What has happened to the MUD???

Uhm, SquareEnix *DID* create a MUD. It's called Final Fantasy 11. However, they gave it a graphical interface.
MUDs have been borrowed, redesigned, and revamped for modern hardware.

There is also Everquest for ps2.

ok, sorry people, i still live back in the stone age. I mean, like an original MUD, text-based. like Zork!

You can't type on a console.

It's hard enough to be able to keep up with what's going on in a 80x50 text screen in a half crowded area. It would be impossible on a tv screen, with limited text.

Quote:

Original post by C-Junkie You can't type on a console.

Actually the PS2 comes equipped with two USB ports for use with a mouse and keyboard. Regrettably, they are never used. I'd imagine they would have gotten more developer support had the PS2 been bundled with them. Sadly, I don't know of any games that support a mouse and keyboard, so we are left with substandard FPS control (red faction) and virtually no RTS's.

Actually, Unreal Tournament for the PS2 allowed for USB mouse and keyboard control, though somewhat pointless with the semi-auto aim. Perhaps if Sony had made a branded keyboard and mouse available it would have raised more interest.

Back on topic . . .
I think the text-only MUD is nearly dead. People just don't have as much of an interest in text anymore, and it can be extremely difficult to keep up with the massive ammounts that scroll past a screen in busy areas of the world. The problem with going completely graphical is that the ability for highly user customizable content is lost. It is reduced to hunting, mining, questing, and crafting items, eliminating the user made areas from MUDs.

I've thought about it before, and I think a hybrid may be feasible using text recognition to create abstract / low-detail graphics of the area to help keep the text down to a manageable minimum, epsecially since most televisions only have an effective readable resolution of 320 by 240.

I think that FF XI is compatible with the keyboard also. I just hate to see text go the way of the dodo. I would prefer a text game over any graphical game(except FFVII). It's like comparing a book with a movie, books are always better.

Apples and oranges: You're dealing with two very different mediums for conveying stories, or for games.

Text is what was used in the begining because it was easy, and it was doable. As technology improved, graphics took over when they could, and text was used for backup, rather than the primary means of communicating what's going on. In engine-based "games" like Doom 3 and UT2k4, you still see text to know what you picked up, or that a flag is on walkabout. But in the meantime, that description of the room has evolved into a fully modeled, multitextured, volumetricly lit, stencil-shadowed, and bump mapped room that we can see, smell the dust in, and watch in real time. It's no longer "there's a long sword here", you see the sword on the busted-looking weapons rack with cobwebs and splinters.

These graphics are also a faster means of describing what's around you. You don't read the rendered landscape like a paragraph, you scan it, dismiss the interesting but mundane areas, and focus on the important things.

MUDs have evolved, not died out. The printed word has changed its purpose. If you want to recapture the spirit of those MUD-ing days, don't go back to the word: determine what gameplay elements were so great, and reintroduce those.

Like your example "a sword is laying on the ground". Well thats whats wrong with games today, you can see it. Text-based games didnt evolve into graphical games becuase that would defeat the whole purpose of a text-based game. A text game is made so that they user can imagine what that sword laying on the ground would look like. It's like reading a book.You reading a book lets you imagine what the things that are happening in the book look like. Thats why i think that people who read books and then watch the movie of a book are really disappointed. Its becuase when were reading a book, we set an image in are head of what the main character looks like and what the roads that they travel look like. We basically recreate the authors work. Thats what a text-based game shuld be.

Most people aren't just interested in playing a game with no graphics. On the other hand, MUDs with some graphics are on the internet, like forlorn hope. It makes things easier to see than a normal text MUD, but still has most of the options. (I think I will stop begging and construct a few homes now.)


[Edited by - Dakar on December 18, 2004 6:39:05 PM]

Maybe you could design a text based first-person shooter. ;)

They kinda did that with Quake 2, providing a modded .exe that rendered the game in raw ASCII... Officially sick and wrong way to do things, y'ask me.

That's text graphics, Sta71c, not text based. Text based would be more like :
"Turn 43.71 degrees counterclockwise, declination 12.9 degrees, fire!"

Quote:

That's text graphics, Sta71c, not text based. Text based would be more like : "Turn 43.71 degrees counterclockwise, declination 12.9 degrees, fire!"

I think it would be a bit more like the text based pong game.

http://www.karber.net/textbased/pong/

Quote:

Original post by Dakar Most people aren't just interested in playing a game with no graphics. On the other hand, MUDs with some graphics are on the internet, like forlorn hope. It makes things easier to see than a normal text MUD, but still has most of the options. (I think I will stop begging and construct a few homes now.)

That game has a nice idea. Occasionally I've wanted to get into MUDs because they seem interesting, but every time I try I'm overwhelmed with trying to keep up with all the text and my position in the world, I've always thought it would be easier if they at least had a minimal overhead map so I can have some idea of where I am, who's around me, and can move normally. Trying to keep track of where I am and typing e/w/n/s to move around, always having to read directions, and often learning a myriad of commands to perform simple actions, is all tiresome and confusing.

MUDs aren't dead, they're stagnant and even more of a niche market then they used to be. Games today are about graphics and sound, people as a whole don't want to read what happens - they want to see it and hear it happen. You can make the same argument with books vs. movies/television; more kids today have seen movies based on books than have read the actual book.

I'd been involved with a mud that tried to do a graphical interface, and while I won't say it failed miserably I will say it's dead in the water. It had the unfortunate happenstance to be in development right when Everquest hit the shelves, and things have frankly never been the same. Games like Myst didn't help; here's a puzzle solving game based purely on graphics - who needs to read?

I do believe that text CAN be brought back into games, but it would take something unique and powerfully done to put it back into the mainstream. If I had the answer...I'd have it on the shelves, believe me.

I honestly don't care if text-based MUDs are put back on the shelves. I don't care if the majority of people like them, because I know that I do like them. Both sides of this have some good arguments. I like games with awesome graphics like Doom 3 and old-school MUDs. Is there some kind of network out there for online text-based games? If not, I think somebody should create one.

MUD Planet

The MUD Connector

MUD World

SMAUG MUDS

Top MUD Sites

...to name a few. Like I said - MUDS aren't dead. Just very niche.

(edit: fixed a link to The MUD Connector)

[Edited by - EricTrickster on December 22, 2004 11:36:41 AM]