[MUD-Dev] Total Annilation of Downtime

[Brad McQuaid]

On 12/12/02 4:28 AM, Amanda Walker [amanda at alfar.com] wrote:

> That's beside the point, though.  Why do you need to know what
> equipment I'm wearing or carrying?  You can't see inside my purse
> or under my shirt in the real world, why should you be able to in
> a MUD?  (please avoid obvious frat-boy answers ;-))

  1. Inspecting someone does not reveal anything that a person
  couldn't see in real life; it does not tell the player what's in
  someone else's backpack, or what 'bra' they're wearing (not that
  there is an 'underwear layer', but if there was, it wouldn't).

  2. Since the ratio of number of items and the number of visible
  texture sets are no where close to 1:1, and since an experienced
  player in the world would recognize items of renown, inspect
  allows the player to see the actual names of the items the player
  is wearing.

  3. This all comes directly from MUDs and EQ IS a graphical MUD.
  In the MUDs we original designers played, you could 'look' at a
  player and it would list the items he or she was wearing.  It
  wouldn't tell you the stats, but you would get a name (and if you
  had color character sets on, it would display some (annoying,
  IMHO) color scheme to go along with the name).  Why?  Because when
  someone entered a room in a MUD it would just say 'Bob came in
  from the south' or whatever.  At an abstract level you could see
  Bob, but not really, so if you needed more information about Bob
  that in RL you'd already have, you could look at him.  Same with
  EQ: sure, it's graphical, but the graphics don't come close to
  representing the true depth of the game and all that is going on.
  That is why you still have a text box, and that is why you can
  inspect.

I'm sure, one day, the graphics will be so fantastic that none of
this will be necessary, but methinks that day is still a long way
off (which means I probably don't fit in with a lot of you who think
and plan and scheme for the far-future :)

As for why does it tell the player he or she is being inspected?
Again, this comes from MUD heritage, and it's really a matter of
pride.  Our experience was that the majority of people liked to know
when other players were checking out their awesome set of armor and
weapons (again, we're talking about the most outer layer possible --
nobody is inspecting anything further in, whether it exists (some
future game) or doesn't exist (EQ)).  Since item acquisition is very
important and 'showing off' is a big thing (and has been in MUDs
for, oh, a decade at least -- Raph could probably give me the exact
date people began to care about items :) *poke Raph*), we put that
message in there since we didn't have room to add an animation or
something.

Additionally, it's not just about 'showing off'... It allows a
player to assess you abilities as they relate to equipment
efficiently, say before a raid or some such... It allows a merchant
player to look at you and compare what you're wearing to the items
he's selling and let you know if he thinks he has something you
might need, etc.  It goes on and on.  And the message, if you want
it on, tells you that all this is going on -- and information is,
generally, good(TM).

Then, later, as the game evolved, a big enough subset of players
voiced their opinions that they didn't like to see the message, so
we made it optional (e.g. you could turn the message off on your
side, but people could still examine the armor and weapons you
wielded).

Hope that clear things up :)

  Ps. What does this have to do with the elimination of downtime
  (not that anyone would want to totally eliminate it, right?)

--

---------------------------------------------
Brad McQuaid
President & CEO
Sigil Games Online, Inc.
---------------------------------------------


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