Slashdot Mirror
Saving MUDs?
chewedtoothpick asks: "My absolute favorite game of all-time, Exile [Archive.org mirror], is a MUD that is about to be shut down, and I've noticed that MUDs have been diminishing in number, especially lately. Why are they all quitting, and what does it take to resurrect them? Is it a matter of buying the code off the creator? Is it a matter of making your own and hope it comes close to the one you want it to be like? Is there nothing we can do to save the classics that define multi-player games?"
I'm still amazed that TinyCWRU is still online after 13 years with the same database. All this time, and I can still login with my old character, not that I remember any of the building commands or anything. Probably for the better, as I'm sure the MUSH led to me failing out of Case in the first place.
This sig intentionally left justified.
I'm not sure if MUDs are actually diminishing all that much. If you look at sites like mudconnector there are quite a few MUDs listed. The same goes with MPOGD. I, myself, am an active participant in a MUD that has been running over thirteen(13) years now. The player base has only increased, as has the complexity of the MUD itself. I know others that have followed somewhat of the same path as well. The only reason MUDs may be diminishing, is that the maintainers lose interest, or go on to do something else. However, it seems that if the MUD is programmed well, and has a strong playerbase, it isn't going anywhere. I know for a fact, that if the MUD I play opens donations, almost every player will donate at least $100 US Dollars without flinching.That clearly shows some dedication. (Note that one doesn't ever HAVE to donate money.)
If anyone is curious, or wants to play, the MUD I'm on is Bat. www.bat.org/
Try actually thinking for yourself. It's quite refreshing.
Actually, NWN has a persistent data storage system coming out with its next patch. It's in testing right now and a number of persistent world developers are gleefully hacking away at it -- the end result should be what you're looking for, a small-scale, MUD style world with full graphical support.
The D&D combat system is entrenched but that hasn't stopped many people from coding their own enhancements and replacement subsystems. For instance, I'm making a Final Fight / Golden Axe style arcade brawler using NWN, thanks to some custom spawning, treasure, and weapon systems.
There is absolutely no reason why MUDs can't keep going. It just seems like they have been out innovated lately by the commercial world.
The simple truth is that open source MUDs need to start helping one another more and start pooling resources to come up with better 2D and/or 3D graphics. People understand that when you pay a monthly charge to a game like Everquest that you are going to get some really nice eye-candy. Still the lack of a monthly charge is a huge advantage towards free games. All MUDs have to do is offer decent 2D/3D graphics to go with the existing quality storylines. This can be done. Go look at a game called Wyvern to see an example (in 2D).
The obvious thing to do is to develop a large base of graphics tiles and skins and that can be shared across different MUDs that use common APIs.
It's not really as bad as it might seem in the first moment when one learns that one's favourite MU* is going to shut down. There are bazillions of them out there, and though I'll grant that most aren't that great (most seem to be ego-trips of their respective creators), there is still a great deal of stuff happenin' out there in the MU* world.
The "threat problem" that MMOGs pose to the MU* community is not so bad once you realize the limits of the graphical medium: you are, in all instances I have so far tested, limited in the choice of avatars to what the design team made available to you. Also, the expression of emotions and even just facial expression themselves are limited to a couple of macros, which are the same for all people playing the game.
All these leave the bitter taste of limitations that I don't want or need on my tongue. Though "MUD" is still associated with the hack'n'slash variety -- and no mistake, a lot of them are --, there are as many out there, especially when you get into the MUSH, MUSE, and MUCK codebases, where roleplay is stressed, not "rollplay".
While the fact that these games are text-only can be seen as a disadvantage, it's to be kept in mind that so are books -- and no one has yet proclaimed the absolute end of the written word as a medium of its own. For people with a leaning towards these things, text can be an expressive medium that can rival any other -- and more than that, because of its very nature, it leaves the entire world open to your interaction and modification, without the need for a feature-laden editor or other modding tool.
It begins with the fact that your characters are at your proverbial fingertip: from their background stories to their appearance, their mannerisms and speech patterns, it's entirely up to you and your imagination. The only limits you operate under are the limits set by the MU* canon -- but even those are open to change for those who have the creative energy to put into the history, physiology, philosophy, and whatever else there is to know about any given city, nation, world or race in the game you frequent.
There are enough people who love these games, and enough to keep themalive. These people frequent The MUD Connector or Top MUD Sites, which serve as a place from which to plunge into the MU* of your choice.
Granted, it takes a while to find a place that suits your taste, your imagination or style; but the rewards can be well worth it.
I myself (not being above a shameless plug besides the two resource sites given above) am a player and staffer on the games found at JoinTheSaga.com, which include OtherSpace, an originally themed SciFi MUSH that's been going since 1998, Reach of the Empire, a Star Wars-themed game where Luke and Leia have died way before the start of the original trilogy (and where the prequels are disregarded), and Chiaroscuro, a newly opened work-in-progress centered around an original Fantasy theme. The former two are completely free to play (though donations are welcome, and merchandise is available), while the latter follows a monthly pay-to-play approach like most MMOGs do, but with a guaranteed close connection to the staff -- and also offers the option to play a lowly peasant for free (only the higher social classes require you to pay to be set up).
The games run 24/7 on reliable servers, and staff is available for your questions if you drop by as a guest and want to have a look around.
As a final note: the entrance bar for these games tends to be high (you have to submit a biography and skill list of your character for approval, which you can all set up in-game), and the expectation is that In-Character Actions have In-Character Consequences. This is to keep grievers, "theme idiots", and similar people from ruining the fun of our other players. Elitist? Yes, but for a good cause.
~Khamura
Graduate of the LeRoy Funkified Badass School of Soul.
Apparently there is. Some differences have been named already by others, things that come to mind are:
Price, lots of muds are free (not all)
Cheap to set up yourself (which is the reason why there so many out there.
Freedom. This one is the most important issue for me. I played muds since 1998. I have also played mmorpg's (beta's mostly or free games) and although they can be fun, mostly they are just limited in the things you can do.
I always compare muds to books, and mmorpg's to movies. I am not saying I don't like movies, but in most cases _I_ like the book better. It's quite easy to go to a movie, absorb all the information and entertainment. A book is a total different story though, you use your imagination to shape it, you interpret the words to your own meaning, and in fact you might differ on your view with others, which is the power of a book. Books are more popular then ever (I seem them everywhere when I go from my house to work and vice versa, tram, train, bus) so it seems. So why does it seem MUDs are going down?
Well for one thing, they aren't advertised. Most muds aren't payed for and a few take donations from their players, but even then it's hard to finance anything else then the machine to run it on and a decent link to the internet.
Last thing I think is detrimental to MUDs in general, is that there are so many. Once you know they are around and you make a search for them or look at the mudconnector, you'll find out there are thousands listed. Some prolly won't even be around but still. From those thousands of MUDs there might be just a few worth checking (also depending on your style, rp or h&s) the others are empty muds with just the admin around or muds with just an admin and friends dressing up in ubergear ;)
However if that is what you see of MUDs then your view will most likely not improve on them.
And thus ends the frustation of a mudder,
Dre
Unless you are running a pay mud, you get nothing for it. Not even appreciation most of the time, as the players have no sense of how much effort it takes to run a mud well. Most of their interactions with you are to bitch about fellow players or even minor changes to the game that they feel are not in their favor.
While you might get away with running a small MUD on your home cable or DSL, you basically can't use it for anything else without offering massive lag to everyone playing. So unless you happen to own an ISP, the chances are that you'll end up paying at least $50-200/month to have it hosted somewhere. Which isn't a big deal when its all you do in your spare time, but after you get a life and don't have the time to put into it, that could start looking like an unnecessary expenditure.
But then the vast majority of the people running them opened a cookie-cutter MUD by grabbing an existing codebase and world and adding some patches and a few hundred rooms to the world. When they get bored and fold, they won't be missed; they had nothing unique to offer anyway.
To top it off, MUDs have lost their "cool" factor. For someone used to first person shooters and MMORPGs, an online text adventure looks more than a little dated at first glance. So you end up with a mixed player base of people who have been playing longer than Quake has existed, and those who are too young or too cheap to afford an MMORPG. Not exactly a booming populace.
Not that I'm jaded or anything. (I've been running Ishar for 9 years and actually do still enjoy the small amount of time I put into it.)
Aaron
I can't comment on the relative number of total MUDs out there, as I have never kept track. I can say that as a former player and now Implementor of a long lived MUD, that the number of players that we attract hasn't changed much over the years. For the last couple of years we have had fewer *characters* online than in the past, but we switched to a non-multiplaying policy and the number of actual players online has remained fairly constant over the years. It has its cycles, some we understand, others we don't, but the only major change that I am certain of is the average age of the players. We've changed from mostly college aged players to mostly teenagers, which probably reflects the same changes in the Internet population.
The reason for stating that the current trend is a good thing, is that in many of the discussions I've followed, many have lamented the number of "StockMUDs" that have come into being. There are several code bases than can literally be downloaded and brought online in a matter of minutes, with enough content to start playing even though that content might be the same as thousands of other MUDs out there. Hopefully, these are the MUDs that are fading out, in favor of the graphical counterpart of StockMUD. Then, the ones that remain will be the ones worth trying. I don't envy anyone looking for a new MUD to play, with only Mudconnector as a starting point. You really need some recommendations from friends to get you started, or the search may wear you out before you find what you want.
Could you provide some basis for your statistics? I've been mudding as a player since 1989 and as an admin since 1994 and do not ever remember there being more then 10K muds in existence.