[MUD-Dev] shrink wrapped mud development kit (fwd)

[Richard Ross]

> ------- Forwarded Message
>
> From: duggoldner at my-deja.com
> Newsgroups: rec.games.mud.admin
> Subject: shrink wrapped mud development kit
> Date: Thu, 20 Apr 2000 18:45:08 GMT
>
> I am an author of a commercial mud package that
> is currently running on AOL. We are testing the waters
> to see if the general computer public might be interested
> in a "shrink wrapped" mud development kit. It would
> come with: the engine running under Windows 95/98/NT/2000
> and Linux, a set of visual development tools allowing you to
> easily create areas, a set of beginning areas to learn from or
> reuse, a complete manual outlining how to create areas and
> run the mud itself, a license allowing you to run the mud without
> restrictions (you can charge for it, we don't care).
>
> We would create an online community where people could share
> development tips and files etc. and develop updates to the engine
> and the development tools themselves.
>
> We'd put it all together in a box and sell it for the price of
> a normal PC game (40-50 dollars).
>
> Ideas? thoughts? Feedback? Do you think this would draw more
> people into the hobby? Allow people not as technical to develop
> and run their own mud?

If this is a commercial mud already running, won't this cheapen or detract
from the original and result in a wave of low-quality imitations?  Surely if
you've come up with a good MUD idea and are/plan to market it commercially
the last thing you want to do is give everyone the chance to copy it and run
it for free.
I like the idea about the visual development tools, although I usually find
them to produce quite "samey" rooms in terms of player interaction and
"features".

I'm not sure about drawing people in... I would suspect that a large
proportion of the buyers would be people from the original mud, and that
this may result in the loss of some of those people.





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