[Muirdach]

Very much agree. MUD reputations (and marketing for them) are very, very fragile things - I think mostly because the community is just so oversaturated with them. All it takes is one thing that a prospective player doesn't like, and you can forget about them, they'll just go hunt through some of the other thousands of games out there. In fact, you're lucky if they give you 10 minutes of honest appraisal. I find myself talking about this on my MUD-related blog (see signature if you're interested) a lot, simply because when there's that much competition, every word is critical. Even misspelling a single word can make a huge difference, because people see that and instantly form a perception, that whoever wrote the ad doesn't care enough to make sure that everything is spelled correctly. Is it harsh and judgmental? Yes, a lot of the time. People don't do it to be shallow, but because there are just so many options out there, dropping 1% on the prospective player's internal test may be enough to get them to move on.