Virtual violence in God Wars II
 

Back in December 2006, I made a post about some new legislation that was being drawn up in Bavaria and Lower Saxony, designed to punish "cruel violence on humans or human-looking characters" inside games, with infringers facing up to 12 months' in jail for promoting or enacting in-game violence - you can read about the legislation here:

(German only)





Everyone thought the law would get shot down, but to the surprise (and horror) of many, it's just been passed - not for players at least, but for distributors and developers. As I live in the capital of Bavaria, this puts me under a lot of pressure.

I've contacted the Scherzamt (the department responsible) to see if the law also applies to text games, and they've said they'll investigate. However their officials don't speak English, so I've been told I need to translate my mud into German for them. I've already started doing this, but it's going to take a while to translate fully.

Hopefully the Scherzamt will say that the mud is okay, because there are no graphics, but it could go either way - so I've asked my players to try and tone down the violence (eg no rampages through the starting village, etc). If the wurst comes to the wurst I may even need to strip out the combat system entirely, and focus on other activites such as quests and roleplaying.

Thus for the time being, at least, I'm afraid the mud is no longer available in English - and while new players are still welcome, I would ask you to show some restraint in combat. It's okay to kill a few animals for their pelts, but please don't go around ripping the arms and legs off villagers.

Re: Virtual violence in God Wars II
 

April 1st? :P

Re: Virtual violence in God Wars II
 

Pretty good one too, would it have killed you to let it sit for a few hours before posting?

Re: Virtual violence in God Wars II
 

What if the villagers are of Jewish decedent?

Re: Virtual violence in God Wars II
 

Well I've reverted the mud back now, as the joke was getting a little thin. But basically I created a separate login screen, and a 'news' help file which gave a similar story to the one I posted here, but with five characters coloured - if read in rainbow-colour order, they spelled out "01APR".

I also created a German version of my NumberText() function (eg passing in '8' would return 'acht' instead of 'eight') which is used throughout the code, and added a few hundred common words to a string replacement function that got called at the socket level (meaning it affected every message sent to the players). The word replacement messed up the formatting and didn't handle grammar, but it was good enough for an April Fool's joke :)

Thai newbies, 'Es ist deutsch.'

[INFO] Dis kommt zuruck zu Gott Krieg II.

Dis newbies, 'Was zum Teufel?'

> who
-------------------------[ SPIELLEITER JETZT ANGEKOPPELT ]-------------------------
Grulk das Alt Ruby Drache (Drache)
------------------------[ SPIELER JETZT ANGEKOPPELT ]------------------------
Freakazoid das Lord von Feuer (Elemental) [Nirvana]
Magog das Aelterer Sturm Riese (Titan) [Koloss]
Molok das Trueblooded Teufel (Daemon) [Koloss]
Moebius das Swooping Wyvern (Drache) [Koloss]
Shin das Dunkel Warlord (Daemon) *AFK* [Hoelle Knights]
Wendigo das Sturm Wolf (Werwolf) [Koloss]
Guxx das Infernal Biest (Daemon) [Koloss]
Thai das Lupine Shifter (Blutsauger) [Schatten Templars]
Shinhino das Skeletal Drache (Dracolich) *AFK* [Gigant]
Cubazon das Dunkel Oni (Daemon) *AFK* [Spuk]
Riel das Enchanter (Magier)
Dakren das Lupine Hunter (Blutsauger) *AFK* -Chaos Syndicate-
Grizzle das Mind Magier (Magier) [Spuk]
ShadowBat das Schatten Krieger (Blutsauger) [Schatten Templars]
Shinhito das Umbral Seher (Blutsauger) *AFK*
IdimmuXul das Lehrling (Magier) [Schwarz Thaumaturges]
Tatsuya das Kleiner Daemon (Daemon) [Spuk]
Mapzilla das Avatar
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Es gibt jetzt 19 spieler angekoppelt, mit ein peak von 44 diese Laufzeit.
Durchschnittswert nummer von spieler ist 21.13, uber 145 stunden, 47 minuten und 3 sekunden.
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------


Previous 20 chats, zusammen mit wie lang her they were gemacht, sind als folgt:
[00:25:31] Slowdraw: Gut fight.
[00:25:17] Shin: Pathetic.
[00:25:01] Shin: Ist moebius das nur ein hier nicht afraid von mich?
[00:24:58] Slowdraw: Wie so? Ich gemacht mich selbst visible und du kept running.
[00:24:49] Shin: Und du left.
[00:24:40] Shin: Nice fleeing.
[00:24:31] Slowdraw: Nach mein blur timer cleard.
[00:24:26] Shin: Sicher.
[00:24:21] Shin: Right.
[00:24:05] Shin: Ist das ein gut fight zu du?
[00:23:56] Shin: Gut fight?
[00:23:47] Shin: Pathetic.
[00:17:15] Thai: JETZT JETZT JETZT.
[00:12:03] Odessis: Hilarious.
[00:11:49] Thai: Fuer das first 10 minuten.
[00:11:41] Thai: Then, nicht so viel.
[00:11:11] Odessis: Haha, ShadowBat das Schatten Krieger.
[00:07:08] Tatsuya: Hallo.
[00:00:08] KaVir: Servus zusammen.
[00:00:08] Thai: KAVIR!

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840>
Thai chats, 'Ich SHALL BEKOMME DU BACK FUER DAS.'

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840>
Atomisk newbies, 'Meanwhile Ich werde protest das joke bei eating arms im glyphstone.'

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840>
Odessis chats, 'Nicht lustig :P.'

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840>
Thai chats, 'Mark mein words....'

Thai chats, 'Auch, lustig als alle hoelle :P.'

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840> chat I thought it was amusing ;)
Du chat, 'Ich dachte es war amusing ;)'

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840>
Thai chats, 'Du bist laughing at alle von us.'

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840>
Thai chats, 'Du bist evil!'

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840>
Thai chats, 'Ii hhave ffound aan aanoying wway aaround iit, hhowever :P.'

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840>
Odessis chats, '*gives middle claw*'

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840>
Das rain outside lightens, becoming ein gentle patter gegen das tavern roof.

(2 neu mails) 2840/2840> chat yes, you can do that
Du chat, 'Ja, du kann tun das.'