[MUD-Dev] Why are we all making RPGs?

[Matt Mihaly]

On Thu, 7 Jun 2001, Lee Sheldon wrote:

> -----Original Message-----
> From: Brian 'Psychochild' Green

>> I think the biggest reason why RPGs are natural for the "online"
>> medium is because it is the one genre that benefits the most from
>> being online.  All RPGs involve other characters.  Computer RPGs
>> (CRPGs) usually have players control one or more of the "good"
>> characters, while the computer tries to cover the rest of the
>> characters.  As any fan of traditional tabletop RPGs can tell
>> you, the computer does a terrible job of making a dynamic story.

> Used in this sense the term RPG isn't really a genre at all, is
> it?  We generally assume it means fantasy-sci-fi because that's
> traditionally the territory most of the RPGs have explored.  We
> -are- stuck in a genre rut of fantasy/sci-fi, not an RPG rut.
> Over a year ago now I remember being approached by three different
> groups all interested in doing a "soap" persistent world.  Since I
> think I can safely claim to be the only person you've ever heard
> of who has designed both multiplayer games and was the head writer
> of a daytime soap, it's not surprising that they looked me up.
> Yet none of the projects ever got off the ground.  We hear people
> say over and over again how the bulk of online gaming is people
> playing hearts.  A vast majority of them are women.  This same
> demographic watches soaps. I think a soap RPG would be the first
> one to break a million subscribers.  <shrug>

The idea Daniel James and I approached you about didn't get off the
ground mainly because a reasonably large amount of money was needed
and it had suddenly become quite difficult to raise that much
money. I still firmly believe in that the idea would work.

 
> I think the challenges are very real.  But that's no reason not to
> do it.  To stop making the same things over and over we need to
> have different models to work from.  World War II -does- spring to
> mind ;-).  We don't have to limit ourselves to the same
> literature.  We don't have to limit ourselves to the same
> boundaries.  Instead of geographical boundaries, how about
> industrial or thematic?  What we call, strangely enough, "arenas"
> in film and TV.  How about an RPG set in the music industry that
> includes MP3 file trading?  How about a western: Rancher?
> Sheriff?  Indian warrior?  How about the Old Testament?  Magic,
> monsters, warring civilizations.  Well, you get the idea.

Heh, amusingly, just go to Vegas and walk down the Strip. They've
got a casino based on a ton of milieus that people like. Excalibur
(Medieval), Caesar's Palace (Roman), Treasure Island (caribbean
pirates), New York New York (heh, new york), the Luxor (ancient
egypt), the Aladdin (ancient persia), the Barbary Coast (obvious),
Monte Carlo (obvious), the Venetian (obvious), the Sands (deserty
theme), Paris Las Vegas (obvious), south pacific (Mandalay Bay),
Wild Wild West (not sure if that one is open yet, and it's off the
strip, but still), Bourbon Street (New Orleans), the Bellagio
(italian resort), etc etc etc. The only things they don't seem to
have much of (at least that I can remember) are things from the
Orient.

--matt

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