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I do love muds. I sorta maintain: https://github.com/shmup/miniboa https://github.com/shmup/miniboa There's a lot of rabbit holes if you ever want to explore

I do love muds. I sorta maintain: https://github.com/shmup/miniboa https://github.com/shmup/miniboa There's a lot of rabbit holes if you ever want to explore the social/textual landscape of the 80s and 90s, especially the 90s and into the early 2000s. A LOT of stuff was written. Recently I've been absorbing more of it Like this: http://pmc.iath.virginia.edu/Virtual.Community.html http://pmc.iath.virginia.edu/Virtual.Community.html And also a book you may like to look up, "My Tiny Life": https://archive.org/details/mytinylifecrimep0000dibb_c6m4 https://archive.org/details/mytinylifecrimep0000dibb_c6m4 Or read some papers indexed here: - https://hayseed.net/MOO/ https://hayseed.net/MOO/ - https://lisdude.com/moo/ https://lisdude.com/moo/ Bare with me, the topic of MUDs isn't mentioned here often and I've been wanting to link dump a little

JKCalhoun 3y ago
Super cool. MUDs were cool because they were open, free. I'm kind of repelled by the modern derivative, the Corporate Games like World of Warcraft. Would a modern MUD be web based? What is the modern web version of a MUD? I don't think immersive 3D like the aforementioned WoW is really a MUD but I am not sure pure text is to my liking. I think Rogue-likes might have hit the sweet spot — allowing you to explore somewhat graphically but there was still a degree of imagination required. The cost to create a Rogue-like world too would not be prohibitive (and I mean cost in terms of time and effort — like the time and effort that would be required to create a 3D immersive universe like WoW, etc.). And, sure, I know Dwarf Fortress is a thing but the other aspect of MUDs that was cool was that so many existed with their own unique feel and character. I guess I am looking for a web ring of Rogue-likes. Even cooler if, while on different servers, they had a mechanism for linking or tunneling to other sites. I'm imagining two sysops cooperating and adding tunnels between their two worlds so that a player could wander into a completely new world — unknowingly moving from one site to another. You get enough sysops to join up and you kind of no longer need a web ring.
- bananamerica 3y ago
  Web MUD clients exist. I'm really not sure if modernizing MUDs is worth the effort. Actual MUD gamers will look at it with either contempt or distrust, especially blind players. And regular gamers are unlikely to play a text game. I could make a game with a MUD sensibility or even use a MUD engine, but I would never call it a MUD. MUD players want more of the past and I'm not really interested in that.
  - brlewis 3y ago
    > especially blind players Isn't accessibility for a web-based MUD just a matter of adding `aria-live="polite"` as an attribute to the incoming text? Five years ago I did this on https://evolvingstory.juliablewis.com/ https://evolvingstory.juliablewis.com/ and it seemed to work with OSX screen reading.
    - bananamerica 3y ago
      This is more of a social problem than a technical problem. MUD blind players are extremely distrustful of innovation because, more often than not, innovation means graphics or custom clients they cannot freely alter and manipulate. And they don't wanna be left behind. They wanna use their own client on a telnet connection because that is already suited for them. Many QOL features for the sighted can have a negative impact on the blind. Any attempt at engaging that audience must first convince them that you won't leave them behind. One simple way to benefit the blind is by making sounds integral to a game, with clear cues for everything.
- raytopia 3y ago
  There's a lot of muds with web clients now a days. Telnet still seems to be the most popular though because most of the popular clients support it. If you're looking for something that isn't just text based Graphical Muds wmay be what you're looking for. For context they are the often times over looked link between muds and mmos. I swear I remember reading something about connected mud servers but I can't remember it off of the top of my head unfortunately.
  - jstarfish 3y ago
    Telnet's a shit option these days. No encryption. Webclients can be protected by HTTPS, and Evennia (for one) offers SSH.
    - troad 3y ago
      Genuine question, but why would a MUD require encryption? Seems like a strange feature.
      - cyanmagenta 3y ago
        Character login requires password, which is sent plaintext over telnet. Even if you get around that somehow, there are still concerns about session hijacking to steal someone’s in-game items and currency.
        troad 3y ago
        I suppose the threat vector seems incredibly low to me. Seems like a strange use of a capable hacker's time, in today's world of bitcoin and ransomware, to be preying on people's in-game currency / pets from ancient MUDs. Their saleability would seem to approach zero. Password reuse might be an issue, but in my experience people had their environments pre-configured to log in automatically, so a unique complex password would eliminate that risk. Personally, I think the complexity of implementing encryption for these services would outweigh the benefits. A big part of their appeal is the ease of setup and shell access.
- Palomides 3y ago
  the modern equivalent of a MUD as a user-designed social experience is definitely VRChat
  - jstarfish 3y ago
    Roblox and Minecraft are what the kids who can't afford a VR setup are using.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- nextaccountic 3y ago
  > Would a modern MUD be web based? What is the modern web version of a MUD? A month ago people posted Improbable Island here. It's not "modern" but it's a mud-like website https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39135779 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39135779 I inquired about the relationship with muds. It's.. like a mud, but without a map (so rooms form an arbitrary graph, and edges don't have a cardinal direction like "north") https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39141173 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39141173
- hnthrowaway0328 3y ago
  Have you tried Neverwinter nights' persistent worlds? Not the NWN online game but the original 2001 game. Back in the day I thought it is the best thing: players can create their own worlds and invite others. Of course builders cannot connect two worlds so that was a pity. Still, I believe it was a lot better than games such as WoW. Nevertheless the game never achieved the popularity it deserves, and nowadays the persistent worlds are not played by many.
raytopia 3y ago
I've been messing around with miniboa. Pretty fun to use! Those links on Moos look interesting thanks for sharing!
troad 3y ago
I too love MUDs / MOOs. I still miss some of the features that Discworld Mud had, and mainstream gaming hasn't warmed to. Strange currencies, complex banking, different in-game languages, convenience features gated in RP ways (the Taxi guild of portal wizards!), etc. The conventional wisdom holds that that'd be far too much friction for modern games, but it contributed so much to making the world feel more than an inch deep, which is something modern gaming needs all the help with it can get. I also think scripting in LambdaMOO may have been my gateway drug to coding. Once I learnt I was able to expand the world myself, I was intoxicated. Yib's Guide to MOOing [0] is a great read for anyone interested in how that all used to work. And the social scene of these services in the 90s and early 00s is hard to describe. Honestly, @go #17 in LambdaMOO at its height felt more like the Metaverse to me than anything Facebook has made to date. [0] https://www.lisdude.com/moo/ygm.pdf https://www.lisdude.com/moo/ygm.pdf
- jamilton 3y ago
  Discworld Mud is still around, active, and getting updates fyi! I'm sure it's not the same as it's heyday but . I love the language feature in particular, I also want it to be used in other games. Having to change currency I could do without though :P How many Ankh-Morpork dollars to an Agatean rhinu? Can I convert Djelian talona to Lancre pounds in this town? Writing that out though, it is great for the roleplaying experience.
  - grimgrin 3y ago
    Earlier tonight I converted some Ankh-Morpork dollars into Lancre bucks so I could buy a tent. They recently added tents so now I can afford a "house" :P Here's a page I threw up with a buncha Discworld MUD links, for the curious: https://badteeth.dungeon.red/ https://badteeth.dungeon.red/

JKCalhoun 3y ago

Super cool. MUDs were cool because they were open, free. I'm kind of repelled by the modern derivative, the Corporate Games like World of Warcraft. Would a modern MUD be web based? What is the modern web version of a MUD? I don't think immersive 3D like the aforementioned WoW is really a MUD but I am not sure pure text is to my liking. I think Rogue-likes might have hit the sweet spot — allowing you to explore somewhat graphically but there was still a degree of imagination required. The cost to create a Rogue-like world too would not be prohibitive (and I mean cost in terms of time and effort — like the time and effort that would be required to create a 3D immersive universe like WoW, etc.). And, sure, I know Dwarf Fortress is a thing but the other aspect of MUDs that was cool was that so many existed with their own unique feel and character. I guess I am looking for a web ring of Rogue-likes. Even cooler if, while on different servers, they had a mechanism for linking or tunneling to other sites. I'm imagining two sysops cooperating and adding tunnels between their two worlds so that a player could wander into a completely new world — unknowingly moving from one site to another. You get enough sysops to join up and you kind of no longer need a web ring.

bananamerica 3y ago
Web MUD clients exist. I'm really not sure if modernizing MUDs is worth the effort. Actual MUD gamers will look at it with either contempt or distrust, especially blind players. And regular gamers are unlikely to play a text game. I could make a game with a MUD sensibility or even use a MUD engine, but I would never call it a MUD. MUD players want more of the past and I'm not really interested in that.
- brlewis 3y ago
  > especially blind players Isn't accessibility for a web-based MUD just a matter of adding `aria-live="polite"` as an attribute to the incoming text? Five years ago I did this on https://evolvingstory.juliablewis.com/ https://evolvingstory.juliablewis.com/ and it seemed to work with OSX screen reading.
  - bananamerica 3y ago
    This is more of a social problem than a technical problem. MUD blind players are extremely distrustful of innovation because, more often than not, innovation means graphics or custom clients they cannot freely alter and manipulate. And they don't wanna be left behind. They wanna use their own client on a telnet connection because that is already suited for them. Many QOL features for the sighted can have a negative impact on the blind. Any attempt at engaging that audience must first convince them that you won't leave them behind. One simple way to benefit the blind is by making sounds integral to a game, with clear cues for everything.
raytopia 3y ago
There's a lot of muds with web clients now a days. Telnet still seems to be the most popular though because most of the popular clients support it. If you're looking for something that isn't just text based Graphical Muds wmay be what you're looking for. For context they are the often times over looked link between muds and mmos. I swear I remember reading something about connected mud servers but I can't remember it off of the top of my head unfortunately.
- jstarfish 3y ago
  Telnet's a shit option these days. No encryption. Webclients can be protected by HTTPS, and Evennia (for one) offers SSH.
  - troad 3y ago
    Genuine question, but why would a MUD require encryption? Seems like a strange feature.
    - cyanmagenta 3y ago
      Character login requires password, which is sent plaintext over telnet. Even if you get around that somehow, there are still concerns about session hijacking to steal someone’s in-game items and currency.
      - troad 3y ago
        I suppose the threat vector seems incredibly low to me. Seems like a strange use of a capable hacker's time, in today's world of bitcoin and ransomware, to be preying on people's in-game currency / pets from ancient MUDs. Their saleability would seem to approach zero. Password reuse might be an issue, but in my experience people had their environments pre-configured to log in automatically, so a unique complex password would eliminate that risk. Personally, I think the complexity of implementing encryption for these services would outweigh the benefits. A big part of their appeal is the ease of setup and shell access.
Palomides 3y ago
the modern equivalent of a MUD as a user-designed social experience is definitely VRChat
- jstarfish 3y ago
  Roblox and Minecraft are what the kids who can't afford a VR setup are using.
deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
nextaccountic 3y ago
> Would a modern MUD be web based? What is the modern web version of a MUD? A month ago people posted Improbable Island here. It's not "modern" but it's a mud-like website https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39135779 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39135779 I inquired about the relationship with muds. It's.. like a mud, but without a map (so rooms form an arbitrary graph, and edges don't have a cardinal direction like "north") https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39141173 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39141173
hnthrowaway0328 3y ago
Have you tried Neverwinter nights' persistent worlds? Not the NWN online game but the original 2001 game. Back in the day I thought it is the best thing: players can create their own worlds and invite others. Of course builders cannot connect two worlds so that was a pity. Still, I believe it was a lot better than games such as WoW. Nevertheless the game never achieved the popularity it deserves, and nowadays the persistent worlds are not played by many.

raytopia 3y ago

I've been messing around with miniboa. Pretty fun to use! Those links on Moos look interesting thanks for sharing!

troad 3y ago

I too love MUDs / MOOs. I still miss some of the features that Discworld Mud had, and mainstream gaming hasn't warmed to. Strange currencies, complex banking, different in-game languages, convenience features gated in RP ways (the Taxi guild of portal wizards!), etc. The conventional wisdom holds that that'd be far too much friction for modern games, but it contributed so much to making the world feel more than an inch deep, which is something modern gaming needs all the help with it can get. I also think scripting in LambdaMOO may have been my gateway drug to coding. Once I learnt I was able to expand the world myself, I was intoxicated. Yib's Guide to MOOing [0] is a great read for anyone interested in how that all used to work. And the social scene of these services in the 90s and early 00s is hard to describe. Honestly, @go #17 in LambdaMOO at its height felt more like the Metaverse to me than anything Facebook has made to date. [0] https://www.lisdude.com/moo/ygm.pdf https://www.lisdude.com/moo/ygm.pdf

jamilton 3y ago
Discworld Mud is still around, active, and getting updates fyi! I'm sure it's not the same as it's heyday but . I love the language feature in particular, I also want it to be used in other games. Having to change currency I could do without though :P How many Ankh-Morpork dollars to an Agatean rhinu? Can I convert Djelian talona to Lancre pounds in this town? Writing that out though, it is great for the roleplaying experience.
- grimgrin 3y ago
  Earlier tonight I converted some Ankh-Morpork dollars into Lancre bucks so I could buy a tent. They recently added tents so now I can afford a "house" :P Here's a page I threw up with a buncha Discworld MUD links, for the curious: https://badteeth.dungeon.red/ https://badteeth.dungeon.red/