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From: byron@cs.mun.ca (Byron Montgomerie)
Subject: Re: Talk about simulations.
Message-ID: <1995Feb20.135814.10082@cs.mun.ca>
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References: <3i50ce$2hq@westnet.westnet.com> <3i833i$sri@senator-bedfellow.MIT.EDU>
Date: Mon, 20 Feb 1995 13:58:14 GMT
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Jadrian Zun (zun@athena.mit.edu) wrote:
: In article <3i50ce$2hq@westnet.westnet.com>,
: Paul Munn <pmunn@westnet.westnet.com> wrote:
: >Recently, there have been posts about simulating locales in text 
: >adventure form.  The suggestions recent and not so recent have been for 
: >simulating parts of cities, of college campuses, and the like.  The user 
: >is then free to walk through the simulations and kick the tires of 
: >everything around him or her.
: >
: >This sort of thing is not really interactive fiction as far as many game 
: >developers have pursued it.  IF requires a plot, otherwise it is boring 
: >and we will turn it off and go play something else.  Yes, we'd like to 
: >walk around and try and burn the houses down with the matches we picked 
: >up a few rooms back, but discussions have gone towards saying that such 
: >levels of detail are almost prohibitively time consuming to program, even 
: >when using a very nice OO language like TADS.

: Yes, that's true.  But in pushing the frontiers of IF, where else do we have
: to expand to?  IMHO, I'd like to see realistic worlds in which several plots
: can take place, in addition to free-form interaction.  This goes even better
: when you get into the domain of multiple players!  And such levels of detail
: are not prohibitive when you have up to 30 authors working collaboratively :)

All that you are describing sounds a lot like the MOO system, which stands for
Mud, Object Oriented.  Check out LambdaMOO on lambda.parc.xerox.com' 
(the numeric address for which is `13.2.116.36'), on port 8888.  This is as
close to a dynamic multi-user text adventure as you can get.  If you want to
start your own MOO there is sufficient programming information and 
binaries/source in /pub/MOO via parcftp.xerox.com.  

I think it is the ideal creating environment since you are inside the world
that you create, there is no extra steps between programming and testing.  When
I was on LambdaMOO I programmed an object to dump source for the room
descriptions and connects in some of the popular IF languages.  I no longer use
LambdaMOO but the object might still be floating around.

: But, just imagine the possibilities of having a richly simulated world of
: Victorian London, in which you can set multiple Sherlock Holmes adventures.
: Throw multiple player interaction in there and you have me drooling.  :)

Sounds like a candidate for a MOO to me.  If you do decide to use MOO then I
would advise you to limit the amount of programers you have.  Too many cooks
and all that.

: For such a project, check the Re: New Language (READ THIS) thread for my post
: about boogum.  Or else e-mail me at zun@foop.mit.edu.

: Cheers,

: . . . Zun.

Regards,

Byron

