[prof1515]

Originally Posted by Xerihae I'm relatively certain all ROM MUDs also have this. My reasoning? If you spam in a bunch of commands and hit enter, you still move at a (relatively) sedate place. If you place the same commands in a mobprog and have the mob execute it, it's done lightning-fast because the mob has no movement/speed restrictions placed on it. I would imagine it was put in to stop people with expansive macro/alias sets from running rings around people who just type. I'm sure someone with more familiarity with the ROM coding could point out the relevant section of code, but I can't be bothered to go find it because I am lazy

Interesting. I'm not very familiar with ROM so I'll have to do some inquiries with folks who are. I'm not completely certain but I think the movement command delays on the RPIs extend to NPCs as well which might therefore help define the implementation of this change. RPIs like HL were Diku-derivitives and thus the change was a custom one and might have been across the boards with PCs and NPCs alike. Thanks for the heads-up on ROM though. Like I said, more research on this needs to be done which is why I'm hesitant to put it on the list.

Take care,

Jason

[shasarak]

A question: why would anyone imagine that the origin of the term "RPI" is even faintly relevant to anything? Words change their meaning over time, and once they have changed it's pointless to carry on trying to use them in their original sense; that simply obscures your meaning rather than clarifying it. Language is dynamic.

[incognito9]

Originally Posted by Jherlen I'm certain that as early as 2002 at least, RPI was a term being used, because I was developing a game that aspired to be one. RPImud.com came about to group together MUDs that had been using the term RPI for years prior.

That's really interesting...

Now, for the sake of argument, how did you try to be one? Did you work on a really good backstory and try to encourage the right players to come by, or did you just try to implement a specific set of features?

[prof1515]

A question: why would anyone imagine that the origin of the term "RPI" is even faintly relevant to anything? Words change their meaning over time, and once they have changed it's pointless to carry on trying to use them in their original sense; that simply obscures your meaning rather than clarifying it. Language is dynamic.

Because when the term was invented it referred to a very small group of MUDs. While no one set out a clear definition of exactly what constituted RPI, it served a purpose by assisting those who coined and used it to reference the specific type of MUD design and philosophy they were referring to and seeking. As used today, it serves little to no purpose because there's no standard definition and is used to describe pretty much the same thing as several other terms.

Think of the term "monkey". People use it to describe a lot of creatures including gorillas, chimpanzees, and the other apes as well as some types of prosimians. But apes and prosimians are not monkeys. Many people can't tell the difference and use the word in such a generic sense but to someone who knows the difference, it's quite clear. The term "monkey" has a definite meaning and refer to specific types of primates, even if the general public couldn't tell a bonobo from a baboon. The same is true of the term RPI. Six or seven years ago if you said you were looking for a RPI, the people using the term knew what you were talking about even if there wasn't a concise definition of the characteristics written down.

The same set of characteristics is still referred to as RPI. The only difference is that a lot of people started using the term but without any clear understanding of it, many based on a linguistic misunderstanding and in a manner to refer to subjective characteristics that can't be quantified ("intense role-play" means different things to different people after all). But just as a lot of people call a gorilla a monkey, it's not nor does their misuse of the term mean that the term RPI means any MUD any more than monkey is an acceptable word to describe a gorilla. Yes, "monkey" has other definitions but they refer to completely different uses such as addiction ("monkey on your back") or to a foolish person ("those monkeys at the tavern") but those are completely different uses, not misuses.

The problem facing use of the term RPI to describe anything but those games to which it originally referred is that there's no standard definition. The games to which it was first applied shared certain characteristics, characteristics which have been present now in over two dozens different games over a period of more than a decade and a half. No such set of characteristics is present in the other games as the term has been used by everything from role-play enforced games to role-play accepted H&S games. Look at Armageddon and you see those 19 characteristics mentioned at the beginning of this thread. Look at Harshlands and you see the same 19 of 19. Look at Shadows of Isildur and you see 19 of 19 as well. Look at any of the other two dozen or so games that are clearly identified as RPI and all 19 are present there too. A clear definition can be formed as to what kind of game the term is referring to. Now look at some of the games over which use of the term is contested and you see 15 of 19, 13 of 19, or 6 of 19 and in some cases the 6 on one game are not included in the 13 on another. There's no consistency.

Thus there really isn't another definition for the word, merely a lack of understanding of the existing definition. Therefore, has the definition really changed or does it just mean people don't know the definition and simply use it improperly. The purpose of this thread is to aid in clarifying what was meant and dispelling linguistic misinterpretations (such as the grammatically incorrect reading of the term as "intense role-play") which have clouded the context of the original definition. Just as the term monkey doesn't mean gorillas and chimpazees regardless of its misuse by some in reference to these creatures, so too does RPI not mean other MUDs just because of misunderstanding. The definition hasn't really changed, it's just misused since there doesn't seem to be any real definition to replace it. It's just, to quote more than one person in earlier discussions, "what people want it to mean". That's not a definition though.

There seems to be some question as to "what difference does it make" if the term is used in such a general sense. For those seeking the type of games that the term originally applied, it serves the important purpose of distinguishing such games from the hundreds of other MUDs out there, just as it did when the term was coined. But what of the opposite? What difference does it make if the term is only used in its original context? Role-play MUD is a term that equally serves the purpose that such a general use does without an original meaning that can lend an alternative earlier definition. If some feel that all that is required to be RPI is the presence of role-play and not even an enforced role-play policy, is that not simply a role-play MUD? RPI has a specific meaning which has existed as long as the term itself. Other uses lack any clear similarity of characteristics beyond that which is already denoted by the term role-play MUD (or if one need be more specific, role-play encouraged or role-play enforced MUD).

Take care,

Jason

[Zhiroc]

After seeing this go 'round and 'round, I think it can be boiled down to this: the RPI folks are trying to create a "brand" or "trademark" well after the creation of their "product". However, the term they used originally has been co-opted by the community at large. Furthermore, the term RPI, unlike "monkey", is formed of 3 words that have generic meaning, and even the order is nothing special as other terms like "RP enforced" and "RP accepted" is the common way to describe a MUD.

Why are brand names nowadays usually some sort of "made-up" word? Because of this very reason, I think. You can't get people to consider a branding unique if they already have an understanding, right or wrong" about the words you choose, unless you are very, very successful and ubiquitous.

So the way I see it? Don't beat your heads against the wall. Make a new term and trademark it. Or maybe, drop the notion that the "I" means "intensive". Create an graphical trademark around the letters RPI and say that it just means "RPI". Or if you want, pick a new word, like "Initiative".

I imagine there are legal ways to protect your brand, and ways to license games to use it, but I don't know the specifics.

[Spoke]

To further shasarak's point that language is dynamic, how many of you would feel offended if told:

"You look very gay, like a fag-smoking guy on his element"?

Well, maybe in England, 50 years ago, this would have been received in a much different light than today's US.

[Bakha]

Originally Posted by Zhiroc So the way I see it? Don't beat your heads against the wall. Make a new term and trademark it. Or maybe, drop the notion that the "I" means "intensive". Create an graphical trademark around the letters RPI and say that it just means "RPI". Or if you want, pick a new word, like "Initiative". I imagine there are legal ways to protect your brand, and ways to license games to use it, but I don't know the specifics.

Good post. This is pretty much my suggestion as well. Just drop the meaning for the acronym altogether.

My question, I guess is: what is the motivation of mud owners to label their games RPI now? How is it different from role-play enforced? I guess that part of it is the trendiness of the term RPI.

Why, though, is RPI a trendy term? Because of a buzz that was created around the term... by the original RPI muds.

Predictably, the "buzz" around RPI will die out as the term becomes basically another meaningless term like roleplay enforced or roleplay mandatory. No one is really at fault, it's just the way things happen. I think this dynamic repeats itself in real life all the time. For example, when a small, trendy hip town like Austin, Boulder, or Portland becomes "discovered." Suddenly, everyone wants to move there and enjoy the coolness of that thing. When all of the outsiders move in, there is a backlash from the "locals" because they perceive the interlopers as destroyers of the very thing which makes the locations special. The people moving in, meanwhile, appreciate and love the very things that the town represents, and they don't understand why they're being accused of trying to change things or destroy the good things in the town.

The same dynamic repeats itself in life all the time, with bands, bars, sports, etc... It would probably be an interesting subject for a Freakonomics style book.

[Milawe]

Originally Posted by Zhiroc After seeing this go 'round and 'round, I think it can be boiled down to this: the RPI folks are trying to create a "brand" or "trademark" well after the creation of their "product". However, the term they used originally has been co-opted by the community at large. Furthermore, the term RPI, unlike "monkey", is formed of 3 words that have generic meaning, and even the order is nothing special as other terms like "RP enforced" and "RP accepted" is the common way to describe a MUD. Why are brand names nowadays usually some sort of "made-up" word? Because of this very reason, I think. You can't get people to consider a branding unique if they already have an understanding, right or wrong" about the words you choose, unless you are very, very successful and ubiquitous. So the way I see it? Don't beat your heads against the wall. Make a new term and trademark it. Or maybe, drop the notion that the "I" means "intensive". Create an graphical trademark around the letters RPI and say that it just means "RPI". Or if you want, pick a new word, like "Initiative". I imagine there are legal ways to protect your brand, and ways to license games to use it, but I don't know the specifics.

Problem is that it's a made-up list of features co-opted by several muds. You can't really license it or trademark it because it's not actually a product. It's kind of like how "cola" is a kind of drink that is sweet and has carbonation except that people try to enforce how "cola" is used rather than cola evolving to mean what it means now. (Well, and cola doesn't really stand for some real words that could be taken to mean something else.) There's pretty much nothing you can legally do with it unless all the muds with that feature set want to come under one business that holds the trademark. It wouldn't be worth the money to do that anyway since only a few people are probably this adamant that this specific feature set is the only type of game they'll ever play. Trademarking isn't cheap!

[Milawe]

Originally Posted by Bakha Good post. This is pretty much my suggestion as well. Just drop the meaning for the acronym altogether.

I still think they should just go with AFS. Drop the Armageddon and just have it be "A Feature Set". As far as I know, no other mud groups really try to categorize themselves so specifically with a list of preferred features, so making it as simple as "A Feature Set" would be clear enough. It'd be at least as clear as "RPI". RPFS? Roleplay feature set? That's probably more clear than all of them.

Originally Posted by Bakha My question, I guess is: what is the motivation of mud owners to label their games RPI now? How is it different from role-play enforced? I guess that part of it is the trendiness of the term RPI. Why, though, is RPI a trendy term? Because of a buzz that was created around the term... by the original RPI muds.

Yeah, I think I heard about it a few years back with some disgruntled Threshold player made some post about playing a roleplay intensive mud where the roleplay was really intense. Thus, my first impression of the term RPI was always that it stood for "roleplay intense." I didn't really pay attention to it then.

Then it cropped up some in the past three years on TMS when I was reading the site on and off. Again, I actually didn't really pay attention except to think it was not really that different from the terms MUD, MUSH, roleplay enforced, roleplay encouraged, roleplay accepted, etc. It wasn't until this thread happened that I something seemed a bit off to me:

Looking for an RPI, where the 'I' stands for "Immersive"

So there was a buzz, but the buzz wasn't really loud and clear for people who weren't really involved in that specific community or for people who didn't keep with every trend that happens in the mudding world. I know now that that the players of this particular feature set want a distinction from other roleplay enforced muds, but I still maintain that it's not quite as clear as its made out to be. Half of the muds listed on RPImud.com don't fit what is posted here as the features required to actually be a part of the group. The standard, before now, just seemed to be "We think this mud's roleplaying is intense, and their code promotes it." Perhaps the people who have spent 300 hours of research on the subject of RPI know better, but most of the world (even the mudding world) probably don't care enough to spend even 1/100th of that time looking into it.

Originally Posted by Bakha Predictably, the "buzz" around RPI will die out as the term becomes basically another meaningless term like roleplay enforced or roleplay mandatory.

I had kind of thought that it had already gone "generic" since the term's kind of just slung around by tons of the newer muds. I figured they were just trying to say, "Hey, we've got RP here!" and players would be expected to research the individual mud's features themselves.

I have to say that I find it a bit silly that a certain players expect to basically have things dumbed down to three letters for them, and then they are horribly offended when the features on the mud don't meet their expectations. That's just me, though. Most people don't know what the three letters stand for except for the generic terms they represent. They have no idea that it involves things like permadeath or a class-less, skill-based system or whatever else gets tacked onto the feature set. They didn't do it to offend the players of such games. They probably just thought, like I did, that it stood for roleplay intensive, and they probably had such lofty goals as to making the roleplay "intense" on their mud. For a while MURPE was extremely popular for roleplaying games, and a ton of people started tacking that on to their muds. Then people got bored of it and moved on with other acronyms and fancy-pants names for their muds. Seriously, though, most mud admins barely pay attention to what's posted on any of these mudding sites. I know that I didn't for a long time.

Originally Posted by Bakha No one is really at fault, it's just the way things happen. I think this dynamic repeats itself in real life all the time. For example, when a small, trendy hip town like Austin, Boulder, or Portland becomes "discovered." Suddenly, everyone wants to move there and enjoy the coolness of that thing. When all of the outsiders move in, there is a backlash from the "locals" because they perceive the interlopers as destroyers of the very thing which makes the locations special. The people moving in, meanwhile, appreciate and love the very things that the town represents, and they don't understand why they're being accused of trying to change things or destroy the good things in the town.

You always had a wonderful way with words. This seems like an apt analogy.

Anyway, it doesn't really matter if the term remains as it is, or it changes. People can't just be expected to know that roleplay intensive means something other than the "roleplay is intense". Crying about it and railing at the injustices of the world won't really change that. We could post our little hearts out, but most players and a whole lot of admins don't really give a crap what we post on these sites.

[shasarak]

Originally Posted by Spoke To further shasarak's point that language is dynamic, how many of you would feel offended if told: "You look very gay, like a fag-smoking guy on his element"? Well, maybe in England, 50 years ago, this would have been received in a much different light than today's US.

Or, in victorian writing, you might encounter a sentence describing a man running around "ejaculating furiously". That roughly translates to "exclaiming furiously" or "shouting furiously" in more modern English. Of course you're perfectly at liberty to use this sort of victorian terminology if you wish, but you can't expect most users of modern English to understand what you mean if you do.

[Milawe]

Originally Posted by shasarak Or, in victorian writing, you might encounter a sentence describing a man running around "ejaculating furiously". That roughly translates to "exclaiming furiously" or "shouting furiously" in more modern English. Of course you're perfectly at liberty to use this sort of victorian terminology if you wish, but you can't expect most users of modern English to understand what you mean if you do.

No, I wouldn't say that "exclaiming furiously" is what comes to mind...

[prof1515]

After seeing this go 'round and 'round, I think it can be boiled down to this: the RPI folks are trying to create a "brand" or "trademark" well after the creation of their "product".

No one's trying to "create a 'brand'...well after the creation" of anything. The "brand", to use your term, was well established. The term is not a new one. The "brand" has existed since the term RPI was created. It was created to specifically describe a group of games sharing a similar code and policy philosophy. The second interpretation of the term really wasn't some long evolution over time but a rather sudden one over a period of a few years. The problem seems to have stemmed from other games who began to use this term, a term which was established in its use, primarily because they either a) didn't understand it and mistakenly believed it referred to a subjective assessment of the quality of role-play, or b) deliberately attempted to capitalize on the belief that the quality of role-play found on RPIs was of a higher degree than found elsewhere. In most cases I suspect it was the former though in a couple I'm not so sure that it wasn't the latter that motivated and continues to motivate them to use the term. Either way, the use of the term was established to denote a particular style of game even though no one bothered to spell out just what that style entailed. It was sort of like that definition of pornography: "I know it when I see it."

However, the term they used originally has been co-opted by the community at large. Furthermore, the term RPI, unlike "monkey", is formed of 3 words that have generic meaning, and even the order is nothing special as other terms like "RP enforced" and "RP accepted" is the common way to describe a MUD.

The order is important however, because if they'd called the first RPIs "intensive role-play" MUDs/code/games, the meaning would match the now-erroneous interpretation. They did not however and there is a difference between "intensive role-play" and "role-play intensive". The placement of a word in such a phrase means everything.

An example would be if I were holding a flower petal and said, "I am holding a rose-red petal." In no way does that imply that the petal is from a rose. However, saying "I am holding a red rose petal" would indicate a completely different meaning. In the first example, the petal could be from any flower but in the second example it is from a rose. The order of words in the English language does determine their meaning. Thus, "Role-Playing Intensive" is not the same thing as "intensive role-playing".

Personally I don't think it's an unreasonable expectation that people in a text-based gaming community be literate, at least not those for whom English is their primary language (and no, this is not intended as a flame). I don't know when they're teaching it nowadays but when I went to school this stuff was drilled into our heads by the time we left junior high.

Additionally, the misconstrued use of the term RPI to denote "intensive" role-play is actually something that can't be assessed objectively (or at least not easily, if at all). As has been pointed out by all sides, the quality of role-play, including how "intense" it is, is a matter of opinion. Thus, it's meaningless as a term for describing a game's role-play quality because such a designation is a purely subjective one and relevant as a designation only for the person using the using it.

Why are brand names nowadays usually some sort of "made-up" word? Because of this very reason, I think. You can't get people to consider a branding unique if they already have an understanding, right or wrong" about the words you choose, unless you are very, very successful and ubiquitous.

There is no evidence of an understanding in the general community before the term was created. Perhaps there was an understanding of the term "intensive role-play" though I would wager that the term didn't find its way into use until after "Role-Play Intensive" debuted and was misinterpreted. When you look at the way in which RPI code was developed in comparison to other role-play MUDs, you can see very clearly that the design followed the function they wanted. It wasn't H&S code with a role-play policy and a world design molded to fit the existing code parameters. They didn't have policies of "ignore the levels" or other such rationalizations to deal with unwanted code nor did they have to create elements of theIt was role-play intensive in design, concentrating on their goals of the role-play.

Or maybe, drop the notion that the "I" means "intensive...and say that it just means "RPI". Or if you want, pick a new word, like "Initiative".

What good does RPI mean if others continue to use the ungrammatical interpretation to describe their games? We're still left with RPI being used in two different contexts, one of which would remain a based on a grammatical error to support a subjective opinion really only valid to the person making the claim.

Perhaps Newworlds' "IRP" designation is a good alternative so far as creating a vague term to describe a subjective opinion of an aspect of a game that really can't be assessed objectively. It really means nothing which is pretty much the same thing the present misinterpretation of RPI means. So long as the distinction between RPI and IRP is made clear, MUDs could continue to hype their games with that term. Though the similarity between the two might still confuse some, it might alleviate some of the confusion.

I imagine there are legal ways to protect your brand, and ways to license games to use it, but I don't know the specifics.

Trademarking a term costs money and there are other considerations that must be met beyond the simple desire to possess a trademark. I do have some experience with this having gone through the process myself with the name of my MUD. Speaking of which, I need to make a call about that....

Jason

[Jherlen]

Originally Posted by incognito9 That's really interesting... Now, for the sake of argument, how did you try to be one? Did you work on a really good backstory and try to encourage the right players to come by, or did you just try to implement a specific set of features?

We did both. The mud never got off the ground while I was staffing it, but we did decide to implement features like permadeath, short descriptions, barriers between IC and OOC, and so on, features common in MUDs you'd associate with the RPI term. We also put a lot of time fleshing out the world and cultures and backstory.

[Disillusionist]

The really dead horse is the word 'groovy'.
It was kinda co-opted from the jazz culture, shortened from 'in the groove'. Interestingly enough, people who used the word 'groovy' ... weren't. I can only recall the Brady Bunch using it. And just see if you feel 'groovy' listening to Simon & Garfunkel's 59th Street Bridge Song (popularly called "Feelin' Groovy").

But, people were trying to relate an emotional set in language. I remember all the hubbub (okay, I don't because there really wasn't any) when 'in the groove' and hence 'groovy' gave way to 'in the pocket'. I mean, come ON, the groove, as everyone knew, was when the music got really -sweet- and made you feel good, although some people erroneously thought it meant 'in the groove of a vynil record album'. What does that have to do with pockets? That much larger and inferior bunch of people obviously were confused by people who had nothing to do with jazz. Damn hippies.

'In the pocket' enjoyed a pretty long run, even though it was broadened to mean a a foregone conclusion (billiards), a bribed official, or a secure location, but it did still retain a meaning about finding that little niche of emotions close enough to its original meaning that it wasn't entirely lost (even though jazz had given way to rocknroll, which gave away grudgingly to disco, which finally died a much-needed death only to be replaced by friggin' hiphop). By this point, however, no one was even saying 'groovy' any more, although it was clear the Brady Bunch was going into eternal syndication. Marsha Marsha Marsha!

But the -final- straw was 'in the zone'! How DARE people clinicize 'groovy' into such a banal generic term like zone??? It lacked artistry, and it usually meant 'oblivious to everything around you but the task at hand'! How could that -possibly- be groovy?

Yeesh!
I'm just glad the military doesn't give a rip that 'RPG' has be 'co-opted' by people in a relatively short span of time. I mean, Rocket-Propelled Grenades vs. Roleplaying Games...I don't want -those- guys mad at me.

I guess I'm playing the 'age card'. I've seen the language change drastically in a generation (I remember when you only heard the word 'gay'