I would like to start here a petition for IRE to create a Scifi or a modern type of MUD.
Please no insults toward IRE.
This post is for those that like to play IRE's muds

Assault: High Tech War is the only modern/Sci-fi -type MUD I've played that has had a decent number of active players; the audience may not be large enough to make a profitable game. IRE's coffers can handle the required advertising and a slow-slope start, belike, but there's little that I've seen to show that the masses want modern MUDs.

And hey, they could call it pay-for-surgery or pay-for-steroids instead of pay-for-perks.

While you're waiting

I have to agree with Asaudan, modern/sci-fi MUDs just don't seem to go over anywhere near as well as fantasy MUDs. The closest to sci-fi a successful MUD usually goes is "steampunk" style or just having futuristic technology be powered by magic (our Aetherships in Lusternia are a little like that).

The thing about having a futuristic mud is everyone expects the combat to be done with projectile weapons, and I've set to see a mud handle ranged combat really well.

It's risky talking about the IRE business model at all, as I will more than likely invite a number of flames by doing so, but IRE games are definitely not, and I think everyone at least agrees on this, pay-for-play.

By the by, if anyone wishes to tell me how stupid I am or otherwise insult me, do us all a favour and either quash the urge or if you feel it truly necessary, PM me.

IRE does have their own forums you know...

I'd love to see another modern day MUD, because it's hardly ever done. I was a fan of Modus Operandi, but it got old and is limited. The-Night is a decent imitation, but it offers even less than MO, but a better community. The rest involve vampires and other stuff too fantastic for me to enjoy in a modern world.

Here's my viewpoint on sci-fi MUDs:

There is a market for them, but I'm unsure how large that market is. Notice when you search for futuristic MUDs on Topmudsites, nearly all of them are using borrowed/stolen (depending on your point of view) IP - Star Wars. Star Wars is sci-fi but it's really more of a combination of sci-fi and fantasy, which is why I suspect there is interest in it.

Eve-Online shows there is a market for sci-fi MUDs but as it is the biggest sci-fi MUD (it's graphical, obviously) around, and there are many fantasy MUDs many times its size (including WoW, which is 50-60x its size), one has to assume that the intersection of sci-fi and text is not going to be that large.

Federation/Fed II is definitely the most venerable of the sci-fi MUDs I'm aware of, and probably the most successful (they adopted our business model as well), but I just logged on right now, for instance, and they only have about 30 players online.

Will we ever do a sci-fi MUD? I wouldn't put it outside the realm of possibility, but it's not something we're falling over ourselves to do either. We've got two MUDs in development currently and that pretty much fills our plate for now anyway.

As far as contemporary-setting MUDs go, I'd say there is no evidence at all that there's any audience for this kind of setting in text. Typically, unless we thought we could build a MUD up to very close to or over 100 simultaneous players quickly, we wouldn't be interested, and I see very little hope of doing that with a contemporary-setting text MUD.

I do appreciate your confidence in us though, lovechief, and who knows, maybe someday we will do a sci-fi text MUD.

--matt

I don't think you are stupid at all Lisaera. I always thought of you as one of the most intelligent admins I've had as a player. You do come across as a bit cranky.

As for a Sci-Fi mud I'd enjoy one.

This is actually easier to handle in a futuristic mud than a fantasy mud, IMO. Fantasy muds have ranged weapons as well (bows, crossbows, wands, throwing knives, etc), but you also have to balance them against melee weapons, because that's what the majority of people tend to use. However in a futuristic setting it's generally accepted that someone with a knife is toast if they face off against someone armed with a gun.