[MUD-Dev] A flamewar startingpoint.)

[Adam Wiggins]

[Ola Fosheim Gr=F8stad:]
> >> I was thinking about the state of the art (games) today, I couldn't
> >> really find many examples of new concepts that haven't been used in =
a
> >> classic CBM64 game.  On the other hand I can think of a couple of
> >> "C64" concepts that isn't visible in the current games I know of.
> >
> >Yup.  My big complaint is that all the technology availible to us
> >goes into sparkle, and not into making bigger, more interesting, and
> >more complex gameworlds.  There are a few genres that have been
> >able to take advantage of the new technology - action mainly (somethin=
g
> >like Quake was unimaginable even ten years ago), but also flight
>=20
> The whole concept of Quake and Tombraider is found in mid-eighties
> games.

Hmmm, I admit I haven't played a lot of Tomb Raider or Quake, but I
never saw any real-time 3D environments with real physics, lighting,
real-time multiplayer games, huge levels with true up-and-down (passing
underneath on bridges, flying up into dark corners), complex weapons
(the physics on the grenade launcher), realistic water, QuakeC, or
the sound effects.
None of this is purely sparkle - lighting has a huge effect on what
you can and can't see.  Sound effects are a similar phenomenon - when
it was just the sound of your gun firing it had no effect on gameplay;
sound effects in Quake are quite important, to the point that someone
playing in a network game without a sound card is badly crippled.
Note that I find Quake mildly amusing in large multiplayer games and
incredibly boring in single-player mode.  But I can still appreciate
the benefits it reaps from technology, making it a completely
different beast from games like Castle Wolfenstien, Lode Runner, or
Battlezone.
Compare this to pure 'sparkle' enhancements which don't really change
the gameplay at all.  Mostly this is just concentrating on more
cut-scenes, more 3D-rendered objects, higher resolutions, etc.  Which
leaves less time for real game stuff, meaning that in 1996 you get
a game like Diablo, which is identical in gameplay to Nethack or Moria
in the mid-eighties, except for being 'dumbed down' quite a bit and
refitted with snazzy 3D rendered graphics.

> Your comment made me go upstairs and look through my 64-stuff
> to look up the name of one of them.  "Talisman", written by a teenager
> (at least I think so, I believe he greeted his schoolfriends in a
> scroller :) has it "all".

Not familiar with it.  When I had a C64 I was too poor to buy any games
and too young to know how to pirate, which is how I ended up learning
to program :)

> I think it might be interesting look back to "the roots" where
> everything had to be simple due to hardwarelimitaions.  Maybe the
> important aspects of the concepts are more visible there than in the
> flashy games of today. (To balance this: I do remember that I
> complained about flashy licenced games without real gameplay back in
> the 80's as well.  I might even say that licenced games have improved
> over the years.)

Meaning movie licenses and such?  Ick...I can recall very few examples,
past or present, of good licensed games.

> What I am thinking of is to go back look at simple, ugly and FUN games
> from the past and try to see if some of these concepts could be done
> in a way that won't suffer too badly from lag. Then one build a new

Erm...isn't that what muds are? :)

> enjoyable platform for muds, with reduced bandwith and everything
> (What would fit in a C64 won't burn too much bandwidth :^).  I'm not
> so convinced that commercial MUDs have to be so flashy, at least not
> with the current competition.  After all, a MUD should be enjoyable
> for more than a week or two.  Communication and contents is more
> important in the long run, right?  Maybe funny graphics, puns and
> soforth is more important than smooth animations?

Actually I can't complain too much about this.  I've yet to see
an on-line mud with better than only functional graphics, and most
of them are downright horrible-looking.  Since people play them quite
a bit, it seems to me that they must be fun to make up for that...