[MUD-Dev] The impact of the web on muds

[Nathan Yospe]

On Mon, 19 Jan 1998, Richard Woolcock wrote:

:Travis Casey wrote:

:> Unfortunately, all of the muds that I've seen have some aspect of
:> real-time play to them -- characters don't take turns and get to do
:> their actions at times determined by the game system, but rather, time
:> is important in reacting to others.

:But turns cannot work in this type of environment - the words "Just get
:on with it" have sprung up on many occasion during my roleplaying 
:experiences.  I also recall a little cartoon in the back of a roleplaying
:magazine in which a group of adventurers are walking into a room full of
:other adventurers and a bunch of orcs, all just sitting around.  One of 
:the recent arrival says "whats going on?".  One of the other adventurers
:who's sitting down says "Oh, we're just waiting for the GM to work out
:the damage on my fireball".

Man! I've had things like this happen.

:Equally, you can't have a pen&paper roleplaying game done real-time.  Try
:it - give each player a little clock which goes off every x many seconds
:(depending how fast their characters are), and tell them they can yell 
:their action every time the clock alarm goes...but if they forget - too
:bad.

:*BEEP* Bubba yells "I'm attacking the...."
:*BEEP* Boffo yells "I'm drawing my..."
:*BEEP* Biffo yells "Wait! where are the..."
:*BEEP* You yell "The dragon breathes on you! DIE!"

LARPs, anyone?

:> > You are exagerating of course.  I was referring at the difference between
:> > saying "There is a large and terrifying dragon here." and showing one.
 
:> Of course, with such a description, you're really bludgeoning the
:> players -- you're *telling* them that their characters should be
:> terrified, rather than trying to create a feeling of terror in them.

:I agree completely.  The desciption should be created dynamically according
:to the players perspectives (I believe this was discussed in the player-
:recognition thread).  Bubba the village boy sees "A huge lizard thing",
:Bubba the village boy who's heard about dragons sees "A huge man-eating
:dragon", while Bubba the experienced dragon slayer sees "A young green
:Wyrm".  How would graphics cope with this?

This much I agree with. Heck, I was the prime proponent!

:   The dragon grins evilly at you, a look of menace in its eyes.
:   The dragon grins at you with amusement.
:   The dragon smiles fondly at you.
:   The dragon smirks as it sees you.
:   The dragon glances at you, a wicked smile on its face.

:Each of the above portray an impression as to the dragon's intent.  How
:would graphics cope with this?

I don't know, but I really didn't like any of the above that much. Well,
maybe its just a matter of triteness. The dragon should be _capable_ of
such an action in the first place. Theoretically, this would be doable in
graphics of high enough caliber.

:   You smell the scent of rotten flesh coming from the floorboards.

Advantage: text.

:   You hear a voice behind you say "Don't turn around"

Advantage: graphics w/ stereo sound. >=)

:   You feel something cold and sharp pressed into the small of your back.

Advantage: text or REALLY good VR.

:   You taste the bile rising in your throat.

Advantage: text.

BTW: I have faded (impresserio) flashes of graphics in the background of a
text window in the prototype client. The graphics are inlined by the
client/server interface, and are generally independant of the game/server
interface. They can be static or flash animated, and a better client might
even render them based on the server's models and the same information 
used to generate text.

:> But who says you have to?  Just as your text description doesn't try
:> to give all the details of the dragon's color, size, texture, etc.
:> that it could, there's no reason that a graphical representation has to
:> be highly detailed.  The dragon could be shown in a cartoon/comic-book

Ruins the flow...

:> fashion, could be represented by a semi-abstract icon, or could be shown

Likewise, unless very subtly done.

:> like a charcoal sketch.  Such representation leave more room for the

This is better. Still hard to do well, though.

:> player's imagination -- just as giving a less detailed textual
:> description does.  (Granted, they don't leave *as much* room -- my point
:> is simply that you seem to be contrasting a very sketchy description
:> with a photo-realistic graphic depiction.)

:Seeing "A large green dragon claws you" wouldn't scare me.
:Seeing a cartoon dragon hitting me would make me laugh - it would also
:spoil the atmosphere, unless the mud was supposed to be funny.

Agreed. The text that most muds use is a lot like said cartoon.

:Ah, but a good CODER could determine what would make the character
:scared.  You don't want to roleplay your character being scared of a
:dragon?  Too bad; you shouldn't have played a farmer.  Just as in a
:pen&paper rpg the GM might say "No way can you attack the dragon!
:You're terrified!  Make a courage roll just to see if you can avoid
:running away screaming!" it was quite fair to put this into a mud,
:and doesn't cause problems for roleplaying.

And I can see you;re firmly in my corner of the ring...

:> "There is a large undine here," 99% of them will have no idea what an
:> undine is, how it looks, or what "large" is when talking about an
:> undine (remember, "large" when speaking of creatures is relative -- a
:> "large cat" might be an 8kg/18lb tomcat, while a "large horse" is much
:> bigger than any human, and a "large tyrannosaur" will weigh several
:> tons).

:Despite my comments on dynamic descriptions earlier in this post, I do
:still feel that being able to SEE a huge monster with tentacles/etc is
:more effective than seeing a description.  Dynamic descriptions I can
:do however, but not dynamic graphics ;)

How about a fleeting glimpse in the background?

:> Further, describing things in this way makes representing similar
:> creatures difficult -- what if I want to have another type of creature
:> that looks almost exactly like an undine?

:The close it looks to an undine, the more likely people will be fooled.
:The result?  People who fight a lot of both creatures will be able to 
:tell them apart, whilst other people usually won't (unless told what to
:look for).  I consider this to be a good thing.

This, of course, is the advantage of dynamic text.

:> I disagree; text makes it easier to bludgeon the players by *telling*
:> them what they should feel.  It takes at least a moderately skilled
:> writer to make the player truly *feel* the emotions.

:Ah, but how good an artist is needed to inspire players to feel emotions
:due to graphical images?

Exactly: the same problem that plagues text muds would plague amatuer
graphic muds: amatuer talent in the creative role. Bad pictures are as
bad as bad writing.

:> find that some of my emotions respond more to written descriptions,
:> and some to graphical depictions.  Which is superior depends both on
:> what emotion you want to draw out, and on the personal qualities of
:> the player you're trying to draw them out of.
 
:> To give a few examples from my own experience...

<snip>

:Same here - but turn the sound off and no movie even makes me jump.
:I think that sound adds atmosphere which graphics alone can never do -
:When I first started playing Doom II for example, it used to make me 
:feel very tense when I could hear growls around me, and sometimes it
:would even make me jump.
:Perhaps the next phase of mud after graphical will be "graphical with
:sound"...

I took that as assumed...

:> Of course, all of this is merely anecdotal, and is just how things
:> affect me -- but I hope my point is made; that both graphics and text
:> have things to offer, and there's no reason to feel that either one is
:> inherently superior to the other.

:I agree of your first point, but not on the second.  Both graphics and
:text certainly have things to offer, but BOTH are inherently superior
:to each other in different areas.  If someone tries to create a graphical
:version of a text-based game, then I would be very surprised if it was
:a success.  I am getting more and more tempted to start working on a
:graphical mud of my own, but if I do, it will be nothing like any text
:based mud.

There are reasons to combine the two as well...

:Out of interest, can anyone recommend a good book on socket programming?
:It a skill I'm sadly lacking to any useful degree...all I need to do then
:is work out how to draw a pixel on the screen, and the rest I can do ;)

Um. *Glances up at bookshelf.* Stevens' Unix Network Programming is the only
one on my bookshelf at work atm, but I can't remember how good it was.
--

"You? We can't take you," said the Dean, glaring at the Librarian.
"You don't know a thing about guerilla warfare." - Reaper Man,
Nathan F. Yospe  Registered Looney                   by Terry Pratchett
yospe at hawaii.edu   http://www2.hawaii.edu/~yospe           Meow