[MUD-Dev] Re: Introduction

[Travis Casey]

> From: S001GMU at nova.wright.edu
>> From: Jamie Norrish <jamie at sans.vuw.ac.nz>
> 
> >              I'm also a long-time devotee of Interactive Fiction
> >(games such as Zork and Colossal Cave) - I see MUDs as almost being a
> >cross between RPGs and IF, but of course a medium in its own right.
> 
> Actually, the Interactive Fiction games that you mentioned were spinoffs
of the
> original MUD1 from Essex.  Having never played MUD1 or very much of Zork
I
> don't know how similar they are, but my understanding is that most of the
> original MUDS were only multiplayer in that multiple ppl could be logged
in at
> once, but each one played a seperate adventure...  kind of a Zork server
or 
> something.  If anyone played MUD1 (or still plays? I hear Essex U. leaves
a 
> copy of the code up for posterity's sake) please feel free to enlighten
those 
> of us who didn't/don't.

Hmm?  I find it hard to believe that those games were spinoffs of any mud,
unless muds are a lot older than I think they are.  The first mainframe
versions of Adventure were written back in the '60s, and both Colossal
Cave and Zork date from the '70s.  When did MUD1 first go up?

(Heck, Adventure actually predates D&D -- which also helps to explain the
differences between the "interactive fiction" way of doing things and the
"computer RPG" way.)
--
       |\      _,,,---,,_        Travis S. Casey  <casey at cs.fsu.edu>
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