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Old 01-03-2006, 07:13 PM   #118
Anitra
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Threshold @ Posted: Jan. 03 2006,02,05
‘Hidden motives’…  well...

The main divider between commercial and free muds is whether or not you make any money from your Mud. (And let's keep the question of whether or not you make any profit from it out of this discussion, because 'profit' can be manipulated in too many ways. So let's keep it simple; if you do or do not make any money from it).

If you do, you can use that money to pay for banners or other types of ads, to market your mud and get more players, which in turn will generate more money... Free muds don't have that option, which puts them at a great disadvantage from the start.

But... Then you have the commercial muds that choose to advertise themselves as free, although they clearly are commercial. Apparently you don’t do that, Threshold. Neither do some large, old time commercial muds like Gemstone and DragonRealms. And I commend you for it. But some commercial Muds do.

And that is where the real hidden motives come into play. Because why do they do it?
Clearly to get new player hooked to their mud, before they realise that they actually have to pay, if they want a real chance to compete with the players that do.

We all know how it works. Players get incredibly attached to the mud they play, once they have vested some time and effort into developing their char, and made some friends within the mud. Even if the Mud is a crappy stock Diku, even if the imps are immature jerks who cheat and/or abuse their players. Or even if the game turns out to be a disguised pay-for–perks mud, most players stick to the mud, after they passed the first newbie stage, unless they get a really strong incentive to leave. So they stay. And sooner or later most of them pay. (And the very few that still don’t can be used in the advertising, to show how you don’t have to pay. As Valg so aptly put it; You always have the option to walk from New York to California, instead of taking the jet flight).

To sum this up, maybe having parallel lists might be taking things a bit too far, I’ll grant you that. But having a way to separate the really free muds from the commercial ones is a very legitimate wish from both mud owners and mere mud players like me. And it is nothing new. It’s a long time request from all owners of free muds. If there were a filter to separate free muds from commercial, just as there is a filter to separate PK from non PK, or RPI from nom RP, I think most members of the mud community would settle for that and be content. But as long as the option does not exist, this discussion will keep popping up from time to time, because the free muds feel that they don’t get a fair treatment.

It would be quite simple to set the separation criteria, so that isn’t really the problem:. If you can get ANY in game benefits from paying real life money, (whether they be ‘pay-for-perks’, ‘donation equipment’ or just the plain ‘pay-to-play’); then the mud is commercial. If not, it is free.

The only reason why a listing option like this doesn’t already exist is that certain commercial muds have always vehemently opposed any suggestions in that direction. And why do they do that?

That is where the real ‘hidden motives’  come into play.
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