an Ice Block.

Barbarian-fighting is a common form of combat that has many similarities to a variation of spawn kill.

Illegitimate battle strategies are abundant. Malicious and sneaky Trolls like to use excessive summons and minions to trick Game Masters.

There are also enemies such as WikiPorcupines, which shoot Toxic Spikes from their heads and gang up against players. There are a similar species called WikiHedgehogs, but instead act as Trolls' pets. They are very blamey about newer players entering their territory.

Players can also attempt to destroy, mangle or disrupt parts of the game world. Player-killing is strongly discouraged, but nevertheless happens. New players are most vulnerable. Game Masters attempt to control disruption by placing offending players in ice blocks, freeze locks, or obliterating them using the ban hammer. Troublemakers may occasionally be brought before the Super Game Masters, who have the final say in dealing with them.

Some Wikipedia players who successfully complete a class change trial manage to become Game Masters, a secretive clan^[2] whose members have access to additional spells and items such as:

• Cave-in – a powerful spell which causes a dungeon's walls to collapse, making it inaccessible to all but the most experienced adventurers (Game Masters and Bounty Hunters).
  • Mining Toolkit – a number of mining tools such as a mining helmet and wooden support beams which enable Game Masters to explore collapsed dungeons and re-open them to others if they want.
  • Nuke – explodes to collapse all dungeons of a player.
• Ice Block – encases another player or minion in a block of ice, preventing them from moving for a certain length of time (or forever!). A similar version is the Freeze Lock, which locks gates or entire borders of gates from acting as entrances into the game. Whether the frozen player can speak or use hand gestures or not is up to the Game Master in either case. Any gate next to a player in an ice block automatically freeze locks.
  • Thaw – thaws a frozen player or minion out. A similar item is the reusable Sandwich-warming glove, which is a wearable item that allows Game Masters and players permitted by Game Masters to enter through any gate, whether frozen or not.
• Magic Chains – seals the entrance to a dungeon with magical chains which can only be bypassed with special items or sufficient EXP and hours spent in-game.
  • Magic chains can come in many types, as shown here:
    • Golden chains can only be bypassed by other Game Masters.
      • Red chains are placed on by the game engine itself, and cannot be bypassed by even Game Masters. However, some special items are able to bypass these, though they are far and few.
      • Similarly, Black chains are used by only Team WMF, in order to block entry to dungeons with highly dangerous traps along with a few other things.
      • Turquoise chains are special, very long versions of golden chains that extend to neighboring dungeons.
    • Pink chains can only be bypassed by Game Masters or those with the Power Pass item. It is almost exclusively used to prevent upgrading certain powers.
    • Silver chains are weak chains meant to block new players from entering difficult dungeons too quickly.
    • Sky blue chains are special chains that block bad dungeons from ever being constructed.
    • Green chains prevent access to the core of the dungeon.
    • Purple chains prevent the upgrading of items.
    • White chains are the weakest of the magic chains. New players have to get the approval of Spies in order to get into these dungeons.
    • Blue chains are upgraded versions of silver chains. They are used for preventing entry to dungeons by players that may be more experienced, but still quite new to the game. It was first used in order to enforce decisions made by the Super Game Masters, and is now additionally used to combat actions performed by deceptive minions summoned by certain players.
  • Skeleton Key – a magical key given to all Game Masters which can remove any magical chains around a dungeon entrance for that player.
• Cloak of Silence – quietens a player's footsteps, enabling them to avoid patrols. A more powerful version of the Boots of Stealth, which can be worn by most players.
• Rapid-Fire – can massively subdue multiple attacks at once. Rapid-Fire can be used by normal players by becoming Gunners, but only with the permission of Game Masters.
• Teleport – can create an inter-dimensional portal that can summon a large number of dungeons.
  • Greater Teleport – Select mages with an advanced study of portals can summon dungeons from anywhere, even outside the known universe.
• Brick dissolving: Only Game Masters may use a brick dissolver, which allows bricks in a dungeon wall to be dissolved. A dissolved brick is nothing but a clear space that still supports the bricks above it, and can be only viewed by Game Masters, Arch Mages, or miners. Whether the signature or even the name of the player who made the brick gets dissolved or not can be decided by the Game Master. The solvent is 69M per-unobtanic acid.
  • Brick crystallizer: A Game Master can also choose to re-crystallize a brick that has been dissolved, turning it back into a normally-functional brick.

There exist several classes of users which have even greater powers and spells than already mentioned.

Outside the culture that the community has made, Wikipedia's development, update pathway, etc. is run by a team of staff members, developers, and the like. Their accounts are easily identifiable thanks to the (WMF) tag appended to them. While it is possible to contact a specific staff member directly using their in-game accounts, this is very unlikely and you will have more options for reaching out using either the community contact page or by following the instructions on contacting Team WMF.

There are multiple branches of Team WMF that contribute in some way to Wikipedia, such as developers that code and release new updates, quality assurance that makes sure that Wikipedia works as smooth as possible, etc. They may sometimes offer to hire as well.

• Users wishing to declare that they believe Wikipedia is an MMORPG may use User:GKFX/Userboxes/WP-MMO.
• Dissent: Wikipedia:Wikipedia is not a video game