Exactly - the rewards are relatively assured. When I used to play Eve there was a lot of tedious work in terms of resource management and repetitive tasks like heading off to shoot pirates or whatever, but as you fulfilled your goals you got new toys to play with and more choices became available. In many real jobs you master some task and you *might get a pat on the back or a promotion, but you might just as easily get stuck with more of the same or have a bunch of extra demands laid on you - especially true in low-wage jobs, which tend to be the least rewarding/interesting ones.