Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

...if you want the "kids"...

Well it depends on which kids you mean. If you mean "the kids who want to play multi-shooter H&S graphics games," then no, I don't want the kids.

If you mean "the kids who like to read and who might be interested in creating and participating in an interactive storyline," then yeah I want the kids. And kids like that, aren't going to "need" graphics in order to get pulled toward text games.

I want people who want to play text games, to play text games. I want people who want to play graphics, to play graphics. I do not want text games to try and be graphic games. When Gemstone came out with an updated super-graphical front end, that's pretty much when I started weaning myself off of it and wandering back to the less graphical telnet-type clients. I quite GS for a lot of reasons, but that was definitely on the top 10 list. I just could not STAND the graphics, and there was no other way to access the game. If you wanted to play GS, you had to use their Wizard. I'm pretty sure you still can't play GS without downloading and using their Wizard; it isn't accessable via telnet at all.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

I've always thought of MUDS as something tabletop gamers would find to play in between sessions of whatever game they play.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

One small real-world detail: above all, kids want to fit in and socialize with other kids their age. This applies to even the most creative and intelligent ones among them. They may eventually love a text-based game, but they're not even going to try it if they fear they'd be labeled as geeks by their peers.

Another small real-world detail: generations of gamers set the bar of what kind of entertainment they would even consider trying. Even in 1996 when I first discovered MUDs, a game with no graphics was below that bar for 90% of my social group. The bar is much higher now, and it includes not only graphics, but also accessibility and social networking. At this point, MUDs as they are, fall below the bar for 99.99% of the gamer population, at least. That includes many millions of people "interested in creating and participating in an interactive storyline" and at least a few million people much smarter and more imaginative than you and I. Yet, they will not pick up a text-based game.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

I just don't see any problem that needs to be solved here. Text games attract people who are attracted to text games. Graphics games attract people who are attracted to graphics games. People who are attracted to games in general and aren't too particular which type they play, or actively enjoy both, will play both.

This so-called "problem" that the OP feels needs to be "solved," isn't occurring in Armageddon. In fact, the game has grown in its playerbase and in "active players logged in" in just the past year, and it's been around for almost two decades.

Just a few years ago when I first started playing it, there might be an average of 30 people logged in on a typical weeknight after supper. Now, it's up over 40, and often goes beyond 60, before I log out for the night. In fact - right now, on a Saturday evening, when most teenage adults, non-teenage adults, and even middle-aged adults, are getting ready to enjoy a night out - there are 51 players currently in the world, other than myself. And it's not even 8PM yet.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Your actually missing, what in my own opinion is one of the MUDs strongest attributes: The size of the worlds, and amount of items and varietry of gameplay.

Anyway, if you team up, maybe make some sort of "MU* lobby" where you can access MU* under far more accurate definitions, with opinions by PLAYERs of what each MU* suites which gameplay style. There no need to alienate players when making a new way to access and begin MUDding. If you look at me and plazmi's posts, we aren''t saying "get rid of the textbase gameplay", what we're trying to convey is "make a pretty face to MU* with graphics, then when they try, let the actual gameplay draw them into the MU* s actual atractions".

plazmi, you are goddamn on the mark.
One small real-world detail: above all, kids want to fit in and socialize with other kids their age. This applies to even the most creative and intelligent ones among them. They may eventually love a text-based game, but they're not even going to try it if they fear they'd be labeled as geeks by their peers.

This applies to games with s*** graphics. I LOVE retro games, anything from "joust" to Aardwolf to "Colin McRae Rally". All have limited graphics, and why i dont bring them up as a subject with my peers. This is even though im already labelled a geek :p.

When you say you dont see any problem needing fixing, there isnt a problem part suppourting your games existence. First you have to expect and acknowledge:You can take the following actions:Obiviously each of these actions hcould end with your game dieing, losing players or you going bankrupt, or could gain you revenue and increase your playerbase.


Obiviously bringing the MU* into the mainstream wont be happening until a few years into the future, even if one game breaks in today. But a good way to start increasing the profile of the games would be:If you want to gain more specific advise, i suggest several key MU* designers set up a collobaration, and fund some Market Research. But i maintain, a combination of what thresholds doing (using other mainstream games to draw people to threshold) and plazmi's doing (a more accessible and attractive way into MU* s for the non MUDder) are the way to go.


I can see the same symtoms here with you guys as i see on another games community: your so used to the way things are run, and mildly disattached to the other existing markets that your missing key movements that are/could be in your best interests. You just need an independent source to help point these out.


If you want to know, there are also several graphical games that cater to low bandwidth, such as Tibia. So saying you have uncontested market with low bandwidth gamers is just really untrue.



Also, its possible to break back into the mainstream. Point and click broke back in for the casual gamers, as has the 2D platformers. But this is only because they made a puch to appeal to a new generation or new market. They kept the main aspects, but created a new front, and PUSHed with advertising, whether it be major or minor. If you dont do anything, nothing will change.


Untapped markets i suggest you consider:Also i said above, you have such a simple server out put, you could make a completely customisable client, with various templates and stages of GUI. Since you lot have covered pretty much everything that can be done with a MU*, why not put the same amount of creativity into the clients.


A joint face can also cheapen Advertising costs. Just make a Portal/lobby/ anything, give the visiters to the afore mentioned portal/lobby the tools to customise there experience and advertise, and they'll take care of the rest.


And, no, im not a marketer. But I've looked into/been part of most gaming connected niches, and i KNOW the flaws they all suffer.


And if your asking how to bring MU*s into the 21st century, then bloody well expect radical new approaches. The genre started in the beginning of a 30-40 year old industry, and its come a long way from the BBC Micros and ZX Spectrums. The target audience has also changed with the new technology, and you have to go with the market or come out as a dead genre. This genre is even less represented than the Sh'mups and Run & Guns, and they both only have a company each pushing them (Cave and SNK respectively).


Just make a collobaration, or I'll set up an amatuer atempt at a directory in my spare time (when i get some), and thats likely to come out worse than anything you lot can do in afew hours.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Why are you all hung up on "i'll lose my players :(((((("

You don't need a "tweeny". Simple solution : Graphics mode/ Text mode. Graphics modes gives you basic gui, that simply out puts the same as a command, with a respective delay, and text mode gives you the full MUD shebang.

There IS an intermediate state between Graphics games and MUDs. Dont pretend there isnt. Your just kicking your self in the teeth. If you still dont get it, ill make a bloody mock screenshot. With captions.

As for the people Jazuela want in MUDs. I believe you have NO idea about the type of people that are the audience for games. I will admit, i was sceptical of MUDs, and i'm litterally what you described as the type of people you wanted to have come into MUDs. But your first impression will always be how something looks or sounds. I didnt come to MUDs except for the reason that ithey didnt use port 2000, so i could bypass my firewall.

Not particular about what they play: They go for what looks like the best game.
Do your games appear alongside others in magaizines : No
Do your games appear alongside others on google: erm...Not obiviously
Do your games get actively discussed outside the small community: Not really
How in Gods name do you think they'll get to MUDs????? They have to go past about 50 games to find the slightest wiff of a MUD, and ALL those games will have an active community that'll try and draw in the prospective player. So, well, again, Advertisement is a key issue.

Oh well that, about players active. Again, i can count about 10 **** games with 5 times the community online at a time. Do you want a proper, well sized community?

Really, few of you are actually understanding whats the issue. Those that do, will, if they execute of good plan, ultimately succed in gaining a true foothold in the niche market. Hell, if you did it right, you could probably live off earnings from the games. Use kickstarter to fund updates, contact webblogs, create graphic face. All have a better chance than just sitting there. If you feel theres no issue, then thats fine. But since the person who drew the issue up is a Developer of a P2P game (as far as i can gather) then there is obiviously concerns. If he thinks there is a concern about gaining new players, he would have a better knowledge than you, as he will have stats of logins over the games history, and against certain direction the game took.

Stop thinking about your games as your child, who you reared, and want to keep safe and familiar. Stop thinking in your normal mind, and thing like a Commercial Developer, PR person or Marketer. If you dont, no new ground will be gained, and itll shrink, as players die, get old, bored or banned. Obviously you'll always have a small amount of new players, but staying content with them, is just living on borowed time.

Yes, this is negative, but if you look at it in a different direction, you'll never get the correct answers. Your just too used to how things are, and content just adding content to the games. MMOs are always fighting to gain new ground in all genres of the gaming market, so why dont MUDs fight as well, when you have so much to offer.

((I suggest rereading my two posts, and properly considering the ideas. Just using the same disagreementsas stated before just won't convince me, but actual well thought through posts with explained reasons would be a lovely progression on top of the "we dont want to change" against me and plazmi))

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Butler, I'm having trouble comprehending your posts. You flit from one thought to the other and seem to be talking about commercial development of the gaming industry rather than the attraction of people to MUDs, specifically.

It's pretty simple, but you're making it complex and weaving some overly creative, overly complex "solution" to a problem that doesn't exist.

The #1 reason why MUD players, play MUDs, is that they are TEXT. That is the REASON they play MUDs, as opposed to any other type of game. For the same reason Graphics game players play graphics games: because they have graphics.

Adding graphics to text games will not attract people who are looking specifically for text games. In fact, it will likely scare away anyone who is specifically looking for a text game. And when all those graphics gamers show up, comparing graphics games to text games, all the existing text gamers will shout a collective STFU NOOB and shove those graphics gamers away, because they are interfering with the gaming, with all their whining about how there's no graphics.

The fact that there's no graphics is the POINT of text games. That is why they have the audience they have, at the present time.

Furthermore, text games are a niche market, by definition. They can expand and contract, but motly (not exclusively) by the number of people who are looking, very specifically, for text games. The biggest attraction to any individual text game, will be by members of the existing text game community and not from outside it.

There are tens of thousands of text gamers in the world. And yes, many of us are getting older. Our children, however, are just getting started. They know about muds because their parents have gone on about their adventures in text-based fantasy land, and show up sometimes out of sheer morbid curiosity - and sometimes by sincere interest.

Some games don't WANT to be massively populated, and would actually suffer such a fate. Consider also that most MUDs are not commercial enterprises and are prevented by copyright of their code from ever being commercial enterprises. So they can't tap into the market of people who pay for games. They don't have the resources because they are not allowed to charge their players money to play, and therefore as a gaming entity, they have no income with which to create commercial advertisements.

Most of the MUDding industry is driven by word of mouth, and by posts on forums such as this, and occasionally, a gaming magazine writer will take a trip down nostaligia avenue and visit the old warhorses of the computer-accessed gaming world, and re-visit our little corner and come out with a new article.

There are very few commercial text-based muds, and those that do exist, don't seem to be going anywhere any time soon. And so - I'm not worried. I don't see a problem. Not because I'm naive or because I have my head stuck in the sand. But because I have been gaming both commercial and non-commercial games for well over 20 years and have watched the trends, and have a pretty good idea as to where the genre is going. And - where it isn't going.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Career, world size ect. Help long term but won't hook people in in their first day of playing.

Also, 'geek' lost meaning like ten years ago. There is no stigma attached to retro gaming. Like none, seriously. And if you are worried abut people thinking of MUDS as primitive, I think educating people is the only way to fix that.


Let me just get back to my point. I don't think graphics are going to make a difference. But more importantly, its not going to act as a gateway mud. Muds are essentially 1D gaming (as opposed to 2D and 3D. Nearly all reservations regarding MUDs have to do with that fact. And graphics won't change that the mechanics are still one dimensional.

But MUDS have changed, they are modernizing, as time goes on new ideas are put in, new clients are being developed. Your graghics are just part of whats already happening. They aren't a solution because the problem they are trying to solve doesn't exist. Stronger computers are allowing for more complex calculations. If you were to bring someone to today's MUDS from ten years ago, their head would explode. They would not recognize anything.

Even existing MUDs are changing and developing and modernizing. 1D gaming is not getting old. If you are looking for problems in MUDs keeping away new players they are as far as I can tell the following.

1. directions. Everyone knows how disconcerting it can be to first try a mud without those maps and try to figure out your way around. There is an actual physiological issue going on with your brain when this happens, that will take at least 2-3 hours for your brain to adjust to. Static maps help, adding an actual map modernized mini-map seems to solve the problem completely. The only problem is for some reason all the MUDs I've played with mini-maps, have sucked in the exploration department. Like super sucked. They have no place worth exploring. Everything is simplified probably to make it easier on the mini-map.

This suggests implementing such maps in MUDS is very hard. Probably require a completely different coding type skill set then building.

That means any MUD that uses a map, whether they do it well or not cannot be a gateway MUD. As there will be very few good muds out there that use maps, that means limited options and these MUDS won't teach a player how to play on any non-mapped mud.

And I've spent so much time on this point I forgot my others. I'll say them when I remember them.

Anyway, point is interface does not seem to be a solution to modernizing MUDS.

But you know what might help modernize MUDS? Some actual advertising. I have never seen a single mud advertisement out of a mud site like this. Nor any word of mouth spread. So what gives about that?

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Most advertising costs money. Most MUDs do not, and cannot, charge their players money to play due to licensing agreement of the code. As a result, most MUDs don't have the financial resources required to buy advertising.

I -do- see players promoting their muds in forums outside TMS and TMC and similar, and I've made a few attempts to promote in other forums. But I don't go to college so I can't put a flyer on a college dorm bulletin board. I've heard some people do that. And I don't LARP or buy components from game stores for D&D or other hobbies, so I can't ask the local game store proprietor if I can tape a flyer up on his store window.

Those are pretty much the only ways people -can- advertise, for most muds, due to financial constraints. There used to be a gaming magazine dedicated mostly to first-person games (like Mechawars or whatever), and Simutronics had a couple articles about them in it, to promote GemStone. But that magazine went kablooie, and I no longer play GemStone, so I don't know what other efforts they're making to advertise their games. They certainly have no presence here, and yet they continue to be profitable.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Well I've never seen it. And I don't mean most MUDs, I mean the ones who are making money. I am bombarded with advertisements every day for webcomics and crap games like tribal wars nearly every day. But I've never seen an ad for a mud, not even one that should have the money to advertise.

I don't even know I ever learned MUDS even exist.

Not that I care a whole lot, I mean, the health of 1 dimensional gaming is wholly irrelevant to me as long as the game I play continues to survive.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

This forum isn't necessarily representative of MUDs, let alone MU*s or text games as a whole so I'd be wary of reading too much into some of the comments here.

I think you'll find most of the big commercial games do care about advertising, promotions and the like. I know for example IRE track their referrals through the different stages of character creation and tutorial so they can see at which points they are losing players. They also track how much referrals spend so they know the value of any particular advertising channel. We used to do similar tracking on the relatively small game that I ran and I think it's pretty standard stuff these days.

Hobby muds may be a different story and while Jazuela's point about most games not being able to charge is a little misleading, it is true that most MUDs are non-commercial.

There's also the issue that a lot of MUD owners just aren't that motivated when it comes to improving their new user experience, for all sorts of reasons.

I think that for many people MUDs are basically a retro experience and trying to modernise them would be pointless.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

If you play an old school game like Zorg or Adventure you'll notice that MUDs moved from being exploration games to being achieving games.

Both in MUDs and MMOs the game worlds are deserts, in the case of MUDs builders try to write pretty descriptions to make it look like something, in the case of MMOs artists try to paint pretty pictures to make it look like something.

MMOs are likely to eventually incorporate physics engines and generate images which would allow for a more dynamic and interactive world. MUDs have an advantage here as rather than complex graphics they only need to generate acceptable descriptions, which is still quite a challenge.

The next stage for MUDs is obviously the handling of physics and the automatic generation of meaningful descriptions. However, the complexity of this is so great that it's highly unlikely that it will ever see the light of day.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

You're not understanding even a little of the issue regarding advertising and licensing. I'm not talking about copyright of the theme of the mud. I'm talking about the copyright and licensing of the CODE of the mud. The actual code that the mud developer uses, as his primary method of writing the game. The code - in MOST text-based games, is either DIKU, LP, CIRCLE, or a derivitive of those three. As such, the mud developer has agreed to not charge players to play those muds. They are -required- to be free to play. The mud developer is not -allowed- to receive money from players to use for advertising - one of them won't let the developer receive money for any reason at all, and DIKUs are a little looser, and allow donations - but not a fee, and never required, - to cover the cost of the server.

The only people who are allowed to charge for muds, are people who create the *code* itself, from scratch, or people who use codebases that come with commercial licenses. There are very very few of either in existence. The vast majority of text-based muds in existence are DIKU, LP, and Circle - and derivitives thereof.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Another issue with modernizing MUDs is that existing muds generally have all of their efforts focused on creating new content. Something huge like adding an interface or really anything takes a lot of time away from that.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

You seem to be missing what im saying: im reffering more to God Wars II ( has custom codebase), Aardwolf (they accept donations to pay for development) and Threshold (which is P2P) type games. I understand the Diku/Circle/LP issue, but there are ways to make alternate funds for advertising. Obviously a good one is IOS clients, androdi clients etc. or say on kongregate, where you can get money donated.

I don't understand fully, but i do know the issues regarding licensing.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Yeah, it can take at least an hour or two.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

For the kind of interface that would actually make a difference, the work would be about as much as your efforts on the server. But (it has been my argument all along) in this day and age, if you neglect the client (or put two hours in it as opposed to the same LoE you invest in the server), then you don't really have a game as far as the vast majority of players is concerned. All you have is a socket server that only a small secret society known as mudders can figure out how to play.

Again, I harbor no illusions that anything will change. Most hobbyist MUD admins run a text-based game precisely because they don't want to care about anything client-side. Most are OK with not having any players, or with having so few players that by any industry-wide definition the game has been a ghost town for 15 years. Many admins spend many years developing dev-pleasing features like mob AI and physics engines that do nothing to increase a game's general appeal. Yet, any thought of a custom client is dismissed as too much work.

That's freedom for ya.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Doesn't a custom client require a whole different type of programming knowledge then building or programming the physics engine or anything like that?

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

I post here very infrequently. I think the last time was in 2008. Here's where I get all cranky and tell you why your great ideas aren't happening in a lot of words because I need to make up for the absence...

Hey that looks really nice. Want to code it up and add in hooks for Aardwolf's GMCP messages and stuff? I know a guy who knows a guy who can get you an in with the developer there.

Here's the thing, though. Aardwolf is Lasher's hobby, not his business, just like nobody pays me in any currency that I can use to buy food or clothing or shelter for client scripting work ( I do this, btw -> ). We do these things in our spare time, when we have spare time, because that's how we like spending spare time. And I guarantee you that almost every single MUD ever created falls into that category. The ones that don't are called businesses. On a side note, name five MUD businesses that I have heard of.

So the first thing you have to realize is that you're really not talking about MUD development here when you wax poetic about developing a whole new interface paradigm. For a lot of people you're talking about starting something closer to a business venture. And as Kimberly "Sweet Brown" Wilkins will tell you, ain't nobody got time for that.

Ok, it's a rough idea. But, and let's say that we've solved the problem of time and desire and money, it's a really really good idea. Except there are details. Like, It's cool that you took some existing ideas from Aardwolf and figured "Hey wouldn't it be neat if they had a paper doll equipment manager and box-style inventory too! Diablo does it, so it must be good!". This is a fantastic idea if your game has players carrying very few items, but it's hard to see how that could work on Aardwolf. We have players carrying hundreds or even thousands of items at a time. Inventory management is like a full time job for some people. And we get groups of more than 30 players at a time (that's more than a lot of entire playerbases out there) fighting just as many enemies. Where does that fit into your Buttles VS Furious Giant box? Game design issue? I don't care to speculate, but the players we have seem to like it. It's just really really hard to sufficiently represent any significant level of scale and detail in little cartoon boxes that still need to leave room for a big box of scrolling text on the side without getting...well...a lot less pretty.
And scale is ultimately what you're talking about as a goal, isn't it? Isn't it?

So now it's not just about making things pretty. It's about making this pretty while still making sense! And I think that that is pretty hard. Can it be solved? Sure, probably. But now you're talking about programmers AND designers. That's called a team, and making teams for projects like this is hard. But maybe you're a one-man-show, otherwise jobless guru designer&programmer in one neat little package. Bully for you; I'm not that flexible.

Hey, I've been saying that for years! I'm getting old, and new material is difficult, so I'm going to start quoting myself from elsewhere now...

It's all true. Widgets and boxes and whatnot are wonderful things. And anyone who says otherwise can have their 10 players on at a time ghost town. But you've just doodled a thing without having to actually worry about how to make it work or build it.

Solve the making it work problem first and add the colors later.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

If someone were bored and wanted to help spread the modern interface love they could always translate KaVir's generic mushclient UI to the web and add websocket support to his server snippet.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

That's simply not true. Even a simple GUI, thrown together in a couple of hours, can be a significant improvement over a plain terminal window - furthermore, once you get the ball rolling it's not uncommon to see players following your example, designing their own interfaces for your game.

I don't know why people continue to perpetuate the idea that it's not worth bothering with any graphics at all unless you're creating a fully graphical MUD/MMORPG. That's the server equivalent of insisting that it's not worth modifying a stock codebase, either use it as-is or write a mud from scratch.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Honestly curious: If I may ask, is there an image for most locations in the game? If so, how'd you manage that quantity of artwork?

-Mal

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Originally Posted by plamzi
For the kind of interface that would actually make a difference, the work would be about as much as your efforts on the server.


By "the kind of interface that would actually make a difference", I meant a UI that a modern-day teenager can pick up and just play, something extremely visual and streamlined, where there would be no need to type a command or process a wall of text.

Yes, it's true that something is better than nothing, and that having a rudimentary UI may get you some attention, but most (or all) of that attention is going to come from existing mudders who are fine with the wall of text and the typing (in fact, need the wall of text and the typing) and who view the graphics around that window as a "tactical" HUD that makes it easier to determine one's location, or monitor one's vitals, etc. Those are all passive UI elements.

Show me a MUD UI that actually lets people click, drag and drop, and swipe to accomplish everything they need to play (of course, they'll need to type if they want to chat, or RP/emote). Then tell me that this kind of UI takes only a few hours to make. Yet, this is the kind of UI that will actually make a difference, the kind that actually deals away with the terminal window.

Taking exception from being one of those "people", I too have observed that some people's "license to do nothing" response is that if you're building this kind of UI, why drive it with a MUD server? The reasons are many, and they vary somewhat from one game to another. I've already talked about how MUD worlds compare favorably to those of Browser-Based games. Many are more sophisticated than even the top commercial 3D MMORG's. It would be sad to see all that good work consigned to obscurity.


This is a good start, but again, the wall of text is still there, in the center of it all. For any action you do, the response is a flow of text you have to read through. The window showing your environment is not interactive. NPCs and PCs are little panels, not part of the environment. Everything sits around the text window, just like in any other so-called MUD GUI out there.

For 2% of the time, you did very well. Now, can you share with us the rate of success you've had getting non-mudders to play your game via this UI? I would like to believe that this is enough to get youngsters to play a MUD and tell their friends about it, but until I hear back from you on that, I'm going to be skeptical.

Yes, I've observed the same. Still I can't help but wish that at least one out of every ten MUD developers would show interest in client design. After all, many of us use working on a MUD as a way to acquire new skills. And still it seems that the people *learning* to develop obscure server-side features far outnumber the people *learning* to design UI's.

Working on the latest iOS app update was a bit of a revelation. There is now a lot of high-quality fantasy stock art out there that's really inexpensive. Sci-fi is a lot harder find, but maybe in a few years it won't be. Even for a hobbyist spending out of their own pocket with no intent to make that money back, but who wants to see if they can make their game more appealing, it's worth it to look around.

I assume that you mean "thousands of different items" that can't simply be stacked by item number. So, if you have this mechanic and if "inventory management is like a full time job for some people", then what are you currently doing to make that job easier in your text interface? Do you provide a method where they can view and manipulate only the items in their inventory matching a certain keyword or string, or starting with a certain letter only? Do you let them view the inventory sorted in different ways, by item type as well as alphabetically?

Some of what you may have already done for your text interface can be mirrored in a graphical inventory. A search box appearing if you have more than 100 unique items, tabbed windows that organize items alphabetically, different types of clicks to multi-select different subsets of items. And, let's not forget that graphical inventory windows can scroll endlessly just like a text window can, and that they display more items per line.

So, while this is a great example of why designing a good UI is actually hard, I believe that in this case there are many good design choices that can make your players' lives a lot easier vs. what they have to do now in all-text.

But, and I have to say this, over a thousand unique items in a character's inventory?! To me, that's going overboard a little bit, and I don't mean the realism of it :) From a game design PoV, I would be asking myself, do all these items really need to be carried around all the time? And even, do all these things actually need to be items?

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

It's likely to draw a lot more attention than investing an extra couple of hours into server development. It also means you've got the infrastructure in place for supporting a more advanced interface in the future, and sets an example that may inspire players to continue the work for you.

All in all, I consider it a solid investment of time, regardless of whether or not you want to take the concept further yourself. I don't think people should be discouraged with the suggestion that they must invest vast amounts of time for it to be worthwhile. Instead, I would far rather point out the advantages of simply getting your foot in the door.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

The whole point of having a graphical client is to engage people who don't see themselves as someone who would play a text-based MUD. Are you worried about definitions or do you want young people to play your game and talk about it with their friends?

If someone can play your game with a text-only client, then it's a text-based game, even if someone else can play it with a hybrid client. Many people may disagree with that, but the reasons they do are either because they are purists (people who not only want to experience the world as text, but who also want everyone else to experience it that way) or because they are looking for an excuse to do nothing, or both.

A lot of us are so steeped in MUDs that we can't even imagine what it is like for someone who has never played one before to be seated in front of one and given 5 min. to level up with no help. If you have a teenager in your surroundings who fits that description, try a little experiment with your client. I would be shocked if they somehow knew to click on the numbers inside the text window that don't look like either buttons or links. In fact, I would be shocked if their first reaction was something other than "Well, first of all, this doesn't look like a game. Where the hell is my character and how the hell do I move around or attack?"

Then I'm not going to feel that my point has been debunked. Although I wish it had been.

Someone mentioned earlier in the thread that there is now no stigma against playing classical or retro games. Maybe that's true among older gamers, and maybe that covers all games up to 8-bit *graphics*. It doesn't seem to apply to games that look like chatrooms. And it's not really about the stigma. It's mostly about the fact that picking up a text-based game without prior experience is extremely hard. It was nerdy/geeky even back in the 1990's.

You should take a look at the subscription packages on . Also, you can add at least 100 more images for free by browsing .

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Good graphics dont need to be expensive. Anything like the Inventory items i did will take maybe an hour or so, and if you go to something like thespritersresource.com , once you have enough post, request a design, explain why you want it, and probably they'll give let you use it without royalties, as long as they keep copyright. As for making scenes, get a few basic backgrounds, buildings etc. then use the wonder of layers.

As for saying i took the GUI elements from classic game, i didn't. I just took it from a generic MMO. Its actually the first thing i panicked about in my first few minutes of trying a MUD, after navigation is trying to figure out what i've got and have. As for the character on opposition...i kind of got the basic idea from God Wars II...when i fought the practice dummy :p I generally based my idea off 3 games: Maps and text off Aardwolf, Basic HUD shape off God Wars II and Inventory from an MMO.

And as has been pointed out above, client development is a visual upgrade. Actually, the reason why I tried God Wars II is its interesting client, apposed to the restricted ones i saw elsewhere. As for elements that make playing easier than typing, i dont think you need too much, maybe a few buttons for the most common commands, like the quick keys in God Wars II or Aliases in other games. Obviously these should have a delay in input, to make PvP fair. I think the wall of text needs to be their, or else you might lose sight of what your working on. Key is to make something user friendly enough that people will be more likely to play, but not too useful that people get overreliant on it. they need to know what text is associated with which GUI input.

As for programming side of things, i admit it, im not a programmer like most of you. I'm a graphics man who can do basic computer generated and ok hand draw graphics. Hey wait, theirs quite alot of people who do that, actually i found one site with a bigger community who do mostly that. For no money.

I also know of a video game music designer who works for a one off fee, and will work on your project until your pleased with it.

Also, just kind of to go back, you should still think of writing to niche mags like Linux Format to get game reviews. Anyway for those interested, todays last day before i write to RetroGamer magazine. They cover stuff similiar to your games, and once notified, will probably review your MUDGamer iOS app, and some of the more popular games.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Wait no stigma for retro games....

I just name a publication that covers only games over 10 years old. Mostly one 20-30 years
Even the games with 8bit graphics still have a HUGE following. Search on ebay for the great giana sisters. Its popular enough to be worth thousands of pounds, due to so many collectors wanting it. People still buy tonnes of games such a Lunar Lander on the vetrex. Many of these games are simpler than MUDs, and some less enjoyable.

Also i suggest against stock photos. Anybody can get them. I mean, just go the forums i said above, and see if anybody will do graphics for you, be them 3D or 2D for the use in a game, and you have a good chance of someone saying yes. And you'll have 100% original graphics as well.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

I disagree with that definition as well, but not for either of the reasons you listed. The situation simply isn't that clear-cut. Take zClient for example:

"With help from Foole on auth and the A9 packet zite created the first and only alternative wow client. It was text based and worked in retail around 1.3 or so. You could create a character, delete characters, log in, move around in the world, interact with vendors, cast spells, open chests, instance, party, chat, attacking, tracking other players, and various other things. It had the ability to be easily scripted to automate tasks and could be used as a bot. It progressed quickly and was squashed by blizzard just as fast."

Does that make World of Warcraft a text-based game? What about Second Life?

"METAbolt is an open source (fully accessible using JAWS) messenger type application (text client) for the metaverse (virtual worlds). It has most of the functions that a viewer has but just not the graphics"

And then there muds like Archons of Avenshar, which is clearly a text-based mud with a custom client - but because it can only be played through its client, which includes a small amount of graphics, by your definition it would no longer be classified as text-based. In fact you could take any mud and block people from connecting unless they use MUSHclient with a simple GUI plugin, but I would still consider the mud text-based.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

I think you need to read up on legalese a bit. "Resold or redistributed" means that you can't, e. g. print posters of these images and re-sell them, or start a clone site and sell the same images to other parties, conferring the same rights. You can, as the license states, use these images as part of your own commercial project, with your own clients, like in a computer game that you can charge your clients for. They do require a link in the credits, but that's not much to ask for.

It's actually pretty clear to me what constitutes text-based and what doesn't in all the edge cases you mentioned. But it's really not a topic I care enough about. For example, I'll be totally fine with everyone in this community (as opposed to only half the people so far) calling my game a non-MUD. Just like I'm fine with TMC not listing my game under "Graphical MUDs" but listing World of Warcraft as one.

I suggest we stay focused on the topic of modernizing MUDs, rather than on who considers what to be a true MUD.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

I'm a software engineer by profession. The answer to "can it be done?" is ALWAYS "yes, of course, but it will cost you". That process is what I do. But you are handwaving the complexity of actually building this stuff. Can you do it as plugins for something like MUSHclient or Mudlet? Sure, and once you actually get into details it either gets incredibly hairy or you just decide to ignore things. I can't tell you how much time I've spent on re-inventing primitives that we take for granted elsewhere like selecting text and scrollbars. Could you build a brand new client from scratch using a proper framework? Of course. Are you also going to build your own alias/trigger/variable/macro systems? Interfaces for those features? Because those are things that players who already know what a MUD is demand.

I don't advocate for all text. If I did I wouldn't put any time into making Aardwolf's client setup. But the things you're describing are significantly more complicated to do well than you admit.


I would be more worried about the "cannot be transmitted to another party" part. Also, calling your players clients would likely not pass legal muster. They have not contracted you to produce work for hire.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

I wasn't handwaving any complexity. You accuse me of handwaving, and KaVir accuses me of exaggerating, while all I'm doing is giving my own perspective. In this case, I didn't even give you a rough estimate, so there's no way you'd know if I'm underestimating the challenge :)

I merely said that the end result of a well-designed graphical inventory is probably going to do a much better job than an all-text one because it has some built-in advantages. The same doesn't strike me as true when it comes to dealing with dozens of mobiles or players in the same room, for example. The endless expandability of a typical MUD "room" is just hard to visualize. I know because I've tried.

I find what these clients allow to be extremely limited, so I believe you when you say it gets hairy. Fortunately, we now have HTML5, mature libraries like jQuery, and a wealth of "primitives" of all kinds that we can leverage.

That's another thing I wouldn't advise. I'm all for leveraging anything that gets us closest to the goal. The "proper framework" for a web-based client, to me, is HTML+CSS+JS, and there are a great number of things already written and licensed very liberally.

I'm not so worried about what MUD vets demand. After all, they are highly unlikely to abandon their favorite MUD client for any graphical wonder. But, for the sake of argument, I have build interfaces to server-side aliases/triggers/variables. I implemented server-side triggers precisely because it lets me just build interfaces on different clients. Those interfaces are pretty basic compared to stuff like battle and inventory management because they're for advanced users and don't have to be sexy. They were actually about as quick to build as their all-text counterparts.

Maybe I'm guilty of both overestimating and underestimating challenges ;) What I'm certainly *not* guilty of is lack of enthusiasm, lack of industriousness, or lack of first-hand experience in what I'm talking about.

When you read the full sentence, it is clearly the license that "cannot be transmitted to another party." Not being able to transmit the license (and having to go to the source to obtain one) is standard stuff.

Believe it or not, I've done my homework. I've read and researched and understood the licenses for all the art I'm using. Before anyone starts worrying and losing sleep, they should at least read the full text of this particular license carefully:

The restrictions below specify that you have to integrate the art into your own product as opposed to re-package and re-sell it. They also specify the maximum resolution you can post on the Internet. But they explicitly allow using the art in commercial software, magazines, newspapers, books. Now, do you think it's likely that they expect these newspapers, magazines, and books to only be sold to people who have contracted the person or party that holds the license?

Clearly, everywhere in the license "client" is used as synonymous with "customer", someone that you render a service to. Either that, or they expect you to sign a contract with every visitor to your website.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

You made an over-generalised definition of "text-based" that would include World of Warcraft and Second Life, while excluding some fairly typical text-based muds - then you claimed that anyone who disagrees with your definition is either a text purist, or too lazy to implement graphics. Now you're not interested in discussing the topic?

In fact the distinction between the two is far from clear-cut, with very few games falling completely into one category or the other. It's a subject I feel mud developers should at least consider, even if only as part of the bigger picture in terms of presentation and accessability.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

I'm all for making MUDs more accessible to anyone that wants more visual cues while keeping the plain telnet based interface for MUD purists. The work we did on Mushclient has definitely helped bring new people into the game and no doubt we've lost others for whom it wasn't enough and they just couldn't get around "typing so many commands".

Other than the usual time constraint, the main thing that has held me back from going much further into this is the MUDs that have already done it - why aren't they overrun with players? BAT has an awesome client. Plazmi's own work on the iphone is impressive. Avenshar had a great client and you could play the game without hardly typing at all until you wanted to chat. If it's as simple as "go more GUI to get more players", where are the results?

At the end of the day it's all window dressing around a text based game and people will either play a text based game or they won't. That is until you reach a point where you're not a text based game anymore because more and more important features can only be accessed via the GUI - I think that's where the fear of alienating existing players starts to creep in.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

It's not a silver bullet, it's not going to revolutionise a mud, or turn it into an overnight success.

But if you're adding features to attract interest and new players, I'd rate it as a good investment of time and effort. It's also something that can be delegated without needing to give other people access to the source code for the mud. And (IMO) it makes a fun change of pace!

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

OK, I'll humor you with a more refined definition:

"A text-based game is any game whose world is designed to be experienced by at least some of its players as a flow of text, and which enables at least some of its players to perform any supported game action by inputting text."

So, WoW and Second Life: not designed to be experienced as a flow of text, not text-based. No amount of 3rd party hacks will change the fact that their worlds are simply not textual, and not intended to be textual. If someone were to sit down and describe their worlds in text and then provide an all-text interface for playing them, they will still not be text-based games, although this particular client can call itself a text-based client for WoW, etc.

Archons of Avensharm, clearly a text-based game. Lining the text window with a HUD and not letting people connect via telnet doesn't change how players experience and manipulate the world, in text. If they morph their client in a way that compels all players to experience the world visually and to perform game actions without inputting text, then it won't matter what their server is, they will then have a non-text-based game *by design* and *in practice*.

Grasping the intent/design aspect of the definition is key to seeing things a bit more clearly. Understanding when something is a "wraparound" vs. when something pertains to the actual design and experience of the game is key. Anything less would mean a lot of confusion, not just in defining MUDs.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

That's the same conclusion I have reached, Lasher.

We add periodic improvements to the , but I think at that point we have pretty much topped out on how much gain we are really going to get from graphics.

The fact that its a flash web client means people don't have to download anything which is probably the biggest obstacle for MUD newbies. After that, how much can you really gain?

As you mention, the MUDs with graphics heavy front ends don't have thousands of people online. Even the ones that do have a lot of users (Batmud, Aardwolf, Threshold) already had tons of users before they put the time into their graphical UIs. I'd venture a guess that the reason for their large userbases is the quality of their games overall, not the graphical UI.

On the flip side, there are many MUDs with graphical clients that have 3 people online.

I'm just not seeing the legit return on investment from the time put in.

Again, as you mention, at the end of the day it is a text game. People are going to ultimately have to embrace that if they are going to remain a part of your community. You are only delaying the inevitable decision with tons of graphical front end enhancements.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Well, there's another way to think about it. We know the issue is definitely not in the quality of the games, because many people have played and enjoyed these games for over a decade. So where else would we look for the explanation than in the quality of the clients themselves?

I don't think anyone has actually managed to produce a MUD GUI that looks like a modern kid's idea of an online game and less like

I'm going to give it another shot with my latest app redesign and will let you know how it goes. If it doesn't work, I'll probably be limiting my work on the MUD server and focusing on building a new server to drive a more simplified, more casual-gamer friendly game.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

I think the demographic that should be aimed for is the 18-35 demographic.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

This is almost certainly a more worthwhile endeavour. I'd recommend you evaluate Electroserver, Smartfoxserver and Photon for your server needs before building your own. There's also uLink if you're using Unity.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Those are some great leads to explore, and worth knowing about--thanks for sharing. For , server middleware seems like an overkill (it's basically enough to have a web/socket server) but maybe for the next after the next :)

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Graphical faces help once new players find a screenshot on google, and once playing. You need publicity and adveritsing to get people to that stage, then the new access ability will help, and then they experience and enjoy the world. Visit other retro sites and make a MUD thread. Then post games, ports to said games, links and some sort of text that says this is really good, that isnt obviously self advertisement.

As for GUI that is attractive to teenagers, Bat MUD is jaw dropping for a PC client (i'd use it if it didnt require Java) and Bedlams iOS GUI is great, functional and looks easy to use. But they need to find it under a heap of Jetpack and Fruit Ninja clones.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Reading this particular thread, while enlightening, has left me wondering what defines bringing MUDs into the 21st century. I think the basic scrolling-text output, command line input nature of the genre is perfectly fine as it is. The rest of the attributes that most folks argue about (server code base, telnet based, any other technology stack item) are completely non-relevant to all but the most savvy (and interested) potential users.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Yeah. I stopped paying attention to the finer details a page and a half ago.

I've said it before and I'll say it again. Graphics are a red herring. It's not pictures or lack thereof that's attracting or deterring users. If a user wants a "regular" video game, he's not going to play a mud even if the client is graphical, unless the interface and experience is so completely changed that the game is barely recognizable as a mud. You'd practically have to turn a mud into a browser-based Facebook game or a Green Dragon clone.

The key is the whole entire user experience. I don't need a stock photograph of an Elf or a Kobold in my view window, but if you're going to make my experience better with some non-text elements, a mini-map sure would be nice. And let me click on my map to move rather than typing n/s/e/w. If you're going to make anything into a picture, do it to my inventory so I can drag items around and arrange them in an order that makes sense to me, and click on them if I want to look at an item more closely and read its description. If you're really organized and your room text output displays mundane text, mobs, items, and players separately, let me click on people and objects to look at them. If you're really sophisticated, let me configure the client so I can left click to look at someone (or something), and right click to open up a menu where I can select give, tell, etc. if it's a person, get, search, etc. if it's an object, kill, ask, etc. if it's a mob. Clean up your syntax. There's only so much you can do in a mud, and if there's some obscure thing outside of the norm that someone has to type to accomplish something, then one of your area builders was a real jackass.

If you get things set up to where the only thing I have to type long-hand is the stuff I want to say to other players, and the client's chat interface is really smooth and easy to use (maybe let me separate room/in character text from various channels in other windows, and store tells in a separate place -- that way, I don't have to type say X and chat Y and tell A blah blah blah. I just type my sentence in the right window and that's what happens), that cuts the entry barrier in half. Then, the main thing turning people off from muds would be roleplaying. People outside of our circle still think that's strange and geeky.

Maybe some or most of this is out there somewhere, but I personally have gotten used to just typing crap in Gmud. But I'm almost 34, not 15, a closet roleplayer, and looking for a creative outlet online.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

SnowTroll, GemStone IV's front end, presently known (I believe) as "Stormfront" has all of what you're asking for. The previous version was called the Wizard, and that also had all of what you're talking about.

GemStone is a Simutronics game, and it's commercial, and the front end is proprietary, but you have to figure - if their designers can make a point-click/drag-drop interface, well, obviously, it can be done.

So now you have to ask why it hasn't been done anywhere else. A few reasons:

1. limited demand outside the Simutronics gaming world
2. limited designer interest
3. limited game-owner interest

And let's not forget that Simutronics is a commercial enterprise - the people who designed Storm Front were paid to design it. Not just free subscription - but real actual weekly salary. Simutronics has its own building, where it houses its own servers, has a full time staff and part time staff, in addition to their in-game volunteer staff. They collect many thousands of dollars every month from subscriptions.

Hobbyist games don't have the resources; several have tried, but burnout comes before completion.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

It doesn't seem to have a mini-map.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Maybe its just really, really mini?

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Did you miss the parts of this thread where we discussed making the client more visually appealing to today's teenagers? If you think things are fine as they are, do you also think that we have a healthy, growing community of players that will ensure, among other things, that *your* favorite MUD won't suddenly close doors one of these days?

Probably not the best way to start a post. If you are not paying attention and seem proud of it, then why should we pay attention to what you have to say?

You can't prove a point by repeating it. Show us some evidence that non-graphical games have the same conversion rates and comparable player bases as graphical ones. I think you'd be hard-pressed to do that.

I believe that the only way anyone can believe what you believe is if they are so steeped in their own subjectivity that by "users" they mean experienced mudders, and exclude 99.99% of gamers.

I agree with the first part of this statement. A contemporary gamer with no prior understanding of MUDs is not likely to settle for a wall of text with graphics around it. They will want a graphical interface that looks like that of other games they are used to playing.

As others have mentioned in this thread, I have made a graphical client for iOS that even experienced mudders barely recognize as an interface to a MUD. This was done without compromising in the least the ability of experienced mudders to play the game using a variety of text-based client. In fact, many of the usability improvements that I made for casual app users, with very slight tweaks, became improvements for everyone.

On to your second point. For the most part, I agree. But given what I've already done for mobile, I believe there's a way for a MUD server to drive a UI that *looks like* a typical Facebook game, but which *unfolds* into something a lot richer for someone who keeps playing.

For some of the more technical folks here, what I'm urging them to see is that the servers driving some of the most successful browser-based social games today probably look like MUD servers with a frontal lobotomy in terms of content and gameplay depth. Yet, they do better than all of us combined, just because they play nice with today's gamers expectations from an online game.

Instead of arguing whether "the essence" of a MUD is lost when it has a browser-based graphical interface or when it integrates well with social networking sites, people should consider some very simple marketing truths. Packaging matters. Going where the customers are, matters. If you are making great-tasting honey, but it looks like mud, and you just tell people to find your house in the woods, and scoop the honey out of a barrel using "whatever they want", then the mediocre-tasting honey packaged nicely and conveniently, and placed on a supermarket shelf, is going to win everytime.

I know this may be hard for any mud vet to grasp (since nowadays they're so used to being courted by devs), but you are emphatically *not* the target audience of any of the efforts I've been discussing. For experienced mudders like you, even if someone spent hundreds of hours building a client to your specs (we're getting pretty close to them with our advanced web app), chances are you will still go back to your Gmud. Chances are, you will never switch games because of the custom client. You're not even going to switch from Gmud to a more modern MUD client like Mudlet or MUSHClient. Am I right or am I right?

Again, I believe that any efforts to bring MUDs into this century do not include appealing to experienced mudders like you. In fact, I believe that many of the efforts by admins to appeal to people like you are holding the community back because that same effort could have been spent on trying to reach people born in this century.

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

Re: Do MUDs need to be "brought into the 21st century"
 

I'd like to try and take this discussion in a new direction, partly because hearing what some people have to say about graphical clients is just making me depressed and pessimistic about the future. And partly because I think graphics is only the biggest, but not only, aspect of a 21st century MUD.

Here's a list of features *unrelated to graphics* that seem to be expected by many online gamers. Some of them may be exclusive to mobile gamers, where the majority of my observations come from. In any case, it may be food for thought for those who want to appeal to younger audiences by walking around the huge elephant of graphics and doing other things:

* A tutorial that can be completed by someone not paying close attention, yet one that teaches all the basics one needs to know in order to gain some form of satisfaction from the first 5 minutes of gameplay (e. g. learn how to kill an NPC and level up). The shorter the better, with absolutely no way of botching it.

* Player guilds and intense inter-guild competitions. Guilds that are easy even for relatively new players to form, with *in-game tools* to reach friends, convert them to the game, and recruit them for your guild.

* Invite codes or other player-facing conversion tools that new players have immediate access to, so they can spread the word while they're still freshly excited by their discovery of the game. Ideally, these player-facing promo tools should be loaded with multiple incentives to convert non-playing friends.

* A friend list, with the ability to add, remove, message offline friends quickly from within the game.

* Some form of compulsory PvP, with built-in protections from being "farmed" at low levels (ideally at any level).

* Leaderboards or other forms of player-facing ranking. The more performance stats by which players and guilds can compare one another, the better.

* Clear progression. It can get increasingly harder to progress over time, but the first few gaming sessions should present clear goals, should make it easy for total newbies to achieve those goals, and then make it clear what to do to get to the next goal. Achieving this can take many aspects working together in unison: in-game tips or easy-to-find help files, enabling easy movement to key locations, easy-to-find support by other players.

If you're thinking about where your game stands in respect to the above list, keep in mind that the target audience we're interested in is virtually guaranteed to have no prior experience with MUDs. Don't be distracted by what your experienced players would call "easy" or "obvious", "annoying" or "blasphemy."