5 ms·
Stanford University acquires source code for Multi-User Dungeon
- slaxo 13y agoThough a cool artifact, it seems like the essence of something like this comes from interaction with the others using the service. There's a really interesting podcast segment[1] about the Preserving Digital Worlds[2] project which tries to answer some of the questions about how to best document / preserve something who's value comes from the experiences users share with each other [1]https://soundcloud.com/roman-mars/99-invisible-13x-game-over https://soundcloud.com/roman-mars/99-invisible-13x-game-over [2]http://pvw.illinois.edu/pvw2/ http://pvw.illinois.edu/pvw2/
- voltagex_ 13y ago99% Invisible should turn up on HN more often. It's a very interesting and very well produced podcast that should interest a lot of people here. The episodes are short and it's worth digging through the archives.
- mejackreed 13y agoHere's a link to other preserved worlds at Stanford. By clicking on the world's and then clicking "Permanent URL for this" you can download the world.
- frankydp 13y agoI will always love Medievia.
- brianstorms 13y agoMulti-user graphical online virtual worlds, multi-user dungeons -- these things were already booming on the University of Illinois' PLATO system in 1978; they'd started popping up in 1973, maybe even '72. You had pedit5, moria, oubliette, krozair, dnd, dungeon, then in 1979 avatar, just to mention but a few. Multi-user dnd games were one of the most popular activities on PLATO all during the mid to late 70s. And these games were all graphics-based, not limited to just text like the far more primitive MUD1. Bartle has gotten a lot of mileage over the years with the MUD1 story, leading to a misinforming of the media and the public, both of whom, when it comes to technology and the history of technology, seem to be perfectly fine with being misinformed. It's a shame to see an institution as prestigious as Stanford fall for the same misinformation and ignore the real history. Five minutes of Wikipedia browsing would have set them straight. I'm sure MUD1 was very cool during its time, and got a lot of people interested in the ideas of MUDs. Unfortunately, it was not first. Hard as it might be for people to grasp the concept, but more sophisticated multi-user dungeon games existed before MUD1 was even conceived. Deal with it.
- pigscantfly 13y agoThe article says the source was "donated." Furthermore, the "first ever online virtual world" bit comes from the Gamasutra title, not any Stanford affiliated source. It doesn't seem like they've fallen for anything - rather, Bartle and Trubshaw have just given them permission to publish the source online since their research papers were also donated to the library recently. I'm not sure why this offends you so much.
- brianstorms 13y agoThere are tons of media articles, conferences, books, and other mentions of MUD1 and Bartle, including prominent newspapers, magazines, etc. The MUD1 story is all over the place. As for your comment "not any Stanford affiliated source" -- if you read the Gamasutra story carefully it has a prominent link to a Standford website page (on game history!) talking about, in its first sentence even,"the first online virtual world, MUD1."
- Tegran 13y agoI decided to do the "Five minutes of Wikipedia browsing" you suggested. Under http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MUD http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MUD I found this: "In 1978 Roy Trubshaw, a student at Essex University in the UK, started working on a multi-user adventure game in the MACRO-10 assembly language for a DEC PDP-10. He named the game MUD (Multi-User Dungeon), in tribute to the Dungeon variant of Zork, which Trubshaw had greatly enjoyed playing.[18] Trubshaw converted MUD to BCPL (the predecessor of C), before handing over development to Richard Bartle, a fellow student at Essex University, in 1980.[19][20][21] MUD, better known as Essex MUD and MUD1 in later years, ran on the Essex University network until late 1987,[22] becoming the first Internet multiplayer online role-playing game in 1980, when Essex University connected its internal network to ARPANet."
- brianstorms 13y agoSigh. You're making my point for me. But the irony escapes you I guess.
- jaryd 13y agoI still play on http://new.vampire-wars.com http://new.vampire-wars.com :)
- Zolomon 13y agoCool! I'm still playing Discworld MUD (http://discworld.starturtle.net/ http://discworld.starturtle.net/) since 2000. It was my saviour through my leukemia treatment.
- ramblerman 13y agoTrying to automate my mud play from aliases to scripting with triggers was how I got started programming. My regex is still better than most ;)
- teh_klev 13y agoDirect link to the announcement: http://www.stanford.edu/group/htgg/cgi-bin/drupal/?q=node/1191 http://www.stanford.edu/group/htgg/cgi-bin/drupal/?q=node/11...
- adefa 13y agoI miss the good old days of: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GemStone_IV http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GemStone_IV The best MUD I've ever played!
- mlitchard 13y agostar wars mud ftw swmud.org 6666