We're gearing up for a revamp for our site and I'm looking around to find a company that can handle what we want - a redesign of the front page's look and organization and overall look of the site, and producing templates for the several different types of web documents we have so they have a coherent feel.  I was wondering if other MUD admins had used professional services and if so, if they have any they would recommend.  

While there are plenty of volunteers among our staff and players, I'd like to find someone who is trained in design, does this professionally, understands the nuances of information organization, can show me some samples of their work and who won't mind reworking the design until we're happy with it.  If you want to post here, it might be a usefult thread for other admins, or if the info's sensitive in some way (I.e. "whatever you do, don't work with Company X"), please drop me e-mail at

Well, the only professional web developer I've known well enough to recommend is the owner and designer of (an extremely popular Wheel of Time/Other Fantasy site), from which you can get a good idea of his style. Nothing particularly flashy or artistic, but clean and friendly-looking. Except for the chat, the entire design and code of the site, forums, features, etc. is his work.

I don't think he's very familiar with text mudding, though, if that's a concern to you. And he's currently working on his doctorate in Telecommunications, so it could be he's concentrating on that full time.

I am interested in this as well - so if you can, please make sure to post the info here. Also - how should one expect to spend on this kind of endevour. I've looked around and see prices fluctuate greatly. Is there a good "base price" to shoot for?

It's pretty variable. Each of our websites (check my .sig) was designed, minus the text content, for between $2500 and $4000. A big corporate web design firm would charge far more. We use a contractor we found by posting a job listing on Craig's List and asking people to submit prototypes for the first website we wanted done. A lot of web designers bitched about that and said we were just looking for free work, but whatever. We chose a guy in the end whose design we liked the best, and then had him do a completely different design for us. I'd refer you guys to him but we're keeping him busy right now and for the forseeable future.

The key is to really look around. If you are going to pay web designers to do it, you can find yourself a great deal by working with individuals rather than corporations and just treating them respectfully (paying on time, etc). Go on Craig's List or whatnot. There are a metric ton of web designers looking for independent contracting work.

--matt

Typically what you'd do for a commercial game is put up a teaser site possibly with forums once you're past the concept stage and are far enough into development that it's worth getting some people excited about what you're doing. Some nice eyecandy, some basic info about your game, but nothing particularly elaborate. Think of it as a brochureware site, optionally backed by forums.

If you release the site too soon you risk exciting potential players and then letting them down with the long delay between site release and your alpha or beta period. If you release the site too late, you miss out on the potential to build the excitement of your potential starting playerbase. Kind of a judgement call.

Whatever you do though, you do not want to release a crappy looking site. First impressions are hard to overcome.

--matt

The guy currently working on our new site is great. I cannot recall the location of the sample work I'd seen, but you're welcome to contact him. He incorporates a lot of identity and branding strategy into his design, which looks like it will work out fantastically. His name is Eric Nowina and his email address is

Good Luck,

Validus

I always recomend Dataworx Consulting Services(). I did my 1 year internship there, they're a great group, have some big names behind them, and so alot of smaller work aswell.