Virtual Globalization

The BBC reports that an online role-playing game has suffered an epidemic among its game characters. Each virtual character is controlled by a real player. An obvious metaphor for biological warfare, the God of Blood, Hakkar (cough, cough) is said to have projected "corrupted blood" upon his slayers. The disease then unexpectedly spread throughout the local server and then beyond leading to what has been called the game's first "global event."

The layers are still a bit too thick for me to completely penetrate, but there is a funny thing going on here. The completely virtual game is designed to represent a fantasy world of the D&D, Lord of the Rings, and SCA kind. While the virtual, networked, and digital nature of the game is a globalized phenomenon itself, it portrays itself as a nonglobal world. This world is a one that is implied to exist before the nation-state, before capitalism, amidst early feudalism. As adventurous as the characters of this game are, the disease of corrupted blood is said to be the first moment of globalization.

Does this game mimic historical developments? Does it provide a parallel and alternative history? How is it that games seem to replicate history?