Bourgeoisie

From Johnwiki

Bourgeoisie is a massively-multiplayer game in which players own businesses, compete for resources, and exploit workers for their own benefits.

Contents 1 Concepts 1.1 Property 1.2 Buildings 1.3 Travel 1.4 Businesses 1.4.1 Operations 1.4.2 Management 1.5 Skills 1.6 Workers 1.7 Consumers 1.8 Taxes 1.9 Contracts 1.10 Laws 1.10.1 Privatization 1.11 Government 2 Implementation Ideas 2.1 Google Maps API 2.2 Alerts

Concepts

A player may leverage his capital (wealth and property) to hire workers and pursue greater capital. The fundamental unit of property is a building, which a player is limited in producing. A player may also own resource-producing land such as a forest, oil field, or farm. Manifest in buildings are businesses, which a player may create freely. A player may either own a business in whole or share the proceeds and mangement responsibilties of a business with other players. A business is characterized by its workers, and its actions are limited by the skillset of its workers. A business generates revenue by selling products or services to consumers and other players. The actions of a business and its workers are monitored closely by law enforcement for tax evasion and lesser crimes.

Property

Properties are tracts of land sold to a player by the state or another player. A property may be combined with adjacent properties, or split into smaller lots to be sold individually. Natural resources occuring on or under the property belong to the owner.

Buildings

A player may build on any property he owns or has permission to build on. The state may also erect buildings. Only players who employ workers skilled in architecture and construction may physically erect buildings, and these services may be contracted by other players or the state. The speed at which a building is constructed is related to the total skill of the workers on the job and the supply of resources, which must be traded for or gathered. Depending on local statutes, law enforcement may collect taxes on the construction itself (i.e., a construction permit), in addition to the monetary transaction between a construction firm and a business owner.

A building has immutable properties such as location and square footage (relevant in subletting space to other businesses) and mutable properties like safety features.

As a building ages, it must be maintained, lest it degrade and eventually collapse.

Travel

Consumers traveling between buildings are limited by the distance, available transportation, and their natural ability. For short distances, the penalty of travel is neglible, whereas long distances require specialized transportation with varying costs. The cost of travel has a significant effect on a worker's efficacy and a consumer's behavior.

Businesses

Businesses are owned and operated by a player or set of players. Through a business, a player controls a set of workers and wields their skills as his own. The research arm of a business may generate trade secrets and patents which magnify the inherent skills of its workers. Secrets are vulnerable to espionage, while patent violations are subject to lawsuits. Both may be sold.

Operations

As a business owner, a player is responsible for directing the company's goals (in terms of product development), budget, and prices. The budget may be allocated to several areas of the business:

• Production
• Management
• Research
• Security
• Dubious Pursuits: bribery, espionage, sabotage.

Day-to-day operations such as hiring, purchasing, and selling may be automated or manually controlled.

Management

The skill level of a company's managers affects the overall efficiency of the company's operations. Managers may be allocated at a budget-area level or company-wide level.

Skills

Skills are abilities held by workers, and unless they can be abstracted (hah!) they will have to be static. Workers may be imbued with skills through job training, formal education, or by default.

Example skills and the abilities thereof.

• Construction: build houses.
• Farming: produce food for consumers.
• Logging: produce lumber for consturction.
• Software Engineering: write computer games for consumers.
• Pharmacology: produce medicinal and recreational drugs for consumers.
• Intimidation: extort protection fees from business.
• Corporate Espionage: steal trade secrets from other players.

Workers

The workers are the subset of consumers with skills. Only workers can be employed by businesses. They choose where they want to work, which is affected by such things as available transportation and wages. If their employer angers them, they will band together and demand better wages and working conditions.

Consumers

The consumers are the skilled workers and unskilled citizens. They like buying stuff and learning new skills, and in the absence of entertainment they will resort to drug addiction in order to occupy their minds keep their bank accounts from getting too large. Sometimes they get hurt at work or from excessive addiction and they (or their employer) have to purchase private healthcare. Sometimes they commit horrible, inhuman crimes and have to be locked up in state-subsidized penal colonies.

Consumers need places to sleep, procreate, raise children, store their cars and coffee tables, and so on, but they will generally live within their means and go where they can live comfortably.

Taxes

All transactions between businesses are taxed, even if the businesses are owned by the same player. Taxes go to pay for lovely things like roads and state-owned, low-rent housing projects. Illegitimate (under the table) transactions, unless accompanied by adequate bribes, will attract the wrath of law enforcement.

Contracts

The legimate business world is driven by the exchange of goods and services between parties. Since it is often the case that a significant risk is associated with an exchange, contracts exist to enforce agreements in exchanges which cannot be immediately executed, as in a transaction. For instance, a player may contract a construction firm to build a corporate headquarters. If the terms of a contract are violated by any party, and no resolution is mutually amicable, law enforcement will intervene and abjudicate a solution in the interest of the general peace.

Laws

The laws exist primarily to balance the power of less scrupulous players against those who would they would otherwise mercilessly victimize. Some laws are fixed, such as taxation enforcement and bribe acceptance, while others are mutable through the process of government, such as workers' and consumers' rights.

Workers and players may perform illegal activities that attract the attention of law enforcement. For instance, a player may own a mafia syndicate that extorts protection monies from the nearby businesses of other players in exchange for not sending soldiers over to permanently silence the other players' workers. This is just business. The victim in this case may either pay the protection or pay the cops to protect him by bribes or pushing through legislation against organized crime. The mafia boss, of course, may also bribe law enforcement to look the other way. This is the mechanism by which illegitimate (under the table) transactions are taxed.

Privatization

There was talk considering privatizing the local police forces, but it was rejected on the grounds of avoiding conflicts of interest and maintaining an ethical standard. While the specific roles of the police still needs to be described, special attention should be payed to ensuring their powers are limited by scarcity.

Government

Decision making process.

Implementation Ideas

Please discuss the feasibility and benefits of these ideas on the talk page.

Google Maps API

Use the Google Maps API to visualize the locations of in-game businesses and buildings. This would require the game's cities to be real cities.

Alerts

Since the game world continues to turn while the player is logged out, it becomes important to alert the player to events that are happening in the game world that affect him or her. Things such as collapsing buildings, strikes, rival players going bankrupt, etc... can be related to an offline player through email, IM, or SMS. Additionally, the game can request offline decisions from players, through these media, such as whether or not to settle a strike. This would make players more immersed in the game throughout their entire day, hopefully making it seem more real to them.