Newsgroups: rec.arts.int-fiction
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From: iiitac@swan.pyr (Alan Cox)
Subject: Re: MUD thoughts
Message-ID: <1994Jan12.182919.25683@swan.pyr>
Organization: Swansea University College
References: <4hAqlwq00iUzQC6B0S@andrew.cmu.edu>
Date: Wed, 12 Jan 1994 18:29:19 GMT
Lines: 33

In article <4hAqlwq00iUzQC6B0S@andrew.cmu.edu> Andrew Lewis Tepper <at15+@andrew.cmu.edu> writes:
>I'll admit I've only tried a few MUDs, and none held my interest for one
>reason: They were all like fancy chat lines; there was very little
>role-playing going on, and _NO_ puzzle solving.
>
>MUDs shouldn't have to be that way; an obvious MUD puzzle would be one
>that requires two or more people cooperating to solve:
Unfortunately the average MUD write is a pimply geek with no real life
experience. Note I say average - not all. If you are/were lucky enough
to play something like 'MUD' you'd discover that there can be a lot
of puzzles and atmosphere.
>etc. Do any MUDs like this exist? Puzzles involving many players would
I like to think the old AberMUD5 game did, but then I wrote it. It certainly
had some really nasty puzzles and group ones.
>be especially fun: Suppose three groups of 3 players had to stand in
>different locations to trigger something; Imagine the chaos of trying to
>organize 9 people in a MUD!

The best version of this I ever saw was a maze where everything you dropped
sank. It took about 4 or 5 people standing in places and working together
to map the maze. 'MUD' also had a problem where three people around the
game needed to meditate at once. One of them got the goodies to give to 
share out - made for some interesting trust games 8-)

99% of MUD stuff is crap.. which is sad because its a brilliant concept.
Oh well when I have the Linux networking finished (Linux people will
understand the sarcasm here) I'll get back to the game I was working on.

Alan
iiitac@pyr.swan.ac.uk



