As Tyche points out, it's not really something that you can easily compare, as popularity has far more to do with other factors. Are Deus Ex, GTA3 and Morrowwind popular because they are non-linear, or because of their marketting campaigns (although on the flip side, I can't recall ever seeing a game promoting itself by offering 'very linear gameplay').
However in the case of this thread it's much more straightforward. We have a fairly well-established mud in which players can only progress through killing monsters. The original poster wants to change it so that, beyond a certain point, players can only progress by completing quests.
Is it this going to make the mud more popular? Or are players more likely to prefer having the choice between killing monsters or completing quests? In my opinion, the latter is almost certainly the case. If the OP wants to encourage people to explore more then he can certainly offer incentives, but forcing (rather than encouraging) an established playerbase to change their playing style is generally a bad idea.
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