[MUD-Dev] Meridian 59 purchased by developers

[Frank Crowell]

From: "Andrew Kirmse" <akirmse at pacbell.net>

> After 3DO shut down the U.S. servers, there were still localized
> versions running in Germany and Korea.  Someone in Russia also got
> hold of an unauthorized version and has been running it for
> awhile.  Any speculation about what will eventually happen to UO,
> EQ, and the like?  After they stop making money, will fans find a
> way to keep them alive?  

Yes, for a while the emulators will fill the gap.  Probably a longer
term way of dealing with this is sort of like movies -- you know
first run, second run, etc.  The existing commerical services are
more like the first-run theaters that have a high cost and expect
high return for their time.  The second-run could be licensees of
the world/game.  Of course this system doesn't exist yet, but if it
went into place it could help give the game a longer life.

Finally-- and this is my hobby horse isn't it-- tranferrable
characters and objects.The second-run servers are not going to have
the stablity that the commerical, first-run will have.  Without some
ability for transfer, you could spend 3 months on some server only
to find out that on Tuesday it is under water because of some storm
in Florida (really happened ) or the system crashed and the admin
"lost the whole darn system and there is no backup" (really
happened).

Although with licensees you would expect some minimum level of
service or they wouldn't stay licensees for long.

frank

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