[MUD-Dev] Opinions (even harsh) on Castle Marrach by Skotos?

[Chris Lloyd]

> -----Original Message-----
> From: mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu [mailto:mud-dev-admin at kanga.nu]On Behalf Of
> Christopher Allen
> Sent: 13 November 2000 08:41
> To: mud-dev at kanga.nu
> Subject: [MUD-Dev] Opinions (even harsh) on Castle Marrach by Skotos?
>
> The beta of Skotos' Castle Marrach game has now been going on for a
> month. Have any of the Mud-Dev'ers had a chance to take a look? What
> do you think of our client? The start story? The game parser? Our
> weird mix of MUSH & MUD?
>

I did (and still do, on occasion) visit Castle Marrach, so here goes...

The first problem was getting in. I had some problems with loading the Java
applet in IE5.5, as did a number of other people. It was a few days before I
managed to get it working on Netscape, but the window is still too small,
and its hard to read anything more than 10 seconds old.

Anyway, into the game. It has a very interesting and slightly mysterious
start-up, where I had to shape my character. The method of doing this is
personally, not really to my taste, but went something like this:

	What was the last thing you remember?

	a) Looking into the night sky.
	b) Writing strange symbols on paper.
	c) Playing chess.
	D) etc...

This method of character creation was brought up a while ago on MUD-dev, so
I won't open a discussion on it here. Suffice to say that you can read very
deeply into the various responses allowed. Does playing chess mean you are a
noble, having the time and inclination to play it? Or just someone really
intelligent? A wizard? A old tavern-keeper? If I was looking at the night
sky am I a dreamer, an astrologer, a thief or just plain lazy? The
introduction gives around a dozen of these choices, and you also get to
choose your appearance (the option of long/short/combed/cropped hair of
colour red/black/brown/blond), which I DO agree with, because it keeps your
player in your world. I see a lot of people pick 'dwarf' as their race in a
fantasy MUD, then write a description saying this dwarf is unique because he
has green scaly skin.

On to the game play... I made a character called Chronos.

Well, my first problem came when I arrived. There was no one there. I
suppose this is my own fault - I live in the UK. Printed quite clearly on
the Marrach web pages it states that the real action is at 3pm-11pm PST.
That's 11pm-7am for me. Bummer. I has a wander around, looked at the little
map on the side of the screen (Great idea, I found it invaluable, but do you
really need all the spare space on the applet? I could really have done with
more text area than the useless buttons to bring up a help file I already
printed off).

Day 1.: Its 1am. No one about. I walk around again, get some more clothes.
Typing WHO tells me there is another person here, but I can find him.

2am. I get bored, decide to come back later

11am. I'm back! Wow. Lots of people here, now. I wander around, say 'hi' to
people, and generally listen to what's going on. After a while the
Storyhosts (admins) and the hosted (admin-controlled) characters come on.
They are all very friendly (or not, as appropriate to their role). But
they're all in very high demand, and I was lucky to get a few minutes with
one. I finally retire at 4am, having met a lot of people and wondering what
to do next.

The little map in the corner still works, and I still like it. another great
thing is the way rooms can become more and more detailed
as you go on...

	> LOOK
	You are in a long room with painting on the wall.

	> LOOK AT PAINTINGS
	There are five paintings, each of a different person. the first is of the
queen.

	> LOOK At PAINTING OF QUEEN
	> Its a painting. Of the Queen. She looks regal and serious, etc...

Nothing of any interest to pick up though - Just food and clothing.

Day 2: 1am. Only two people here. I eventually find them - They are talking
about something from last night that I missed. Damn. Better come back later.

11am Lots of people again. I managed to get assigned a mission by one the
hosted Characters - Find and arrest the mysterious 'shadow' that people are
seeing. Unfortunately, this is a bit tricky. You see, there aren't really
any objects in Marrach yet, aside from the generic food and clothing. I
can't get hold of a bag of flour and lie in wait for the shadow, for
example, and no one ever seems to see it more than once.

Day 3+; Its impractical for me to stay until 5am every night now, so I
don't. I practice a few duels in the sparring room (but only in the evening,
because only the hosted characters have access to the practice swords), and
occasionally chat about whatever it was I missed in the early hours of the
morning.

To sum up, then, I missed out a lot because I live in the wrong time zone -
I don't expect Skotos to employ 24/7 staff. I was a bit depressed by the
lack of things to do during my daytime hours. Marrach is built around social
interaction, but there are few real rewards as far as I can see. By winning
an argument or by meeting lots of people you get... To have more arguments
and meet more people. If I didn't need my sleep I'd be up until 6am every
night trying to build up a social life in Marrach, but some of us have to be
awake for 9 am ;)

C.




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