Posted by
michael
on from the back-in-my-day-we-used-telnet-and-we-liked-it dept.
br00tus writes "With the advent of MMORPG's like EverQuest, old-fashioned text-based, free MUD's may seem kind of antiquated. Nevertheless, I've been looking around for a good, free (e.g. not ZMud etc.) MUD client that I can use on Windows and/or UNIX. Any ideas?" Uh, TinyFugue?
E_elven wrote: Only if you're too much of a pansy for telnet.
I've never understood this "Real men use crappy tools" philosophy. It is perfectly possible to MUD with telnet --- I recommend turning "scroll to bottom on TTY output" OFF in your xterm --- but anyone with two brain cells to rub together should be able to realise that MUD clients are better. Even if you just use TinyFugue out of the box, you still get basically the same interface as with telnet, but with a couple of lines separated off for text entry and better scrollback support.
(I get these same emotions whenever I see someone proudly claiming that they make their web pages in notepad... I want to go up to them and beat them with a stick until they realise that notepad is complete crap. Just because Microsoft doesn't give you a good text editor doesn't mean you can't go and find one yourself! Use gvim or emacs or ultraedit or just about _anything_ else...
Ahem.
Sorry.</rant>
)
--
Repton.
They say that only an experienced wizard can do the tengu shuffle.
Re:MUD clients
by
scrytch
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
Seriously, I think most people who claim to have edited their web page in notepad really meant that they edited it with a basic text editor like emacs, metapad, vim, UE, PFE, whatever. Still, I long ago ceased to be impressed by people who consider it a measure of... anything, really. If I had to work with someone so insecure they had to put me down for using Dreamweaver, I'd really consider either foisting off the webmonkey work on them or doing it myself without consulting just so I wouldn't have to get into such inane pissing contests.
When you can speak corba with netcat, i'll be impressed, but HTML was never a terribly hard problem, and it doesn't really ring my bell to try to make it one.
-- I've finally had it: until slashdot gets article moderation, I am not coming back.
gMud
by
Anonymous Coward
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
I haven't mudded for a while, but I always used gMud on windows. It has decent scripting/trigger/aliasing capabilities. It is freely avaliable for download. Do a google search.
Because it allows people like me, who haven't ever experienced anything MUD related, to get a glimpse of the fun that could be had. For many like me, a large appeal of slashdot is being introduced to a variety of activities/news/interests/sites. I'm willing to wager that most of the people that saw the story and are now going to check out a MUD would not have initiated the search by themselves.
Why? Because I did check Google and Freshmeat (do people still use Tucows?). For one thing, as I said in the article, MUDs are somewhat obsolete in the face of MMORPGs like Everquest. I know ZMud is a decent client, but it is not free as in beer or speech, after a 30-day trial it conks out. As far as Google, it recently discontinued archival of the
rec.games.mud groups, so that answers that question for one.
Theoretically, I could have downloaded 30 MUD clients, many wanting me to download PERL for Windows, or TCL/TK for Windows, or GNOME for Windows, or whatever, just to look at it, but I figured I would ask here. Have people here rallied around a Windows MUD client that is free as in beer and as in speech, that doesn't need a normal user to download Cygwin, TCL/TK, PERL and so forth for Windows, compile it and so forth, that is still actively updated? If so, I haven't seen it. That confirms my suspicion - that there is no good, free (as in beer and speech) MUD client for Windows, or at least one that you can download that doesn't require you to transmogrify your Windows box into a UNIX - I'm better off just using a UNIX then anyway.
You're assuming that anyone using Google or Freshmeat will find what they're looking for. I didn't. So now I'm asking as a last resort, before I possibly even begin writing one (that is beer and speech free) myself, if I have the spare time to do such a thing.
To all those recommending google, since when does google have a good-ometer? It gives you hints, and might even come up with a list of all MUD clients available, but usually it is the product/project pages and not reviews.
As for freshmeat and version tracker, yes they have ratings, and for that they are good place to start. But when you get to niche software like this, the best place is to ask the community surrounding the niche.
While slashdot readers do overlap, you best answers will be from more focused mailing list (or, in this case, those you meet in the MUDs). The same could be said of most Ask Slashdot questions. But, then again, if we did that, we'd never ask slashdot dot.
If you're going to reply "ask google" to every "ask slashdot", then please just edit your slashdot profile to ignore the section. We don't need your comments or your moderations.
Five different moderators thought you were being funny. And maybe you were, but you make a serious point: why does anybody need a fancy client to play a text-mode game?
Re:ask google, not slashdot?
by
TLouden
·
· Score: 2, Insightful
If you don't like the humor, or how much it gets modded, then set the bonus for funny to -2 or -3.
Slashdot Mirror
Win: MUSHClient.
-- The only relevant client. XML storage,
full scripting in multiple languages,
triggers, macros, aliases.
www.gammon.com.au
Lin: TinTin++.
-- Only if you're too much of a pansy for
telnet.
Marxist evolution is just N generations away!
I haven't mudded for a while, but I always used gMud on windows. It has decent scripting/trigger/aliasing capabilities. It is freely avaliable for download. Do a google search.
Exaurdon!
TinyFuge. If you are using Linux (or MacOS X) it is the best of the breed.
Integrate Keynote and LaTeX
Sorting through? Just set score filter to 3. Anyways, some people here might have some good comments or know of a client that's good but hard to find.
-Tim Louden
Because it allows people like me, who haven't ever experienced anything MUD related, to get a glimpse of the fun that could be had. For many like me, a large appeal of slashdot is being introduced to a variety of activities/news/interests/sites. I'm willing to wager that most of the people that saw the story and are now going to check out a MUD would not have initiated the search by themselves.
Theoretically, I could have downloaded 30 MUD clients, many wanting me to download PERL for Windows, or TCL/TK for Windows, or GNOME for Windows, or whatever, just to look at it, but I figured I would ask here. Have people here rallied around a Windows MUD client that is free as in beer and as in speech, that doesn't need a normal user to download Cygwin, TCL/TK, PERL and so forth for Windows, compile it and so forth, that is still actively updated? If so, I haven't seen it. That confirms my suspicion - that there is no good, free (as in beer and speech) MUD client for Windows, or at least one that you can download that doesn't require you to transmogrify your Windows box into a UNIX - I'm better off just using a UNIX then anyway.
You're assuming that anyone using Google or Freshmeat will find what they're looking for. I didn't. So now I'm asking as a last resort, before I possibly even begin writing one (that is beer and speech free) myself, if I have the spare time to do such a thing.
To all those recommending google, since when does google have a good-ometer? It gives you hints, and might even come up with a list of all MUD clients available, but usually it is the product/project pages and not reviews.
As for freshmeat and version tracker, yes they have ratings, and for that they are good place to start. But when you get to niche software like this, the best place is to ask the community surrounding the niche.
While slashdot readers do overlap, you best answers will be from more focused mailing list (or, in this case, those you meet in the MUDs). The same could be said of most Ask Slashdot questions. But, then again, if we did that, we'd never ask slashdot dot.
If you're going to reply "ask google" to every "ask slashdot", then please just edit your slashdot profile to ignore the section. We don't need your comments or your moderations.
Anm
Five different moderators thought you were being funny. And maybe you were, but you make a serious point: why does anybody need a fancy client to play a text-mode game?
If you don't like the humor, or how much it gets modded, then set the bonus for funny to -2 or -3.
-Tim Louden