Gaia Interactive (found at Gaia Online dot Com) is a free online MMORPG/forum that has become increasingly popular since its 2003 début. It is an entity that is difficult to describe as it combines many interests, such as mini games and forum socialization. However, its many layers of entertainment have lead people from across the globe to log on and enjoy a truly unique online experience.

An Overview:

Gaia Interactive is foremost a forum site, encompassing a broad range of topics. Gaia also has its own economy and currency (dubbed Gaian “gold”), and a broad range of mini games. From time to time, usually to mark a holiday, Gaia will hold an “event” during which members of the site can participate and earn gold and items that are unique to that event. Gaia is an anime¹-themed website and has its own unique story line, thus allowing it to call itself an MMORPG².

Creating a Character:

When creating a new user account, the user first makes their own unique “avatar” to represent themselves when using the site. This avatar is an anime-style chibi³ that the user can customize using pre-made hair styles, eye styles, mouth styles, and body styles. The user will choose whether to be represented by a male or female avatar, and thus choose accordingly from the available hair and eye styles. They will also choose a skin tone for their avatar, ranging from a pasty yellow to a very dark brown. Once they have their avatar, they are then given the choice of three starter sets of clothing. Each set contains three outfits, complete with shoes. Finally, they are given 400g⁴ and invited to take a tour of the site. Each new user is also entitled to a house, which will be discussed further in the “Gaia Towns” section of this article.

If the user decides they are unhappy with their eyes or skin tone they have the option of deleting their character and redoing it. This does not remove any of their items from their inventory⁵, nor does it allow them to change their gender or name. If a user wishes to change their gender or username, they may do so from their profile page twice for free, and then on an increasing gold fee scale every time after that (starting at 20,000g for their third change). Users may change their hair style at any time by going into the shops and choosing a new hairstyle, or by deleting their character. There are more hair styles available in the shops than there are when the user creates a character.

Personal Profile:

With their new user account, each user is allowed a personal profile page that they can customize using graphics and themes from Gaia, or by programming their own using CSS coding. Currently, users can have an “Old School” profile or a V2 profile. The main difference between these two templates is the style. The “Old School” profile is a rectangular page aligned to the left with a background image behind it while the V2 profile utilizes frames set against a background image. The profile itself is similar to the MySpace layout. Users have different sections on the page to list out personal information, email address, interests, friends, their item wish list, and so on. Each user’s avatar is shown on their profile and directly underneath this image is a listing of what that user is wearing on their avatar. Also, profiles include a multimedia section (where users can embed videos from sites such as YouTube and Revver), a Journal, and their signature. Signatures must conform to specifications given in the Rules and Guidelines. Signatures are displayed below the last posting a user makes in a thread.

Forums:

Gaia is at its heart a forum-based website. Gaia currently has 27 forums grouped into 6 categories. Many of the forums relate to Gaian topics such as the Gaian economy, the role playing aspect (covered in the Barton Town forum), mini games, towns, mini shops, and Guilds. The following is a complete list of forums broken down by category:

Gaia Online

• Announcements
• Welcome
• General Discussion
• Extended Discussion
• Questions and Assistance
• Site Feedback

Gaia Gaming

• Gaia Gaming Discussion
• Gaia Towns
• Minishops
• The Gaia Exchange

Artist’s Corner

• Art Discussion
• Picture Post
• Writer’s Forum

Gaia Community

• Gaia Community Discussion
• Gaia Commerce
• Barton Town
• Chatterbox
• Registered Guilds
• Guilds

Entertainment

• Entertainment Discussion
• Anime/Manga/Comics
• Gaming Discussion
• Music
• Computers/Technology
• Sports

Misc

• Test Forum
• Memorable Threads

Additionally, each forum contains a plethora of sub forums to cover just about every topic you could think of within a given forum.

Gaia Gold:

Users can earn Gaia gold in a variety of ways. The easiest way is to simply surf the site, post in the forums, and take user-created polls. Users may also earn gold through selling the items in their inventory (such as avatar clothing). Users will not necessarily earn gold every time they post or take a poll, and they will not earn the same amount of gold for each post or poll. It runs on a sliding scale for the most part, with your first post of the day earning you 50g and each subsequent post earning you less and less gold throughout the day.

Items:

There are 12 shops on Gaia in which users can obtain a wide variety of items they can use for their avatars and houses. Types of shops include a hat store, jewelry shop, 5 clothing shops (each boasting a different style of clothing), a housing shop, and a hair salon among others. In the shops, users can also obtain items needed to participate in some mini games (such as fishing equipment and bait, a butterfly net, and a spade) and also trade in game items such as fishing junk and tickets. Items range in price from 1g to over 60,000g, and hair styles range from 250g to over 5,000g. Shop item prices are set by the Administrators.

In addition to store items, there are random event items, monthly collectables, and event items. A random event usually is indicated by a box floating across your computer screen. There are brown boxes (usually higher in supply), blue boxes (mid level supply), pink boxes (lower in supply), brown trunks (higher in supply, containing housing items only), and golden trunks (lower in supply, containing housing items only). There are also pink links, which cause a link on the page the user is looking at to have a pink outline, but when clicked on the user receives gold only and not an item. Users who receive a random event may choose to open the box or not. If they open the box, they do not have a choice of what comes out of it; Gaia gives them a random item. Each box gives the user one of an average of 15 items unique to that box. In other words, Pink Boxes don't give the same type of items that Blue boxes do, and so on. There are numerous items that can come from the boxes. Since these random event items are not available in stores, the prices for them are set on the marketplace by the users themselves. Prices range on these items from lower than 500g for common items to over 500,000g for the really rare items.

Monthly collectables are seen as an investment. They are obtained by giving real money to the site. In years past, they were called “donation items” but the site ran into legal difficulties over this terminology, leading to the change to “monthly collectables.” For every $2.50 American a user gives to the site, they receive a sealed pixilated envelope in their Gaian inventory thanking them for giving the money. Users cannot open the sealed envelope until the 15th of the month, when the collectable items are revealed. There are usually 2 items to choose from, though in recent months there have been two occasions where three items were offered. These items are never released again on the site once they are revealed and are never available in stores. As such, the users set the prices on them in the market place and they can range from 5,000g for an unpopular item to upwards of 50,000,000g for the very first item ever offered on Gaia (a Golden Halo). These items suffer the most from inflation.

When Gaia holds an event (say, for Halloween), the Admins create items that are specific to that event. Users can only obtain them during the event and they are never duplicated or offered again. These function in the economy in much the same way as monthly collectables do, though recently they haven’t seen as much of a price increase as the collectables have. More users participate during events than at any other time during the year and as such there are more event items in the market that users are earning. Higher supplies mean lower prices.

Gaian Economy:

The Administrators of Gaia Online have basically left the economy up to the users themselves. The economy, as with any real-world economy, is based on supply and demand. That is to say, if demand of a certain item goes up the price goes up accordingly. Because of the nature of gold gain on the site, there is a problem with artificial inflation caused by botters. “Botting” is when a script is used to refresh a page many times a second, thus giving the botter more gold than the average user would obtain in the same amount of time. Twice in the site’s history, inflation due to botting has gotten so bad that, even though the Admins usually leave the economy alone, they have instituted roll backs in order to attempt to maintain some control over artificial inflation. During a roll back, Site Admins roll all the information on the servers back to a time before the artificial inflation began (usually between a week and a month), thus returning a sense of balance to the economy. Botting is against TOS and if a user is found to be botting they are banned from the site.

Gaia has a forum dedicated to the buying and selling of Gaian items called the Exchange forum. The exchange forum is used mainly for users to trade items for items or to sell high priced items for a combination of gold and items. Gaia also has its own Market Place which functions in much the same was as EBay. Users, when selling on the marketplace, may set an auction for the item, a buy-only price, or both. Many users choose to set both, setting the “buy now” price at a slightly higher value than the item is actually worth and relying on the auction to make a profit on the sale of the item.

In order to use the exchange and market place, users must purchase a trading pass for 500g and a vending license for 1000g. The trading pass enables you to trade items and gold with other users and the vending license enables you to sell items in the marketplace.

Questing:

Due to the nature of the economy, many new users have a wish list of items that they want but are too expensive to be bought outright. When they decide to really try and save the gold for the item, many users go on what is termed a “quest” for that item. Successful questers will make their own threads as a base for their quest. These threads usually contain information such as the item being quested, a tally showing how much gold they have toward the item and how much more gold they need, a list of other users that have donated gold to them toward the item, and a banner image of some sort that can be used to link to the thread. In order to keep these threads on the first page of a forum, the user will "bump⁶" it; That is, the thread is posted in every minute or so. Bumping is helpful in two ways. First, it gets the user posting which brings up their gold tally. Second, it gets their thread on the first page where it is more likely to be seen by other users who may donate gold to their cause. Because of the advantage to bumping, many questers will run contests to encourage other users to bump their thread.

Questing has also give rise to many charities around the site. These range from charities specifically started to help new users to charities specifically started to help users questing a certain item. Most charities have qualifications the user must meet and an application a user must fill out in order to receive a donation.

Mini Games:

Gaia has a variety of mini games to hold users’ interest. Each mini game can be played by one’s self or with other Gaia users in multiplayer rooms.

Fishing was the first mini game introduced to Gaia. Users can purchase a variety of fishing polls and bait, each with their own strengths and weaknesses, in order to fish in any of three fishing holes located around Gaia. Each fishing hole has its own difficulty level (Bass'ken lake being easiest, Port of Gambino medium difficulty, and Durem Reclamation Facility hardest) and unique fish to catch. There are also rare fish in each lake that are difficult to catch. Different fish come out at different times during the Gaian day, and fish can be traded at The Ole Fishing Hole (the fish shop) for game items such as fish-themed hats. Users can (and will) also catch their fair share of junk such as tin cans, old tires, and old shoes. The junk can also be exchanged for items. There is also a fishing hall of fame which showcases the best fishermen and women on Gaia, and trophies can be won by demonstrating your fishing prowess.

Newer mini games include word bump, black jack, slot machines, and jigsaw. Each of these mini games gives users the opportunity to earn gold and random items. Black Jack and slots are part of the "Gold Mountain Casino" which has its own unique store. When users play the casino games, using "tokens" they purchase with their gold, they receive their winnings in tickets which can then be traded for items in the casino store.

Word bump starts the user off with a block of random letters arranged in three columns with a three-letter word in gold the middle. The user must work the word in gold up to the top of the puzzle. In order to do this, the user must make words using the random letters of at least three characters in length. Every time they make and submit a word, the letters used for that word are taken off the board, thus allowing the gold letters to move up the column. As the user progresses through the levels, the word in gold starts out closer and closer to the bottom of the board, and the game gives you less time to complete the board. In addition to gold and item prizes, users can earn Gaia Bachelors and Masters Credits that can be traded in (currently) for a Gaia Bachelor’s Cap.

Jigsaw is just what it says on the tin...a jigsaw puzzle. Completing more challenging puzzles gives the user the opportunity to win items that can be used in their Gaian home.

World Map:

Gaia online is a world unto itself. Site Admins have divided up the Gaia universe into 7 main areas which are as follows:

• Barton Town
• Bass’ken Lake
• Port De Gambino
• Isle De Gambino
• Durem Reclamation Facility
• Durem
• Aekea

Each area has its own unique stores and traits. For example, Barton Town is a sort-of small and happy town, home to the Barton Boutique (a clothing store), the Guild Commission, The Gaia 9 Action Newsroom (who makes site wide announcements), and Gaia Towns.

In addition to having its own “world,” Gaia also has its own time. Gaia time is not based on any particular real-world time zone. At the time of writing it was 12:25AM GMT and 8:49AM Gaia time, to give an example.

As Gaia is its own little world, the Admins have come up with unique story lines concerning NPCs⁷ such as Johnny K. Gambino (a rich, powerful, and influential Gaian once thought to be dead but now back with a vengeance), the Von Helson sisters (who haven’t been heard from since Johnny K. Gambino destroyed their Mansion), and the shop owners such as Ian (Barton Boutique), Moira (Durem Depot [another clothing store]), and Sasha (Gambino Outfitters [yet another clothing shop]). During Gaian events, the site Admins will sometimes release online Mangas⁸ concerning the current Gaian storyline. During larger holidays like Christmas and Halloween (the two largest event holidays on Gaia), story lines unique to the holiday are usually written and posted/explored before the kick off of the event. This past Halloween for example a strange NPC named Ron Bruise suddenly appeared around the forums about a month or so before the Halloween event. When he posted in the forums or updated his user profile, he left subtle clues about an alien invasion that happened during the event itself.

Towns:

“Gaia towns” is a real time version of Gaia itself. When a user enters towns, they are taken to a landscape where their avatar can walk and talk in real time with other users. You are also able to collect game items such as trash, flowers, and bugs that you can trade in for other items such as ink and hats. This is also where users have their houses.

Houses are obtained by going to the Aekea Housing Commission and choosing a house style. Each user receives a house for free. Upgrades can be bought to make the house bigger for 20,000g. In order to place the house in Towns, the user must buy a plot of “land” at the Aekea Housing Commission. This has caused some minor problems as there aren’t always plots available for the inflow of new users. Houses, once obtained, can then be furnished in a variety of ways by purchasing items from "The Faktori," the housing shop in Aekea.

When using towns, if a user wants to speak to another user, they type what they want to say into a text box and hit enter. The text entered then appears as a speech bubble next to the user’s avatar’s head that other users can see. Therefore, unlike in the forums, users can communicate in real time in much the same way as using an instant messaging system. Users can also choose to use a variety of emoticons that, when clicked on from the emote menu, display as an animated character above the Avatar’s head.

Guilds:

Users that share the same interests (or are really good friends and want somewhere to hang out just among themselves) sometimes choose to start what’s called a Guild. In order to register a Guild, the user must purchase one for 20,000g. Registered Guilds are a large responsibility because they are largely user-moderated. They are loosely monitored by site Moderators so as to make sure they do not violate site TOS but other than that, the users control the Guilds. Guild hierarchy consists of a Captain (the owner of the Guild), a Vice Captain (second in command), and as many crew members (moderators) as the Captain appoints. Registered Guilds have their own homepage, which usually consists of a brief introduction of the Guild, and their own forum and sub forums. They are their own separate entity from the rest of Gaia, to the point that the Guilds system is actually contained on different servers from the rest of the site. Captains and Moderators decide who is allowed to post in the Guilds.

Guilds aren’t always made for specific topics. For example, many poll Guilds exist. Poll Guilds don’t exactly have a specific function other than every thread created has a poll in it. Until recently, polls gave the user 10g every time they voted in one and so were a good source of gold. Poll Guilds were started as places where avid poll takers, called “poll whores,” could go and have an always fresh supply of polls to take. In late 2006, however, Gaia Admin changed the poll gold gain system so that polls no longer gave a guaranteed 10g, and therefore effectively killed profitable poll whoring. However, poll Guilds still exist.

Arenas:

Users with talent (or who want to know if they have talent) can display their work in one of three arenas: The Art Arena, The Avatar Arena, and The Housing Arena. For a nominal fee, users can display their original art, their avatar, or their Gaian house to the designated arena and compete against other users to win a trophy or gold prize. Also, if they win the Avatar or Housing Arena their avatar or house will be displayed on Gaia’s homepage for everyone to see.

Tek Tek and Gaiapedia:

The growing popularity of Gaia has sparked two user-created tie-in websites. Tek Tek dot org is basically an all things Gaia website. On it, users can choose from a variety of functions and programs, as well as profile themes, to make their Gaia experience easier and more enjoyable. Tek Tek is free for anyone to use, and has become so popular among Gaians that using Tek Tek is almost a way of Gaian life.

Gaia’s popularity has also lead to a Wikipedia spin-off website called “Gaiapedia.” Like Wikipedia (and H2G2) it is contributed to by users who write encyclopedia-style articles pertaining to uniquely-Gaian subjects. The Gaiapedia has its own affiliated site, “Plotwiki,” that keeps up with current Gaian storylines and also archives older storylines.

Big Thanks to Treyo aka. Evan who helped me alot with this and other Gaia articles that are in the works.