10 Sep, 2008, ShadowsDawn wrote in the 1st comment:
Votes: 0
One thing I have noticed in my years of being part of the MUD community, albeit I've been a quiet member, is that we are always looking for something new and fresh. Many interesting features for our games have come out over the years, but at the same time there some things that have not changed for one reason or another. Maybe it is because no one has thought of it, or maybe it was attempted, but not in a manner that was appealing.

The vast majority of our games all have a game design modeled after the tried and true model of killing the creatures for XP (to level up) and the likes in some form or fashion. Even the vast majority of graphical games have this core aspect. Admittedly it is a core design that has worked well for many years, and has been the backbone of many successful games.

Unfortunately, the success of the model does present a problem. It is used often, and these days with so many Graphical games that use it (and rather well) it's harder to compete as a MUD when the same core gameplay is offered elsewhere, and with fancy graphics. So the question is, how do can we break the mold? Don't worry about difficulty to implement, as just about anything can be accomplished really. Just how would you break the mold of the current game structure (any aspect, not just the kil stuff for XP thing) and stil keep the game appealing and fresh? Of course at the same time, what drawbacks could you see from doing it, or issues that'd also have to be addressed.

Possible ideas:

XP handed out over time, and used to purchase abilities
Persistent game data… could theoretically drive races of mobs into extinction among other things


I'm still working on ideas myself, but I'd love to hear if anyone else has thought about this and has any ideas.
10 Sep, 2008, Hades_Kane wrote in the 2nd comment:
Votes: 0
On the note about exp gained, what my game has moved toward doing is giving a bit less exp for killing something, but adding in other ways for a character to gain experience, most notable through skill use and skill improvement, along with experience rewards for reaching certain milestones in the playable storyline we are implementing. Some characters have managed to gain upwards to 15 levels without killing a single NPC or PC.

For an RP MUD, I can see experience being awarded based on roleplay or playtime, etc. but that's not really an applicable train of thought for our game.

There are other things that we have done that I think have done a bit to break the mold, but alongside that you also have to keep at some level of familiarity, in my opinion, in order to keep people interested. One of the biggest issues that custom codebases or games that have been too heavily modified face is people coming in familiar with a different codebase, not liking what they see, and leaving.

Myself, I've given up on MUDs 2 minutes into it based soley on such trivial things such as extended exits (I hate NE, SE, SW, etc.) or an account system.

Since combat is such a crucial part of most MUDs, I think that's one of the biggest places to try to do something different. I haven't played Godwars II, but I've heard only great things about what KaVir has done with his combat engine.
10 Sep, 2008, Sandi wrote in the 3rd comment:
Votes: 0
Given the changes in world politics over recent decades, I've been thinking of a game based on economic warfare… instead of killing mobs, newbies would sell them something. Perhaps vacuum cleaners, or insurance. Instead of levels, players would advance to the next floor, and the best on each floor would get the corner offices with two windows. Periodically, "high sellers" would win contests, giving them a vacation cruise to a real MUD where they got to kill things.

Murder, thievery, magic… perhaps the attraction of these games is they let you do things you can't do in the real world.
10 Sep, 2008, ShadowsDawn wrote in the 4th comment:
Votes: 0
I was not saying remove killing or combat. I was meaning why stick with the character advancement based on going out killing creatures to level up and gain more skills. Yes I know there are some games that break from that already. This thread was intended to be discussing ways to break outside of the standard game design elements that are always seen. An attempt to help breed new ideas and innovation for our game. I never said *anything* about taking the fun and wonder out of the game.
10 Sep, 2008, Orrin wrote in the 5th comment:
Votes: 0
I am not sure I agree with some of the premises of your argument, namely that muds have a core design focused on killing creatures for xp to level up. There are plenty of successful games that place more emphasis on other types of gameplay such as social interaction, roleplaying, player conflict etc.

I don't believe that MUDs have to compete with graphical games at all. There is so much that one can do with a MUD that a large scale graphical MMOG can't possibly hope to achieve. Some areas where MUDs have a real advantage over graphical games:

1. Diversity - MUDs are comparatively cheap to develop and operate and most are non commercial. This means they can appeal to minority interests far better than any commercial large scale game. You will find a far wider range of themes and play styles catered to in MUDs than you will in graphical games.

2. Responsiveness - in general MUDs are able to implement changes to the virtual world much faster than their graphical counterparts. This is due mostly to text being faster to type than graphics are to model and animate (not to mention cheaper!) MUD players in general enjoy much more influence over the virtual world than their graphical playing counterparts. World changing events and large scale quests are much easier to accomplish in a MUD and tend to occur more frequently.

3. Player created content - most graphical games feature very little player created content. In most cases the content creation tools are too complicated for many players to make use of, or the staff costs needed to monitor the player created content too great. However in MUDs it is relatively easy for players to create items, creatures and locations themselves. While this is commonly seen as a staff activity on DIKU style games, player created content is a central part of all MUSH style servers.

4. Community - the largest MUDs are probably far smaller than the smallest graphical games. In most MUDs if you play for long enough you can interact with the entire playerbase and will certainly form meaningful character relationships more easily than you would as newbie number 1329381034 in WoW. This means MUDs are often better at encouraging roleplay, political intrigue and other types of intense character interaction.

There are so many ways that MUDs can present interesting and appealing gameplay where graphical MMORPGs cannot that really there is no good reason why MUDs cannot flourish alongside their larger counterparts.
10 Sep, 2008, ShadowsDawn wrote in the 6th comment:
Votes: 0
Hades_Kane said:
There are other things that we have done that I think have done a bit to break the mold, but alongside that you also have to keep at some level of familiarity, in my opinion, in order to keep people interested. One of the biggest issues that custom codebases or games that have been too heavily modified face is people coming in familiar with a different codebase, not liking what they see, and leaving.

Myself, I've given up on MUDs 2 minutes into it based soley on such trivial things such as extended exits (I hate NE, SE, SW, etc.) or an account system.

Since combat is such a crucial part of most MUDs, I think that's one of the biggest places to try to do something different. I haven't played Godwars II, but I've heard only great things about what KaVir has done with his combat engine.


Oh I will fully agree that many times a game that radically differs from your comfort zone can be a huge turn off, especially if all those differences are more options that you have to take in and learn in order to play the game even remotely decently. Familiarity is definitely helpful in attracting people. However, if the game is design from the beginning to incorporate the differences, I feel that the designer could easily find a way to implement them in a fashion that is intuitive and prevents the feeling of being overwhelmed.

Granted things like extended exits and account systems are not exactly something you can make 'behind the scenes'. Though if you don't mind my asking, why don't you like those things? I will admit I get annoyed with the extended directions when no real though is given to the layout and you end up with places that 'overlap' if you try to map it out in any manner. I guess that's a good argument for only having the standard 6 directions.
10 Sep, 2008, Lobotomy wrote in the 7th comment:
Votes: 0
Hades_Kane said:
Myself, I've given up on MUDs 2 minutes into it based soley on such trivial things such as extended exits (I hate NE, SE, SW, etc.) or an account system.

I also have to wonder: What's wrong with account systems? Is it all of them, or is it particular implementations that you find bothersome? :sad:
10 Sep, 2008, ShadowsDawn wrote in the 8th comment:
Votes: 0
Orrin said:
I am not sure I agree with some of the premises of your argument, namely that muds have a core design focused on killing creatures for xp to level up. There are plenty of successful games that place more emphasis on other types of gameplay such as social interaction, roleplaying, player conflict etc.

I don't believe that MUDs have to compete with graphical games at all. There is so much that one can do with a MUD that a large scale graphical MMOG can't possibly hope to achieve. Some areas where MUDs have a real advantage over graphical games:

There are so many ways that MUDs can present interesting and appealing gameplay where graphical MMORPGs cannot that really there is no good reason why MUDs cannot flourish alongside their larger counterparts.


Yes, not all MUDs follow the kill creature go up in level model, but there are many, *many* more who do than don't. Is that to say there is the only method to enjoy those games? By all means no. I have played all varieties of MUDs, from pure H&S to Pure RP, and enjoyed them all.

I agree with you on the fact that we don't have to compete because we can do so much more. That is the intent of this thread. In what other ways can we break from the traditional method of doing things? Since we are not tied to the need to sell our product we can afford to take the risks of developing something that is different. We already differ on many of the aspects you listed… now the question comes in, what new things can we try with gameplay mechanics and the likes?
10 Sep, 2008, The_Fury wrote in the 9th comment:
Votes: 0
Sandi said:
Given the changes in world politics over recent decades, I've been thinking of a game based on economic warfare… instead of killing mobs, newbies would sell them something. Perhaps vacuum cleaners, or insurance. Instead of levels, players would advance to the next floor, and the best on each floor would get the corner offices with two windows. Periodically, "high sellers" would win contests, giving them a vacation cruise to a real MUD where they got to kill things.

Murder, thievery, magic… perhaps the attraction of these games is they let you do things you can't do in the real world.


Maybe we should talk, I have a partial design for a game somewhere here and i think even some code that's based around resource management and a central stockmarket, where wealth determines your level, where you would hire lawyers to start legal proceedings against other players for IP infringements to steal their wealth, in the early stages players would need to gather resources to get a foot in the market, but as they proceed into the game they would be able to leverage their wealth more and more to attack the market and drive it in certain directions with the view to making a huge profit. Stocks could be bought and sold, staff hired and fired, compeditors could advertise positions vacant and attract your staff to their firm and the like, sorry thins has been very disjointed i have only just woken up.
10 Sep, 2008, Hades_Kane wrote in the 10th comment:
Votes: 0
-Account Systems: Generally they don't seem very intuitive, and it tends to bother me having to login, more or less, twice. I also have found it annoying when logging into a game that I am give a 6 option menu, such as checking the who list, entering the game, exiting the game, writing my description, deleting my character, etc. That all seems like things I should be doing in game, not from a menu. Likewise, I hate logging out and going back to the menu only to have to basically log out again. Those are some of the basic annoyances I've had with many of the account systems I've encountered. I want to login once, logout once :p I've envisioned making a psuedo account system within my game where basically you have a character you designate as a 'primary' and then all of your alts you link up to that one specific character, then from any one of your characters in game you can access account stats, data, list of alts, maybe even things like shared quest points, check milestones, be able to create or have access to new content based on milestones your characters have reached, etc. Not sure if I'll go through with it, but with that style of implementation in mind, it would basically be an optional account system, and if you don't want to mess with it, its more or less like it doesn't exist, but it could hold some benefit for those interested.

Extended Directions: A lot of that has to do with poorly designed areas for one. I'll admit a few times I've made an area with a diagonal path and I've thought that having NE-SW would be nice to avoid a n, e, n, e, etc. path. But a pretty significant reason is that I've gotten very, very used to having my key/num pad on the right side of my keyboard mapped a particular way in zmud. I use 8 as north, 6 as east, 2 as south, 4 as west, 9 as up, 3 as a down, 1 as scan, 0 as recall, . as who, 7 as flee, - as score… etc. On a game with extended directions, that messes it all up. 9 would have to be northeast, 3 southeast, 1 southwest, and 7 as northeast. It's a habit and a familiarity I've developed that I've become absolutely unwilling to compromise. Like I said, that's the main reason, but poorly designed areas really doesn't help, and its one of those things that just seems excessive.
10 Sep, 2008, David Haley wrote in the 11th comment:
Votes: 0
I think that one issue why we haven't seen many game-changing ideas become reality is a simple technical one. A lot of interesting, mold-breaking ideas would require a lot of work to implement. Usually the reason is that the common code bases make many assumptions about many things, and the mold-breaking ideas almost definitionally break those assumptions. So, you need to change a lot of the code. Depending on just how much you're changing, it can be better to just rewrite the codebase. And that means lots of work.

I mean, just looking at the ideas that have been floated around in the past few days/weeks/months here, many of them would require substantial changes to how the code works. There aren't many people who have the time, or even sometimes skill, needed to make very large changes to concepts so deeply-rooted in the code.
10 Sep, 2008, David Haley wrote in the 12th comment:
Votes: 0
And HK, your preference against more directions due to how your keypad is set up is basically a nightmare. I would have to put someone like you in the outlier category and not even try to cater to you. :wink: I'm not trying to argue with your preference, but I do think it's unfair to blame your preference on areas or designs that use diagonals just because you have a certain keypad layout.
10 Sep, 2008, quixadhal wrote in the 13th comment:
Votes: 0
Why limit yourself to a single career advancement path?

The reason most games emphasize combat is that most games only give you a single "level" to advance. You choose a "class" and then you gain "levels" in that class. Even skill-based games often still have a "level" idea for your character.

As long as you only have one "level" to work on, the path of least resistance for both the developers and the players is combat, because the infinite respawning mob/resource game is easy to do.

If you want to get out of the box, you need to either do away with levels entirely and base your character's progression on some OTHER measure of achievement… or track multiple kinds of activities and give players levels in many different areas, all of which have to be useful and necessary to reach higher tiered content.

One example that comes to mind as I type this is a "social" rank. This would be a measure of how many players and NPC's you've interacted with, and to what degree. Perhaps to get to level 2 in "social", you have to have met and talked with (using tell) 50 different named entities in the game world. So, saying 'hello' to an orc might work once, but you can't go talk to 50 orcs to level. What good is social? Perhaps you get access to quests in the noble district if your social skills are high enough. Maybe certain aggressive mobs would give you the option to pay a ransom to avoid combat if they see you're of a high enough social circle. Maybe you just get better/rare clothing from merchants in town.
10 Sep, 2008, David Haley wrote in the 14th comment:
Votes: 0
Oblivion's concept of fame/infamy – you get such points based on the quests you complete – is a pretty interesting way of representing your social renown. Not quite the same thing as how sociable you are, but it's a little easier to control and less prone to abuse than just the number of people you've spoken to. (I could easily automate the acquisition of such points by writing a bot that goes around saying hello to every NPC it encounters.) I realize that you were probably leaving out lots of details, though.
10 Sep, 2008, Hades_Kane wrote in the 15th comment:
Votes: 0
I'm quite sure there are people who disconnect from MUDs before even reaching the game because of even more trivial things then my not liking diagonal directions :p

Genuinely though, I don't much see the point in them either :p
11 Sep, 2008, David Haley wrote in the 16th comment:
Votes: 0
Well, I wasn't trying to say that was the worst thing to disconnect for… :wink: Basically I think that unless you can establish that a sizable number of people are turned off by a feature, it's really not worth worrying about it.

They're very useful in outdoors type places, where rooms are "open" (no walls) and logically lined up on a grid anyhow, so being able to traverse that grid in all eight directions makes sense. It also makes sense when exits are "interesting", like trap doors, hidden doors in general, entering a tree trunk, and so forth. There's only so much you can do if you insist on having only the four cardinal directions.
11 Sep, 2008, Hades_Kane wrote in the 17th comment:
Votes: 0
DavidHaley said:
There's only so much you can do if you insist on having only the four cardinal directions.


Well, we're able to program pretty much any type of command to do anything our programs are capable of. Admittedly, part of that comes from the "alias" snippet for mprogs, although I've done a lot of customizing and modification of that to work exactly as I would like. But if I wanted someone to have to 'feel' for an object, 'sniff' the air, or even type 'northeast' and even though those aren't commands, they will trigger the program and then the program can run however it would be programmed to run, such as mimicking someone leaving northeast. We also have it where it can base off of existing commands and basically just interrupt it.

I can see the merit in having those exits in a very large open grid like area, but we don't tend to have a whole lot of those except on our world map, and no one seems to find the lack of the extended exits to be a problem.

I don't know that there are many other people that are bothered enough by extended exits to disconnect from a MUD with them, but like I said, it's a very annoying feature for me and generally not something worth getting to know the MUD better if they have it. With over 1000 MUDs, I'm likely to find at least one game that will match what I look for out of a MUD, so I don't see too much of a reason to settle on one that has fundamental features that I find really annoying.
11 Sep, 2008, Kayle wrote in the 18th comment:
Votes: 0
So you're saying that any game with extended exits (Like MW, which we use in our Pre-auth area to emulate walking down a spiral tower.) is a huge turn off, and just because we use extended exits you wouldn't even give out mud a try? (assuming of course everything that needed to be done to even consider allowing players to test was done.)
11 Sep, 2008, Asylumius wrote in the 19th comment:
Votes: 0
There are a couple of reasons I dislike extended exits, including the fact that many area writers just take the concept overboard, as well as just preferring a plain old grid more.

When it comes down to it though, the MUD I first played (and still do) doesn't use them, and it's just one of those things that I'd rather live without. I'm just used to not having them and like it that way, even if I don't have a good reason.
11 Sep, 2008, Hades_Kane wrote in the 20th comment:
Votes: 0
Kayle said:
So you're saying that any game with extended exits (Like MW, which we use in our Pre-auth area to emulate walking down a spiral tower.) is a huge turn off, and just because we use extended exits you wouldn't even give out mud a try? (assuming of course everything that needed to be done to even consider allowing players to test was done.)


I'm saying I likely wouldn't give it a try past maybe 5 minutes. I wouldn't rule out the possibility of having my mind absolutely blown by some incredible features in that first 5 minutes that would outweigh the extended exits, but it has yet to happen :p

It's funny because the first MUD that I really got into actually used extended exits. It was a Nightmare LP MUD I seem to recall, and it was much, much different than any other MUD I've ever played. From spending exp to raise stats/skills and your level actually coming from that, to the extended exits, to players able to buy and describe their own castles… From there I went to a Merc game and really haven't looked back past Diku derivatives. I've given other games a try, usually I make up my mind within the span of a 5 minutes. But yeah, extended exits for me is a MAJOR factor I consider.

Is it silly? Probably. Have I likely missed out on good MUDs as a result? Undoubtedly.

The point of all of this on my end hasn't been to diss extended exits, but more to illustrate that even seemingly simple things like that can run a potential player off, as people, generally, want to play in a familiar environment. As a developer who has taken great pains to de-stock my MUD, I'm frustrated by such a claim because I'm sure I've missed out on players not willing to give new systems a try. That might even be a bit hypocritical on my part, and I probably should give a game more of a try past my initial impressions as I would want new players to do with my game. But really when it comes down to it, the only time I look for a new MUD is generally for a short-term distraction from developing my own, and when I do that I'm not really interested in having to take the time to learn a new game, I'm looking to just jump straight into something that it feels like I already know since I don't really plan on investing anything long-term into it anyway.
0.0/43