[MUD-Dev] NEWS: Why Virtual Worlds are Designed By Newbies - No, Really (By R. Bartle)

[Martin Keegan]

On Thu, 25 Nov 2004, Mike Rozak wrote:

>> To me this calls into question the benefits of muds which are
>> expected to sell new experiences indefinitely. There's something
>> wrong with this "neverending story" narrative structure, and
>> maybe muds with a defined endpoints should be explored.

> I'm surprised; I didn't think anyone was browsing my blogs... I
> was just putting the articles out as a way to clarify my thinking,
> and on the odd chance someone looked.

You advertised the earlier piece about "the trouble with explorers"
on this list a few months ago. I read that at the time, and it got
me thinking about the economics of designing quests and puzzles: in
a widely-distributed single-player adventure game, or in a mud,
players have both an incentive and an ability to share information
with each other.  This information is a non-excludable
good. Consequently, the same content cannot be reused for all
players, and designers must invest even more resources in creating
this content and its secrets to deliver the same level of
entertainment to the players.

This applies most strongly (and possibly only) in the case of
Spade-style players, who advance through the game by disinterring
its "secrets".

> I assume you're talking about some of my later ramblings where
> I've been thinking that a virtual world designed to keep players
> around until they were bored enough to quit (500-1000 hours of
> play) isn't such a good idea.

No.

I only read that one article, not the later ones, before forming my
view about time-limited muds. What I meant by that was a mud which
advertised itself as having a definite end-point when the game
finished and was switched off, not that individual players would be
kicked out after their hundredth hour. Now having read more of your
material, I can now see there are other possibilities, and I expect
you believed that I had something else in mind.  When you said that
a time-limited mud would be even more dependent on newbies, were you
contemplating the imposition of a time limit on the whole game or on
individual players?

As to your other points, which I've not quoted ...

I don't remember the first film I ever saw; what I want to know
about Point #3 is why, for muds, the switching costs are *so* high.

Point #4 is not something I would propose trying to "solve" by a
100-hour virtual world; I don't think Points #2/#4 *can* be
"solved"; I think they're just human nature.

What did you mean by the induction chain?

Mk
_______________________________________________
MUD-Dev mailing list
MUD-Dev at kanga.nu
https://www.kanga.nu/lists/listinfo/mud-dev