[Threshold]

In Mike Rozak's post from here he wrote:

Originally Posted by MikeRozak the potential extinction of MUDs in general... To use an analogy, it's like saying, "Even though most people haven't heard of clog dancing (Clogging - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia) , it only takes 1% to 0.01% of all night/dance-club dancers to jump in and there'd be a huge clog-dancer population"... which implies that the reason there aren't more clog dancers is largely because people haven't heard of it. Yes, advertising will bring in some people. But the fact is, clog dancing is no longer in vogue, not since the 18/19th century according to Wikipedia. You can (a) admit that and live with a dwindling and aging population of clog-dancers (staving off the decline with clog-athons and other occasional advertising), or (b) change clog dancing so it fits with the times more.

I think it is a little early for the clog dancing comparisons, since a lot of text mud operators here frequently score a lot of new players from graphical MMOs. Mike, I don't know what your actual playing history is as far as MUDs, but they offer a very different gaming experience from graphical MMOs. I actually think it is getting to the point where they are no longer direct competitors.

I will use Threshold RPG as an example. 2004 was probably our peak year in terms of total usage. We had a small but noticeable decline in both 2005 and 2006. But in 2007 we experienced growth that made up for most of 2006's decline, and so far 2008 is continuing in that direction. If it continues, either 2008 or 2009 will be a *NEW* peak. Considering the fact that Threshold is a 12 year old game, I think the possibility of hitting a new peak after experiencing a decline is pretty amazing. Obviously, I was highly motivated to figure out the reasons behind this resurgence, and I have narrowed it down primarily to these:

1. We made some changes in development philosophy, administration methods, and content creation that have been very well received by our players.
   
   
2. We hired a very productive staff member who took on a major development role and did a great job with it.
   
   
3. We suddenly started getting a LOT more players from WoW and other graphical MMOs than ever in the past.

It is easy to understand how #1 and #2 worked. That is just standard game management stuff. Meet the needs and desires of your customers and you benefit. Hire good people and you benefit. The harder one to decipher is #3. Why in the last year and a half have more and more graphical players been trying MUDs for the first time? I have a few theories.

1. The population size of gamers that have now played more than 1 graphical MMO is pretty large. Now that they have played more than one, and probably see a lot of similarities and repetitiveness, they are more interested than ever in a totally different type of online RPG experience.
   
   
2. The popularity and greater acceptability of online gaming in general has increased the pool of people playing online RPGs. A wider pool of people means people with a broader set of preferences. Graphical MMOs almost exclusively play like EQ/DAoC/WoW, and that doesn't really suit everyone. MUDs offer an almost limitless variety in gameplay options: MUDs, MUSHes, ARPs, PKMUDs, etc., etc.
   
   
3. A lot of MUDs have indeed changed and adapted. The EQ/DAoC/WoW style of gaming was based on MUDs, and for a long while MUDs tried to compete on that same playing field. A lot of MUDs are now ceding that specific style of gameplay to graphical MMOs, and instead focusing on things MUDs can do better than graphical MMOs: communication, customization, persistent alterations to the game world, highly complex gameplay features, etc.
   
   
4. A lot of gamers are sick of always being limited to gaming on the best gaming PC out there. They like having games they can play on a work computer, a library computer, a hand held device, a laptop, or any computer from anywhere. This is not just in MMOs, but in the single player PC games as well. I have read numerous articles about the returning success of small, independent developers who make ~$10-20 games that you download as a trial and then pay to convert to the full version - basically the old shareware model.
   
   
5. The growing dominance of consoles. This one is a bit of a stretch, but it makes sense if you follow it. Consoles are becoming more and more the gaming platform of choice for a higher percentage of gamers. The desktop PC is becoming less their primary gaming platform and more of a tool and a general entertainment appliance. People watch tv and movies on their PC, they play simpler games, they use it for internet applications, etc. As the PC starts to become more popular as a low/mid-range gaming platform, the desire for lower tech games actually grows.

Now, I am not about to say that this is the Golden Age of MUDs and they are going to rise up and have more total players than WoW and its ilk combined. But what I do see is that MUDs are actually starting to reap a little benefit from the overall growth of online gaming, and the failure (and/or unwillingness) of graphical games to meet ALL of gamers' needs. This presents an opportunity for MUDs that I think should be, and can be, taken advantage of.

[Lasher]

Not wanting the important matter of clog dancing to be interrupted by this MUD discussion I move it to it's own thread where the subject can receive the attention it so rightfully deserves.

Let's use this thread for your views on the future (or lack thereof) of MUDs and compare clog dancing socials in the break room. Thanks!

[MikeRozak]

Originally Posted by Threshold I think it is a little early for the clog dancing comparisons, since a lot of text mud operators here frequently score a lot of new players from graphical MMOs. Mike, I don't know what your actual playing history is as far as MUDs, but they offer a very different gaming experience from graphical MMOs. I actually think it is getting to the point where they are no longer direct competitors.

I totally agree.

The problem is, even if you can convince players that text/language is a good foundation (and I definitely think text has strong points), a LOT of other stuff about MUDs holds them back. My first reactions on entering a text MUD are:

- Why does the overall UI look so crappy (because I'm usually using a Java-ish client written by a mud-admin who thinks of it as a holdover until I splurge and pay for Z-mud... which is incredibly scary looking, although powerful.)

- Why don't I have a graphical map? (Because it's assumed that I'll eventually use Z-mud or something and figure out how to use automapping.)

- Character creation usually involves picking one of 50 races and one of 50 classes. To find out what the races/classes are, I either have to type in an obscure command or visit the web site. Why isn't this better integrated.

- Why do I have to type all the time? Why can't I click on the word "orc" and get a context menu for the most common stuff I can do to the orc. Arrow keys to move, etc.

- And MUD help reminds me on Unix "man".

- And a few pictures here and there wouldn't hurt. It doesn't have to be $30M worth of art, just a few.

- At which point, I usually log out disgusted.


People coming from MMORPG-land will all have their own conscious/subconscious impressions, and they won't be exactly the same as mine.


To use a book analogy: Back in Roman Times, there were no spaces between words, and scrolls were more common than books. Imagine reading Harry Potter on a scroll, with no spaces. It could be the exact same text, but the presentation limits the experience.

Which is why I wrote option (a) is to do nothing (stick to scrolls, and MUDs tha run on virtual teletype machines), or (b) update the experience (books with pages and modern conventions, or MUDs that solve some of the problems I mentioned above, or whatever problem most people see as being important).

Originally Posted by Threshold I will use Threshold RPG as an example. 2004 was probably our peak year in terms of total usage. We had a small but noticeable decline in both 2005 and 2006. But in 2007 we experienced growth that made up for most of 2006's decline, and so far 2008 is continuing in that direction. If it continues, either 2008 or 2009 will be a *NEW* peak. Considering the fact that Threshold is a 12 year old game, I think the possibility of hitting a new peak after experiencing a decline is pretty amazing. Obviously, I was highly motivated to figure out the reasons behind this resurgence, and I have narrowed it down primarily to these:

That's great.

Some counter-thougts:

1) You may be the exception. What's the total MUD population now, and has it been increasing or decreasing? No one knows these answers. My own highly-flawed memory of watching the MUD forums (topmudsites and ilk) is that post numbers seem to be going down. (Just as the population numbers in individual MMORPGs have a habit of peaking and gradually declining. At the moment, MUDs seem to be on the gradual decline.)

2) The MMORPG population is growing at the rate of around 30% per year (plus or minus). If the MUD population is shrinking at 10% per year (my non-scientific innacurate guestimate), then relative to MMORPG's, MUDs are shrinking at approx 40% per year! Yes, this isn't an entirely fair comparison, but it's something I got used to doing when deciding what financial investments to make, where the return on an investment is relative to what other investments return.


And a slightly wild tangent that's related (and which you briefly mentioned):

I'm excited about UMPCs, mini-notebooks, or whatever you want to call them (Eee-like devices). I expect them to be popular with schoolkids, travelling adults, and 3rd world countries. At the moment, MMORPGs don't work well (if at all) on them.

Imagine a nice-looking, easy-to-get-going MUD on such a device. It's be perfect! MUDs are low bandwidth, low CPU, low screen-real-estate, and MOST IMPORTANTLY, low power consumption.

So yes, I do see hope for MUDs, but I think they have to change and adapt. (Which leads to paradigm shifts and why people/companies fail to ride out the paradigm shift, but that can be for yet another topic.)

[Disillusionist]

I can only speak from a single person's standpoint, but I'm certain I'm not unique in this respect. For the most part, Threshold is dead-bang on the money with his points. Especially the 'keep up with the tech advances' part in order to play a game.

As to the comparisons of Harry Potter and Roman scrolls, I think a better analogy between MMORPGs and MUDs is book-to-movie. While the subject and much of the content might be nearly identical, it's that intangible element that a reader brings to a book, hefting some or much of the imaginary burden of visual and audial imagery, absent in the nature of movies to spoonfeed that content to the viewer in totem. No matter how good the graphics and sound get, human imagination is better, and MUDs passively accomodate those willing to lift that imaginary burden.

I can see some of Mike's points, but seriously, how much visual input or lore research does one need to do for 'orc'? No matter how most MUDs shade the differences, we all pretty much know what it is. Even if a game has fifty races, I'm willing to bet 8-10 of them are quickly recognizable from the name alone, if not more.

Granted, I do some things to my keyboard for MUDs to make it more like a very complicated handset, such as aliases and hotkeys and macros to make the experience less typing-intensive and more fluid, but it's been my observation that those who are willing to read almost 100% of their content don't mind typing almost 100% of their input. Generally. I'm actually -against- art in MUDs, for the same reason I was appalled by the inclusion of brothers Hildebrandt paintings inserted into the LotR novels. What I see in my head is better rendered, especially when viewing the words of genuinely great wordsmiths.

I'm also one who tends to think there's still a steady population (and will continue to be so) of people who like the challenge of the medium. Most of our graphics-based joystick reflexes will hit a peak, and in many of those games, the race is to the swift, those best in shape from the wrist down. Unlike such games, MUD skills, a different set, tend to only improve over time. You spell better, your read more quickly or more comprehensively, you type faster, and you're exposed to some people who are truly gifted at it, and their skills become part of your skillset as well. I greatly prefer learning (and I still do, even at age 47) from a great roleplayer to learning from a talented gamer. One such skillset is 'seeing' the map in my head. I do refer to some of the ingame maps from time to time, but to me, seeing the terrain in a MUD is as transparent a process as looking at a graphics screen.

Whether or not the market trends bear out my observations eventually, my prediction is that MUDing is far from dead, except in the cases of rigid development.

Two cents.

[Newworlds]

My post went to the wrong thread and should be here, toit:

I think you may need to read back to a thread I started awhile ago called the book and the movie for a more appropriate analogy of Muds.

The Book and the Movie

[MikeRozak]

Originally Posted by Disillusionist I can see some of Mike's points, but seriously, how much visual input or lore research does one need to do for 'orc'? No matter how most MUDs shade the differences, we all pretty much know what it is. Even if a game has fifty races, I'm willing to bet 8-10 of them are quickly recognizable from the name alone, if not more.

I happen to like pretty pictures, but can easily understand why some people would want text-only.

Some random comments:

1) I should probably clarify "click on the word "orc" ". In my own game, I show pictures of objects (which text MUDs won't have, of course). There is a command line, but 90% of what a player wants to be done can be accomplished by clicking on an object image and selecting a menu item from a context-sensative menu. For example: Click on an orc's image and you'll see a menu with "Attack", "Say hello", etc. Click on a lantern and it'll have "Light/douse", "Add more oil", etc. A text MUD wouldn't have the images, but it would make sense to click on the object's word/name in the text and get the same menu.

2) As for character creation, or any other UI element: Imagine your mother (or appropriate tech neophyte) trying to play your game. Where would they have problems? It seems to me, that text MUDs have evolved and complexified so that there's a lot of stuff you need to know to play them. Z-Mud is an example of this, with a UI just as complex as Microsoft's C++ development IDE.

Raph Koster made a point (don't have the link) that game genres start out easy and accessible, and gradually get more and more complicated until only the illuminati know how to play. And then the illuminati die off, and the genre dies. He uses the example of table-top war games, which started out being fairly simple (Risk-like complexity), but by the 1980's had thick rulebooks and took days/weeks to play out. When wargames first appeared, they were so simple anyone could play. By the 1980's, only the hard-core would play. D&D is similar: It started out very simple, with the origianl D&D rulebooks and then Basic D&D. Now on the 4th edition, it's hugely complicated, especially compared to its origins.

If your MUD is so complicated that there are 50 races, 50 classes, 5000 items, 6000 spells, etc., then you'll find it hard to attract new non-MUD players. They'll find the whole thing overwhelming. Meanwhile, your experienced players are continually asking for more complexity. If they get it, they stay. But the extra complexity also creates a barrier that prevents new players from joining.

The same can be said about muds with 20K rooms. It's simply overwhelming to a new player.

As an example, a few years ago I saw Legend of the Green Dragon on the Internet. (Legend of the Green Dragon?) It was almost a MUD. It had LOTs of players, partially because it was playable from a web page, and partially because it was such an easy game to play. It seems to have empties out since then.

[MikeRozak]

Originally Posted by Newworlds My post went to the wrong thread and should be here, toit: I think you may need to read back to a thread I started awhile ago called the book and the movie for a more appropriate analogy of Muds. The Book and the Movie

I don't disagree with the book vs. movie analogy. I've used it many times before.

I do disagree with the reliance on a UI based on a teletype (Teleprinter - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia). You can still have text, but you don't need to rely on just one window with 10-point courier font, that scrolls. And you don't need to rely just on typing.

BatMud's UI (www.bat.org | The official site of BatMUD) is a step in the right direction. But it's a relatively small step, scary looking to new players (see my previous comment), and it only works with bat mud.

[Aeran]

Originally Posted by MikeRozak 2) The MMORPG population is growing at the rate of around 30% per year (plus or minus). If the MUD population is shrinking at 10% per year (my non-scientific innacurate guestimate), then relative to MMORPG's, MUDs are shrinking at approx 40% per year! Yes, this isn't an entirely fair comparison, but it's something I got used to doing when deciding what financial investments to make, where the return on an investment is relative to what other investments return.

I think part of the problem is that people separate MMRPG and MUD. In my view they are different realizations of the same idea. While the text mmrpg gaming might have declined, the graphical mmrpg gaming might have grown. In a way you can say that text MUDs have evolved into graphical mmrpgs. That means that MUDs are very successful instead!

Usually discussions like these mostly cover observations but don't offer any solution. One such observation often mentioned is that a lot of people don't know about text MUDs.

Say we had 2-3 graphical MUDs(aka mmrpgs) here on the TMS toplist. What would happen?

[shadowfyr]

Originally Posted by MikeRozak The problem is, even if you can convince players that text/language is a good foundation (and I definitely think text has strong points), a LOT of other stuff about MUDs holds them back. My first reactions on entering a text MUD are: - Why does the overall UI look so crappy (because I'm usually using a Java-ish client written by a mud-admin who thinks of it as a holdover until I splurge and pay for Z-mud... which is incredibly scary looking, although powerful.) - Why don't I have a graphical map? (Because it's assumed that I'll eventually use Z-mud or something and figure out how to use automapping.) - Character creation usually involves picking one of 50 races and one of 50 classes. To find out what the races/classes are, I either have to type in an obscure command or visit the web site. Why isn't this better integrated. - Why do I have to type all the time? Why can't I click on the word "orc" and get a context menu for the most common stuff I can do to the orc. Arrow keys to move, etc. - And MUD help reminds me on Unix "man". - And a few pictures here and there wouldn't hurt. It doesn't have to be $30M worth of art, just a few. - At which point, I usually log out disgusted.

You nailed most of the things that have bugged me right on the head. Some of those are fixable now, in "some" clients. Some are fixable in the future, with "some" clients. Frankly, I keep hoping, now that Mushclient is source available, someone with way better understanding of script integration and event handling will look it over and figure out how to get those things to work, ironically, the way they do in IE. We badly need basic controls support, and some way to use the COM system via scripting to plugin in external objects, so we don't have the limitations we do now. At the moment, their are only two ways to take, I don't know, lets say IE itself, and patch it to Mushclient:

1. Create a shell application that has UDP support, and creates the IE instance itself, handles the "page finished loading" event, then links via UDP to Mushclient, so that your script can receive noticed that data came in and respond to the "event".

2. Create a shell applicaiton that uses the Mushclient .tlb structure to get callbacks to the client, and creates the IE instance itself, handles the "page finished loading" event, then calls, using data passed "from" the script, CallPlugin(some_hex_number,data), then have that plugin try to figure out what the hell to do with the data, which is *not* able to contain more than like 255 characters, even if the data you need to send it does.

The *correct* way to do this would be something like:

#Don't remember the exact names at the moment. "world" is the internal Mushclient functions.
a = world.createobject("ie.application")
connect(a.finished, "myfunction")
a.loadurl("www.test.com")

sub myfunction ()
  note "Yeah! The page finished loading!"
end sub

But, this just isn't possible at the moment. If it was, then it would make using external applications unbelievably easy, make designing them easy, make using controls as easy as downloading the dlls for something like the VB runtimes, etc. The only thing the client itself would need to supply is the handlers for the objects, tiny bit of code, but a pain in the ass to manage, and a basic window that supports control container features. Everything else could be done via the script system.

You can't imagine both how fracking hard it is to either find how to manage the above though with a scripting system, or how much even more insane it is to try to do it with MFC getting in the damn way.

A lot of stuff it would be nice to see are just plain trade offs. Mushclient doesn't currently support 1) blinking, 2) text positioning, 3) inline graphics, 4) more than one font at a time, 5) a mapper. Why? Because the first four make writing the custom windowing code even *more* complicated. The last one the author didn't even have the first idea where to start making one. He figured an external for that might be better, and I tend to agree, since as things stand with scripting, some stuff, like path finding, would lock up the client while it ran, and synchronization of the script to the triggers, etc. without having the client suspend while they ran... isn't too feasible. And external, with proper integration is better for that.

Anyway. Point is, clients tend to be hit or miss when universal, since there is always "some" features that are not as practical as one would like them to be, which never make their way into the client. And, invariably, the ones that do have them, are missing other things. Ones like Batmud, which is mentioned, have a leg up only due to the fact that they don't even try to be universal, so don't have to make apologies for not supporting some feature the mud itself doesn't supply.

Some, like the one I use and mentioned, are so damn close that my teeth itch, but none of those of us that use it have the slightest fracking clue how to fix the problems, including the guy that wrote it, who frankly has no intention of fixing some of the things I consider flaws himself (not when he had to release the source to keep it alive, since no one would fracking pay him for using it).

[MikeRozak]

Originally Posted by Aeran I think part of the problem is that people separate MMRPG and MUD. In my view they are different realizations of the same idea. While the text mmrpg gaming might have declined, the graphical mmrpg gaming might have grown. In a way you can say that text MUDs have evolved into graphical mmrpgs. That means that MUDs are very successful instead! Usually discussions like these mostly cover observations but don't offer any solution. One such observation often mentioned is that a lot of people don't know about text MUDs. Say we had 2-3 graphical MUDs(aka mmrpgs) here on the TMS toplist. What would happen?

While I'd like MUDs to evolve with limited graphics, I expect most people here prefer just straight text, which is fine with me.

(High-quality graphics would be wonderfull too, but that's completely unrealistic because MUDs are more of a hobbyist virtual world, with limited ($0.00) budgets. And those small budgets are part of the reason why MUDs are worth keeping alive, because they're not trying to be (to use another analogy) mass-market McDonalds or McWoW, but a mom-and-pop restaurant on the corner - niche market, small community.)

However, I would like to see MUDs evolve (not towards MMORPGs - that's already been done).

[MikeRozak]

Originally Posted by shadowfyr Anyway. Point is, clients tend to be hit or miss when universal, since there is always "some" features that are not as practical as one would like them to be, which never make their way into the client. And, invariably, the ones that do have them, are missing other things. Ones like Batmud, which is mentioned, have a leg up only due to the fact that they don't even try to be universal, so don't have to make apologies for not supporting some feature the mud itself doesn't supply.

Which is my point about paradigm shifts that I didn't get to.

I suspect lots of people here have some of the same issues that I do. There are certainly enough posts on topmudsites and mudconnect talking about clients, attracting new players, etc.

However, the reason that companies don't survive paradigm shifts is because they refuse to make/see hard decisions. Often, they can't switch to the new technology because that will upset their existing customers. (As per IBM and PCs/Dos/Windows paradigm shift.)

The "facts" are:

- "Everyone" knows a better client would be a win.

- But no one has written it. It's a lot of work. (I know, since I've written a better client.) There are dozens-to-hundreds of attempts, but none have hit the mark. Or, those that have come close charge money (because it's a lot of work). Or there are other problems, like it only runs on Windows.

- And, MUD players have a proud tradition of being able to play with whatever client they want. If one client were to come out that was perfect, admins would need to convince all their players to use it, which wouldn't be possible.

- And, even if the perfect MUD client were written and admins could convince all their players to use it, it's basically impossible to convert a huge 20K-room MUD to use the new client. There's way too much code/content to fix.

- In addition, there's the "making the gameplay simpler to attract newbies" issue because that will probably lead to losing some long-time players who will complain that the game is too simple.

As a result, there are half measures like the BatMud client. But (IMHO) they aren't sufficient.

[Lasher]

Originally Posted by MikeRozak - In addition, there's the "making the gameplay simpler to attract newbies" issue because that will probably lead to losing some long-time players who will complain that the game is too simple. As a result, there are half measures like the BatMud client. But (IMHO) they aren't sufficient.

Enjoying these posts Mike, very insightful. I share the same concerns on the client side and as a MUD owner it has never quite made sense to me to tell someone they have go buy a client to play the mud, particularly a client from someone else. It makes sense for established MUD players perhaps, but not for someone who just happens to find your game and isn't famiiar with MUDs.

On the BAT client, what would you add to that particular client that would take it from a 'half measure' to 'almost there'? I've played around with it a little myself and was quite impressed, although I didn't get into checking out its capabilities for client basics like external scripting, triggers, etc.

[Newworlds]

I have a few issues whenever the topic (and it's happened a few times) comes up about the fear of the demise of MUDS or the need for "new clients" with maps and gadgets and automapping and pictures, blah blah.

I started out playing all graphic games, Ultima Online, Meridian 59, Diablo, and on. When I found muds it was through a third party chat room on gaming and my first impression was unique, definitely different and I thought a strange concept. But after two weeks on a zero whistles and bells client (telnet), I was hooked with the whole imagination (book vs. movie) style.

After many years, I see it the same way. It IS an entirely different concept and style of gaming and to me much more immersed roleplay than any graphic game could hope to achieve. My arguments are not about that though, but rather about why the push to bigger, more functional, more graphic oriented clients? Bat client? Who cares. I don't play MUDS for automapping, graphics, mouse clicks, or multi window interfaces. If I did, I'd be playing the multitude of graphic games that blow mud features out the window.
What will happen with newer graphic/sound/mapping clients is that your clients (players) will eventually say, "ya man, L33T client dood! It's even starting to catch up with Runescape and WoW. Hey, let's just play WoW, ain't much different!" And unless you are prepared to build a WoW game, you will have oversold yourself.

Now I'm not against better clients with features that enhance text gaming and new clients should bost that.

In short. MUDs are text for a reason. They are books. Don't try to make them movies.

Enjoy!

[MikeRozak]

Originally Posted by Lasher Enjoying these posts Mike, very insightful. I share the same concerns on the client side and as a MUD owner it has never quite made sense to me to tell someone they have go buy a client to play the mud, particularly a client from someone else. It makes sense for established MUD players perhaps, but not for someone who just happens to find your game and isn't famiiar with MUDs. On the BAT client, what would you add to that particular client that would take it from a 'half measure' to 'almost there'? I've played around with it a little myself and was quite impressed, although I didn't get into checking out its capabilities for client basics like external scripting, triggers, etc.

I haven't played with it much, and I'm not so much concerned with extra features (like scripting) as with the initial user experience... a poor initial experience which (IMHO) will scare away new (non-MUD) players, though not as quickly as plain telnet. If MUDs want to attract more players, they'll need a nicer newbie experience because (according to the posts I've seen) most players are lost within the first 10-60 minutes, long before they worry about scripting.

Some thoughts from my first few minutes of playing:

- Clicked "Create new character" and it sends me to a web page! Why not do this in the client?

- The web page wasn't working, and I found I could bypass that and just log in. All the "action" appeared to happen in the LL corner, where there's a small window (with small text, in courier) that's standard mud output, which has a fairly direct lineage from teletype. It doesn't need to do this, and could have one window for the room description, another for "events that are happening". (I've seen other MUD/IF clients that do this.) Or how about a separate window for inventory.

- As posted earlier, I'd like to click somewhere (on the words or ob