Everything back then was heavily based on MU*s (ie also MUSH, MUSE, MUX, etc), for instance Designer Dragon (aka Raph Koster) came from LegendMud. For those wh

Everything back then was heavily based on MU*s (ie also MUSH, MUSE, MUX, etc), for instance Designer Dragon (aka Raph Koster) came from LegendMud. For those who were around back then, there is zero question that many design decisions of EQ were chosen as a direct reaction to the state of things in UO and evolving customer tastes. Put simply, the average gamer simply was not (and still is not) ready for the sort of sandbox that UO initially provided, but a Diku on steroids was definitely in the cards.