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Meridian 59 Still Not Near Death

Posted by simoniker on from the rare-before-everquest-specimen dept.

tvalley000 writes "Warcry has just finished up a 3 part interview series with Brian Green, CEO of Near Death Studios and Lead Developer for Meridian 59, potentially the oldest commercial MMOG still running today. You can catch the first part here, the second part here, and the third part here. Brian talks about the PC MMOG genre, where he came from, and how the game has weathered the storm of nearly a decade in development and production."

16 comments

  1. I guess it's a nice change of pace... by lightspawn · · Score: 1

    from the normal slashdot headlines.

    Is innovation dead?
    Is Java dead?
    Is bluetooth dead?
    Is HTML dead?
    Is ethernet dead?

    (ad nauseum)

  2. New Rendering Engine by BrookHarty · · Score: 2, Interesting

    Interesting they just keep the game going, and put out new rendering engines. Always wondered why MMPOG's just scrap the game and go on, when the client can just be updated with new GFX. 1996 and the game still looks nice.

    I've always wanted to see a AutoDuel MMPOG, some kind of wasteland, not all this RPG with swords. And Anarchy Online just didnt make the grade, and Star Wars Galaxy isnt hitting the mark.

    1. Re:New Rendering Engine by DrEldarion · · Score: 1

      What I really want is a Shadowrun MMORPG. Cyberpunk theme, guns everywhere. It would have enough classes - Typical fighter (street samurai), Ninjaish (physical adept), Mage (... mage), Summoner (shaman), rigger, decker, etc. The way the pencil & paper game is set up would make translation to MMORPG very easy. The game could be mostly mission(quest)-based, and the quests could even be player-run. Imagine playing Mr. Johnson and being the one saying "Yeah, head over to the Shiawase facility and bring me back this..."

      I'd kill for a new Shadowrun game, but MS acquired the license with and is just sitting on it. MAKE A NEW ONE DANGIT. I'd buy an X-Box just for a new SR game...

      -- Dr. Eldarion --

    2. Re:New Rendering Engine by cronostitan · · Score: 0

      >I've always wanted to see a AutoDuel MMPOG, some kind of wasteland, not all this RPG with swords. >And Anarchy Online just didnt make the grade, and Star Wars Galaxy isnt hitting the mark.

      You should really try Neocron. It's based in a Blade Runner Theme world.
      http://www.neocron.com

      --
      Spelling errors were made for your amusement only...
    3. Re:New Rendering Engine by vjmurphy · · Score: 1

      "Always wondered why MMPOG's just scrap the game and go on, when the client can just be updated with new GFX"

      Both Everquest and Dark Age of Camelot have updated their game engines and graphics over time, so it does happen with other gamges.

      --
      Vincent J. Murphy
      Spandex Justice
    4. Re:New Rendering Engine by FiberOpticMayhem · · Score: 1

      Fallout RPG anyone?

      --

      www.jeffgoldblumiswatchingy
  3. Meridian 59 Still Not Near Death by InsaneCreator · · Score: 1

    Call dr. Kevorkian. Maybe he can do something about it.

  4. It looks nice and all... by DrEldarion · · Score: 1

    Well, it looks pretty nice and all, but from the screenshots shown, the atmosphere really doesn't grab me at all. The look of it reminds me of the plethora of crappy RPGs released in the 90s. When I'm playing an MMORPG, I want it to be immersive. With all the alternative MMORPGs available today (some with an incredible atmosphere), the only thing that M59 seems to have going for it is the "small town" type feel of the servers, and I still can't decide if that's fully a good thing. I remember playing on smaller MUDs that had the same feel (where you knew everyone) and that got to be a bad thing - if you screwed something up or pissed somebody off (usually something relatively minor that people got mad about for no reason (dude, this is MY zone!)), you couldn't just blend in with the crowd and ignore them.

    I'm sure it's a great game and all, but this is like playing Warcraft when you could be playing Warcraft 3 - why?

    (Disclaimer: No, I'm not a graphics whore, but if I'm going to be immersed in a world for hours and hours at a time, I want to sit back and enjoy the atmosphere)

    -- Dr. Eldarion --

    1. Re:It looks nice and all... by or_smth · · Score: 1

      You're absolutely right. There is no god-given atmosphere in Meridian 59. For the most part there never has been and probably never will be. Hell, you can run the thing in a window and dock ICQ right next to it. You can't go in expecting Doom III.

      At the same time, for whatever reason, Meridian 59 remains as the most fun I've ever had online. Anyone can tell you fun can not be manufactured for the people, it has to be created by the people.

      You claim that it sucks that you can't blend in with a crowd and ignore the person you pissed off. Quite the opposite, the beauty of the game is that there is no escape. You screw up, you're getting killed and all your items (along with enough spells/skills to take off about an hours work off your game). Of course, maybe you are in a guild so now the person is kill-on-sight by the guild. Meridian puts the least limits on player's actions as possible and thus becomes the only true player-oriented online RPG. I'm sorry that weinnies from Everquest can't take the fact that Player-vs-Player is fun, not in the Quake sense, but when you have everything to lose going into the battle.

      Meridian 59 may be as old as dirt but it remains unchallenged by any online RPG today.

    2. Re:It looks nice and all... by DrEldarion · · Score: 1

      That whole never-forgive thing is why I hated the small community - If someone who didn't like you for whatever reason was more powerful than you, you could count on being dead at least a few times a day, and having all your stuff stolen (which really sucks in a game where most things are equipment-based). There was really nothing you could do about it, either, short of making a new character and losing all the time you put into the old one.

      I don't mind the no-PVP restrictions, but getting killed multiple times a day just because there's no way to blend in with the crowd is a bit much.

      -- Dr. Eldarion --

    3. Re:It looks nice and all... by curtisk · · Score: 1
      Quite the opposite, the beauty of the game is that there is no escape. You screw up, you're getting killed and all your items (along with enough spells/skills to take off about an hours work off your game). Of course, maybe you are in a guild so now the person is kill-on-sight by the guild. Meridian puts the least limits on player's actions as possible and thus becomes the only true player-oriented online RPG. I'm sorry that weinnies from Everquest can't take the fact that Player-vs-Player is fun, not in the Quake sense, but when you have everything to lose going into the battle.

      I've never played Meridian59, but I've certainly heard many many stories about it over the years. My "graphical" MMORPG gaming started with UO. (UNIX Muds aside, and bbs DOORS aside) Thats one thing that made me love UO when it started, man.....you would sweat it when you'd leave certain towns, because if you got jacked-up, you were losing everything you had. But then its a simple matter of rounding up the posse and getting some revenge....when it was open ended, it was more dynamic and fun. Too many games have "pussy-fied" PvP since then...DaoC had a good idea with the frontier-lands for battle, the problem there being, if you are in a large raid, your system will puke on all the polygons it has to render, while juggling CPU resources with network packets, audio, alot of stuff... :p

      --

      Sehr geehrter Toilettenbenutzer!

  5. Runs great on WINE by or_smth · · Score: 1

    Just wanted to put the information out there that the current Meridian 59 client works very well with WINE. I didn't get a chance to test sound, but I had no problems walking around and killing a few monsters in the world while I was on my FreeBSD box. Doesn't even require WineX (the client is THAT old). I'll admit that it looks like shit, but that's the fault of the game and not WINE. Anyone using WINE shouldn't care too much about graphics anyway :)

    I know that the developer has stated some interests about creating a true Linux port of the new client, which would definitely be neat, but I'm not sure how that is going to work out.

  6. The headline makes me wonder... by Landaras · · Score: 1

    Does it run on *BSD?

    --
    My legal education, in nifty podcast format
  7. Non-PvP version at Skotos has free trial by herderofcats · · Score: 1
    There is also a non-PVP version (called Sacred Haven) of Meridien 59 licensed to Skotos that has a one month free trial.

    One of the best things about this game is that because of the smaller server sizes (100s rather then 1000s) the community is more solid.

    -- Herder of Cats

    1. Re:Non-PvP version at Skotos has free trial by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      For a game with such old graphics like M59, with such a small community, I'd probably prefer a good lpmud.

  8. Oldest MMOG? I think not. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Gemstone III is quite a bit older than Meridian 59, for instance. MMOG != graphical game. There's nothing inherent about an MMOG that requires graphics. If it's a matter of players online, Gemstone, Dragonrealms, Achaea, and a number of other muds all crush it.