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[george]

this is like the sequel (lovechild?) of Do You Mud?, and muku's post in another thread.

I've played muds for a fairly long time, mostly casually, and there are some good muds, many not so good muds, and a few pretty damn epic muds out there.

One thing that doesn't seem to be out there these days is much visibility for muds in the wider gaming world.

Which some might say is due to their long, slow flame out and irrelevance in gaming culture. However, I still have a lot of love for muds, their often unique style and gameplay, and if there are people here who might really like these games and never get a chance to play them just because no one talks about them, it's possible that would make me cry rivers of tears.

So without further ado let's play some muds. 


herewith is an updating list of muds people will play and are playing (I'll start the list):

Archons of Avenshar
God Wars II
Armageddon


herewith is what you need (a client) to play:

On Windows: MUSHClient
On Mac: Atlantis
On Linux: KMuddy (or MUSHClient in WINE)
On &c.

[george]

Archons of Avenshar

I'm going to begin this thread on what are basically 30 year old games with a new game -- Archons of Avenshar. I found this pretty randomly on a mud forum. Anyway it seems appropriate to start with this as it's quite easy to get into.

The thing that distinguishes AoA from most muds is that it's played solely in the browser with a Flash client, whereas most muds are played via Telnet. Furthermore AoA is written in Python, and the dev (Darsh/Sean) is really good with feedback and working with contributions (ideas and content) to the game (which basically is still in an alpha stage at this point).

AoA's client is in my opinion quite nice, and fairly simple:




Character creation right now is basic and quick:




Your account holds a roster of all the characters you can play. And once you're in the game, you can start gaining skills and exploring the world.




In short AoA is a very easy introduction to muds, but since the game is early in development it should be seen as just that. From this point muds branch in a super wide spread of directions, and I'll get into that more with the other muds I'll play here in the near future.

One of the cool things about muds is, once you hang out for a bit and get to know the devs of a particular game, they are a very creative space for adding content of your own that can be immediately enjoyed by the other players there. Because of the relative simplicity and ease of creating levels and content in text, it's a good way to learn the basic things that make games fun and interesting for a variety of players as well.

OK! I hope this is all somewhat interesting to at least one or two people.

[Don Andy]

AoA looks quite intriguing, especially since it's played with Flash, which MIGHT (although I'd have to try) enable me to play at work, which is one big weakness other muds had (that god damn proxy).

Right now I'm not really playing (I always get lost in these things, literally), but I've played with the thought of doing my own MUD now and then. Never quite pulled it through, though.

Would love to see more SciFi muds, though. Especially with a good space system.

Edit:
Proxy 1 - AoA 0 :T

[jimmythechang]

This letter could stand to be longer, methinks. I played Achaea for awhile, but one thing I could never get around were the use of macros and triggers. I know the concept of reflexes in a text-based game is kinda ridiculous, but I actually liked having to type out commands.

[george]

Edit:
Proxy 1 - AoA 0 :T

 . What do you think the proxy is blocking exactly?


@jimmy, you're right, it is rather short at the moment. I'm planning on adding more plays. But the point is for anyone to add a play like I did, or like muku's post about Armageddon...

And I'm with you about typing out commands. Achaea, however, is particularly a macro heavy mud, because of its particular systems. 

[increpare]

Right now I'm not really playing (I always get lost in these things, literally), but I've played with the thought of doing my own MUD now and then. Never quite pulled it through, though.

I made one a couple of years ago (never had more than 5 people on it at once though): it was a thoroughly entertaining experience, and I heartily recommend it

[Cheater‽]

This letter could stand to be longer, methinks. I played Achaea for awhile, but one thing I could never get around were the use of macros and triggers. I know the concept of reflexes in a text-based game is kinda ridiculous, but I actually liked having to type out commands.

Yeah. I stopped playing a while ago, but it is awesome, as the other IRE games. For those discouraged by macros and triggers, they are only really necessary if you intend to delve into combat and high-level bashing.

[Don Andy]

Edit:
Proxy 1 - AoA 0 :T

. What do you think the proxy is blocking exactly?

Pretty much everything that does not go through port 80 or 8080 (can't remember which). That's why the client loads fine, but can't connect to their server.

[Ivan]

I used to play Ancient Anguish in the 90s.

[skaldicpoet9]

Man, I was actually just thinking about getting back into a MUD recently. I used to play the Wheel of Time MUD which was pretty good and Materia Magica. I've been wanting to roleplay on Armageddon for awhile but have been too lazy to create a character yet. Honestly though, I'll probably end up back at WoT lol...

[pnx]

I've kinda been interested in Armageddon mud for a while now, I kinda like the look of it but I can never really sit down and write out my character, I really prefer making my characters up as I go along (which actually tends to work out well for me). Still, I suppose I should be able to write a bit of back story at the least.

[george]

The last time I made a character on Armageddon I didn't really put too much into the back story I don't think, probably four or five very short and kind of sketchful paragraphs, so I don't think it would be a problem. 

[george]

God Wars II

God Wars II is kind of like Dwarf Fortress meets Street Fighter.

Back in the mid-1990s a young English mud player and coder attending Portsmouth University, Richard Woolcock (aka KaVir in the mud community), took a copy of the Merc codebase (originally derived from DIKU) and modded it to create God Wars, a player-killing mud. KaVir went on to create a few other GodWars-derived muds, as did many other developers when they got a copy of the code (officially or unofficially). KaVir eventually publically released the code, and there currently are 55 GodWars muds listed at The Mud Connector.

However GodWars is not to be confused with God Wars II, which is KaVir's reincarnation of the original ideas of his first codebase. Now if I sound a little like a fanboy here, well, it's true . But let's get into the game and you can judge for yourself.

I'm going to be using MUSHclient for most of the screens, so what you're looking at is basically Telnet with GW2 coloring and styling the text.



When you first create a character in GW2 you can do a quick start, choose a concept, or fully customize. I took the knife fighter concept, but the important thing is that, with some important exceptions like choosing a class, character creation is basically fully customizable and rebuildable at any time (sort of like Guild Wars).



You first enter GW2 in Glyphstone Village. You can see a small ascii map and a description to the right of it. All descriptions in GW2 are generated based on the terrain, weather, your character, and other things nearby. Since GW2 uses a 'roomless' world (compared to most muds which use a nodal map based on the 'room'), you perceive a number of things within a radius of your character, taking into account some basic line-of-sight. You have the option of turning off the ascii map as well (particulary helpful for visually impaired players).



The Village has basic amenities such a store of free equipment, which you'll need to start training. To get to the store, I move to it:



And once there you have a pick of as many items as you can somehow carry, strap to yourself, or stuff in your pockets:

What item would you like to take? Options are as follows:
Longsword, broadsword, bastard sword, greatsword, shortsword, rapier, katana,
wakizashi, tanto, scimitar, falchion, sabre, tiger claw, katar, swordbreaker,
knife, butterfly knife, kris, main gauche, dagger, stiletto, greataxe,
battleaxe, hand axe, throwing axe, buckler, crescent shield, target shield,
kite shield, tower shield, cudgel, mace, war hammer, maul, shortbow, longbow,
quiver, crossbow, case, net, whip, morning star, halberd, naginata, spear,
trident, quarterstaff, lance, robe, cloak, shirt, vest, jerkin, ringmail vest,
chainmail vest, ringmail shirt, chainmail shirt, breastplate, bracers, battle
bracers, loincloth, shift, belt, trousers, skirt, dress, ringmail leggings,
chainmail leggings, codpiece, greaves, boots, shoes, sandals, socks, cap,
mask, headband, helmet, hoplomacus helmet, secutor helmet, thracian helmet,
full helm, collar, chainmail coif, gloves, gauntlets, crucifix, lockpick set,
bottle, whetstone, cleaning cloth, sewing kit, champron, criniere, peytral,
flanchards, croupiere, saddle, bridle, bread, egg, wand, torch.

These are the standard issue items; everything else you either find on a monster or craft yourself.

So now with some weapons (and other things as you'll see), I can get into play. Like many muds (or similar long-play games) GW2 requires a not insubstantial initial effort to get the ball rolling.

Here's the technical details of Tuppens at the moment:



And what he looks like:



god this is getting long, so we'll have to save Tuppens' first fight, and a look at what Tuppens will really be doing in the world of GW2, for the next play...but here's a preview:

You somersault over the white-sash martial artist's head.

You thrust your right knife into the white-sash martial artist's side, drawing blood.

You land, your bare feet slamming down on the polished floor.
The white-sash martial artist tries to headbutt you.
You sidestep to the left of his forehead.

Your body begins regenerating itself.
You crouch down into a low ducking position.

The white-sash martial artist tries to headbutt you.
You duck under his forehead.

You thrust at the white-sash martial artist's chest with your right knife.
The white-sash martial artist leans to the right of your blade tip.
You kick the white-sash martial artist's legs out from under him.

[skaldicpoet9]

Would love to see more SciFi muds, though. Especially with a good space system.

Yeah, I would love to see a good Sci-Fi MUD for sure. Small single man ships in a vast interstellar system fighting it out against space pirates and other players. You could have smugglers, bounty hunters, Galactic Federation pilots and such as classes. Damnit, why isn't there a game like this?

[george]

Other than a number of Star Wars muds (47 listed at the MudConnector), a bunch of Star Trek, Firefly, etc. roleplaying muds and mushes, Miriani, which I haven't played, and the in development Tears of Polaris, I haven't seen much in the way of good SF muds. That reminds me there's another interesting one in development (see this thread). I'd like to play one too. A few of us were talking about putting something together but nothing has come out of that yet.

[postlogic]

Materia Magica always kicks ass!

[Eclipse]

i used to play in Nebbie Arcane and Lumen Et Umbra (two italian muds) using the good ol' telnet or better the ZMud client: http://www.zuggsoft.com/zmud/zmudinfo.htm

it has also an interesting map feature that creates automagically a map of the mud world while you're traveling inside it. And then you can even edit it to add fancy stuff

[skaldicpoet9]

That's what I hate about a lot of MUDs. It's just too damn easy to get lost. The first MUD I played that actually had a semblance of a map was Materia Magica. I don't see why some MUDs just can't implement a simple ASCII map.

[george]

Speaking of a map...

I felt like reviving this thread to add an update on Archons of Avenshar, because, basically, the solo developer on this mud has been kicking some serious a*# lately. He's redesigned the game and much of the UI into a top-down/text mud hybrid. It's the best looking one I've ever seen.

[undertech]

The two I spent a lot of time on way back when: LegendMUD and BatMUD.

LegendMUD - A nice time-travel theme between the various worlds of legend that comprise it. Used to be run by Raph Koster before he jumped ship to design UO and other games. A DikuMUD, not too tough to get into.

BatMUD - A Finnish MUD that has been around for quite some time, with a huge world and zillions of races/skills/whathaveyou. Definitely for the hardcore, although they've softened up the learning curve somewhat (I think). It is an LpMUD.