Just curious, what kind of affect has the release of World of Warcraft had on the mud you admin/play? We've seen around a 10% drop in numbers, but some of the earlier players of WoW have started to return saying that it lacks longevity and depth. Then again, some others have said they'll probably never mud again.

Interestingly enough, I've just recently made the connection. The drop is certainly there, but like you've said, many are coming back for the RP that you simply cannot get in a graphical MMORPG.

You can get roleplaying in a graphical MUD/MMORPG, just not one that's trying to appeal to the lowest common denominator. Check out Underlight for instance.

--matt

I myself am probably one of the last living humans to have not played World of Warcraft. Everybody says it's really great, but I just don't have the money to play it.

You're right. I was speaking on MMOs as a whole, though. Certainly there must be exceptions, but I cannot imagine an RP Graphical world as functional and brilliantly done as a text-based MUD. My judgment was based on the Graphicals I've played and the ones I've taken a look at.

Graphics and graphical interfaces just aren't there yet in terms of equaling text MUDs for the kinds of things most of us like text MUDs for. As the saying goes, "Try bowing ironically in a graphical MUD." (Easy to do in text of course.)

Equaling the sort of feature range text MUDs can have just in terms of emotes would be prohibitively expensive in graphics, which is good news for all of us. =)

--matt

Feh, WoW is bollocks anyways. Whoever made that MMORPG? Disney? It looks like some dumb Nintendo game aimed a 12 year olds instead of a serious MMORPG.

Too many colors, too much hype, not enough RPG.

But those of you who want to play it, just wait a while for some private server to come available. I've finally found myself a good private Lineage 2 server. Best thing ever. It looks good, the players are nice, PK is allowed and the admin actually know what he's doing. In short, everything my old MUD wasn't, heh.

Ingham, by "private server" I assume you mean a pirated/illegal server?

Don't you think it is morally reprehensible to play, and encourage others to play, on such a blatantly illegal server? There certainly is no room to debate the possible ethics of such a thing. If it is a pirate server of a commercial MMORPG, it is definitely using stolen IP.

As for RP in MMORPGs:

I think one of the bigger interface problems is the fact that it requires an activation command (usually the enter key) to go into chat mode. If for some reason you hit enter twice or the first enter press is not registered (lag or whatnot) then your attempts to chat cause 15 windows to pop up as your speaking is translated into keyboard commands.

In a MUD, you are always right there at the command line and it is MUCH easier to communicate.