[MUD-Dev] Towards virtual worlds ... (and the failure of the current industry)

[Marc De Mesel]

Hi fellow travelers,

I thought I should inform you gamedesigners and innovators about
these discoveries I made last night. It started all with an
exceptionaly interesting article entitled 'Sins of the Empire'
written by a certain 'Darien Kane':

  http://www.stratics.com/content/editorials/articles/sins.shtml

Astounded from her insights I sended an email to the author asking:

  From: Marc De Mesel [mailto:marcdemesel at hotmail.com]
  Date: sábado, 30 de novembro de 2002 03:30
  To: darienkane at stratics.com
  Subject : About your article, Sins of the Empire
  
  In short, fantastic!
  
  And therefore I have a question that really bugs my mind:
  
  1. Howcome Raph Koster or Will Wright does not use this knowledge
  in the layout of the fundaments of their worlds?
  
  a confused observer
  

On which she responded:

  From: darienlkane at netzero.net
  To: marcdemesel at hotmail.com
  Subject: a confused writer
  Date: Sat, 30 Nov 2002 16:06:48 GMT
  
  I'm glad someone joins me in my perilous musing. But even amid the
  nebula of unpredictable formlessness we've come to know as the
  MMORPG industry, I dare to cast my own prophecy in the context of
  rising empires: when a game that observes the rules of empire
  building sets itself revealed, it will be done by the hands of the
  first-timers, not the mainstream.
  
  Thanks for your word. Take care.
  
  Darien
  
But the most fantastic discovery was the project she and her fellow
soulmates are trying to realize:

  http://www.archaean.com/emage.html

I also found an interview with the team were the interviewers added
their comments on the answers given by her and the lead designer of
the project. Certain questions and comments by the interviewers,
Logan and Kevin, illustrate really well how the industry thinks
about certain concepts and how difficult it seems for certain people
to understand the innovative but very logical concepts brought
forward by this team.

You can find it right here:

  http://www.geocities.com/logan9a/Archaean.htm

There's also the official version of the interview where the
interviewers keep the comments for themselves and the layout is more
attractive:

  Part 1 - http://www.rpgdot.com/index.php?hsaction=10053&ID=297

  Part 2 - http://www.rpgdot.com/index.php?hsaction=10053&ID=299

Now, I'm interested in what the mud-dev mailinglist thinks about her
points clearly written out in the article as well as any ideas on
the Archaean project.

That 'The Sims Online' is a joke when it comes to the ideas
presented in this article is quite obvious. But Star Wars Galaxies
seems not to be that close eather (correct me if I'm wrong
Raph). The problem is we haven't seen a successful world yet using
these ideas as fundaments for their world/game design so we don't
know for sure weather they are sound and since Archaean is currently
suspended, this might take a while.

So, the question is, would it be possible to create a world where
the virtual citizens have 'needs' like food, drink, shelter and
medical care comparable to real life? A world where shelter is quite
a necessity in order to have a normal civilian life? Where newcomers
are guided into the community through a societal framework that
learns them social values (a birthing system for instance)? And most
importantly where judgement of good and bad is left to the virtual
inhabitants instead of the game designers?

--MarcDM
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