[MUD-Dev] Balance... RPG or Role-Playing Game?

[Raph Koster]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu
> [mailto:mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu]On Behalf Of
> Patrick Dughi
> Sent: Tuesday, July 25, 2000 6:36 PM
> To: mud-dev at kanga.nu
> Subject: RE: [MUD-Dev] Balance... RPG or Role-Playing Game?
>
>
> On Mon, 24 Jul 2000, Raph Koster wrote:
> >
> >
> > > -----Original Message-----
> > > From: mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu
> > > [mailto:mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu]On Behalf Of
> > > Ben
> > > Sent: Sunday, July 23, 2000 5:59 PM
> > > To: Post
> > > Subject: [MUD-Dev] Balance... RPG or Role-Playing Game?
> > >
> > > People play games today for the combat.
> >
> > More people don't play because of the combat than do play
> because of the
> > combat, IMHO. How many times have we heard the pejorative
> "hack n slash" or
> > these games referred to as juvenile testosterone fests? A
> game just about
> > combat is a proven turn-off for most females, for example.
> >
> 	Actually, I'm going to agree with Ben.  We're talking about the
> lowest common denominator here.  This is why the overall population of
> muds far exceeds mushes.  Granted, the devoted populations
> (sticky) will most likely be a different story.

Do we have evidence that the overall population of GoP muds exceeds that of
mushes? Because my impression had always been that in the text world, the
population sizes were comparable, if not in favor of mushes/moos/etc
(because many of the latter dislike being indexed on mudlists).

> 	Even among the pseudo-angst ridden, 'I-feel-the-poet-inside-me',
> skin-deep introspection attitude which is so prevaliant in generation X,Y,
> and Z (anyone from 16-28 basically), we still see the less intellectual
> forms of entertainment grabbing the lion's share of the population.  I
> don't have any hard data for this, other than my own experience, and
> knowledge of numbers for what is in the field.

Pfft, you always see the less intellectual forms of entertainment grabbing
the lion's share of the population in every medium and art form. But
"Friends" also happens not to feature combat. Or "Who Wants to be a
Millionaire."

> 	I think if you're going to want to pull in the numbers, you're
> going to want to avoid the niche market.  I think that's already been
> covered pretty well on the list.  No-combat muds are
> definitely a niche market compared with what's out there now.

Well, speaking from a commercial perspective, combat is a niche market
compared to The Sims and Barbie and so on. :) It's certainly a niche market
compared to IRC and ICQ, which seems like an ideal audience for commercial
muds to try to go after.

> Summary:
> 	!combat is a niche market.
>  	Niche markets mean smaller playerbase.
> 	therefore, !combat means smaller playerbase.
> 	Q.E.D?

Only if you accept the first statement, which I don't.

-Raph




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