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KaVir · 05-01-2002, 12:01 PM

Dulan, I could understand your doubts if Alexander Tau had claimed to have been creating muds for 20 years - but he didn't. There is a big difference between creating "games", and creating "muds" - I've been doing the former for around 15 years, but the latter for only 7.

In regard to the "success" of NWN, I have my doubts, but I do think this is another step (for graphical muds) in the same direction that text-based muds have gone. I have spoken with Alexander about the GDG via email and have been following the discussions on his public forum, but I'm seriously considering taking a more active role. In particular, one of the things he said to me in his email was "Some of the motovation behind this is to help to legitimize the MU* community in the eyes of the world. By making them such a part of the new GDG, and showing how the work that was done in all those 'old text' games has meaning today is part of that."

His point is a very valid one. I'm sure many of you here are familiar with the way the graphical muds (or "MMORPGs" as they like to call themselves) look down on us. The majority of players of games like EverQuest - which is little more than a DikuMUD with a graphical front end - look down on us as being insignificant and outdated (if they even notice us at all) despite being a decade behind us in terms of feature development. We might laugh when they try to tackle problems that we've solved years earlier, but at the end of the day we're losing out, because their attitude seems to be reflected by the gaming industry as a whole. NWN is being praised for doing what AberMUD did 15 years ago - allowing the public to run their own online roleplaying games - and we don't even get mentioned.

I think it's about time that we started giving these newcomers a lesson in history, and Alexander's forums are certainly a good place to start. I want these people to realise that text-based muds are not antiques, but in many cases are actually the forerunners in terms of features and gameplay, and that there is still much that this newer generation of muds can learn from us.

05-01-2002, 12:01 PM	#16
KaVir Legend Join Date: Apr 2002 Name: Richard Home MUD: God Wars II Posts: 2,052	Dulan, I could understand your doubts if Alexander Tau had claimed to have been creating muds for 20 years - but he didn't. There is a big difference between creating "games", and creating "muds" - I've been doing the former for around 15 years, but the latter for only 7. In regard to the "success" of NWN, I have my doubts, but I do think this is another step (for graphical muds) in the same direction that text-based muds have gone. I have spoken with Alexander about the GDG via email and have been following the discussions on his public forum, but I'm seriously considering taking a more active role. In particular, one of the things he said to me in his email was "Some of the motovation behind this is to help to legitimize the MU* community in the eyes of the world. By making them such a part of the new GDG, and showing how the work that was done in all those 'old text' games has meaning today is part of that." His point is a very valid one. I'm sure many of you here are familiar with the way the graphical muds (or "MMORPGs" as they like to call themselves) look down on us. The majority of players of games like EverQuest - which is little more than a DikuMUD with a graphical front end - look down on us as being insignificant and outdated (if they even notice us at all) despite being a decade behind us in terms of feature development. We might laugh when they try to tackle problems that we've solved years earlier, but at the end of the day we're losing out, because their attitude seems to be reflected by the gaming industry as a whole. NWN is being praised for doing what AberMUD did 15 years ago - allowing the public to run their own online roleplaying games - and we don't even get mentioned. I think it's about time that we started giving these newcomers a lesson in history, and Alexander's forums are certainly a good place to start. I want these people to realise that text-based muds are not antiques, but in many cases are actually the forerunners in terms of features and gameplay, and that there is still much that this newer generation of muds can learn from us.