Alternative Formats to MU

[faraday]

@alzie said in Alternative Formats to MU:

the evidence is that people will in fact be perfectly happy using a web interface when a good one is available.

Some people use BSGU and Arx's web clients too. But I'm talking about a game that only has a web interface. If the majority of people logged into RfK via the web, I might believe that a web-only game was a viable thing. But I highly doubt that was the case given all the other evidence I've seen.

@thenomain said in Alternative Formats to MU:

I feel like I'm saying that you can just do something because you want to and see what happens, and being told I'm wrong.

No, that wasn't what I meant. Of course you can do something just because you want to. I'm just saying that if countless polls and feedback say that people don't want something and you go and build it anyway, chances are good you're just wasting your time.

[surreality]

I am one of the MU* only experience dino sorts -- but aren't there some game formats that are already web interface? Some of the IRC style things or similar? I have heard people refer to 'digichats' that have sounded like something web-side, but I can't say I know anything about it.

I'd still encourage (generic) you to try things you think are good ideas, if you don't mind the potential reality of having wasted time if it doesn't catch on. That's kinda the way things go with any project in this hobby, really, from somebody's tenth alt on a game to entirely new tech.

[Tez]

MU*ing by telnet is kind of ridiculously outdated. My approach to this topic is a somewhat hyperbolic "change or die". But -- seriously. Change or die.

We have a huge percent of players who have never touched a MU* before in their life. We have guests who make their way to logging in, and then get too intimidated and log out; friends of current players -- curious about the game, hearing great stories -- are ultimately too intimidated by the format to join

It's not friendly. It's not accessible. It's not welcoming.

I've often dreamed of a web-based format that combines the best aspects of slack/discord, google docs, roll20, wiki, whatever. Harper's Tale, a Pern game where I started mumblety years ago, had better web integration than 95% of the games that I've played since. And they did that back in the 90s!

Lacking the time to make my dream real, I'll instead wait patiently to see what Ares does. I'm thrilled to see Faraday taking it in a more web-oriented direction. I think one of the things you aren't hearing yet, but may see in the future, are the many people just outside our little box who RP in different formats because the barrier for entry on MU*ing is too high. They'll thank you for looking forward.

[Griatch]

@auspice said in Alternative Formats to MU:

Fast-forward three hours, 'Hurr. Sorry guys, I lost track of the tab because I was doing other stuff. Sorry.'

But when it's a whole other entity, I can remember.

I speak from experience. I've tried some of those other 'RP' experiences (Storium? Web chat 'deals,' etc) in browsers. I forget they exist very, very quickly. I can't do web based chat at all. I reload this only when I'm bored and come back to it later on. I couldn't keep up with a scene with any expected consistency.

For example Evennia's web client will both ping you (flashing icon in the tab showing how many new messages have appeared since you last looked at the tab) and optionally pop up a notification in the corner on your desktop to tell you about new activity if you don't have the browser/tab in focus. It could even play a sound.

Edit to add: Generally, the web browser is the future for text gaming IMO. We are not where we want to be with that on the Evennia side - our web client is still basically a crude emulation of a telnet interface and a third-party client still has a lot more possibilities and options. But that's something we hope to change.
.
Griatch

[Rook]

So we replace one client with the next, with... what new features?

We already have a client that updates and optionally pings/flashes/jumps up and down when there are updates/activity.

Will your web client allow for persistence of customization for things such as Macros, Events, Auto-response, Auto-walk/mapping? What about spawning new windows on events?

Since it's taken us two decades to develop any sort of reliable web-based integration from the game server, how long does anyone bet that a reliable full-feature replacement of the MU Client will be?

Unless you are actively participating in a development effort (like Griatch and team seem to be), I wouldn't hold my breath. Seems like something that will eventually go the way of pay-to-play, and you'll lose a lot of the current crowd with that.

[Sparks]

I would argue that macros and auto-walk are outdated options too. The whole point is not to think of a web client as just "Potato on the web" or "Atlantis on the web" or "SimpleMU for Chrome", but as something entirely new.

If 'pages' are instead one-on-one or groupchat windows that pop up in an instant-messenger style format in their own little tabbed popout window, why do you need tools to manage pages?

If you have a map right in the client where you can click on a room to go there, why do you need a speedwalk macro?

If 'channels' are part of an OOC communication interface that works like Slack, why do you need spawns when each channel already has its own tab in that?

Etc.

[Roz]

@rook said in Alternative Formats to MU:

Unless you are actively participating in a development effort (like Griatch and team seem to be), I wouldn't hold my breath.

I mean, there are multiple developers in this thread. I also know of people who have actively worked on what a build like this would look like. So. Yeah I'll feel free to keep talking about it.

[Rook]

Good. I encourage it.

[ShelBeast]

Reading through this (I fell behind and am only now on the second page), I keep seeing this idea that being web based would slow the RP down... might take 1-3 days to resolve, etc.

Why?

If it's a web-based set up, it doesn't have to be slowed down anymore than a MU*, as long as it is immediate input-response. Maybe I'm missing something, but when I was talking about a web based client/code/set up, I'm talking like a full scale, MU-in-a-web-format. We're talking a grid, poses, pages, etc. all right there. I'm talking games designed with a set up similar to WebMU by Cheesesoftware (which is what I use when I'm at work), but with a few bells and whistles, to make the play EASIER and more clean. The inclusion of a sidebar with clickable common commands (like clickable combat commands, especially. No more +rolling and figuring out dice pools and bonuses, etc. Automate that shit) and tab-spawning wiki links. But at it's core, the experience would be nothing more than what we have already. Just no need for clients and the focus would be more on making the games easier to use and interact with. Less antiquated code. No weird command inputs like + and @ to do things. Click a button on the sidebar to generate a pop up box to input a request to staff. Click send, and it puts in the job. Same with mail. Just stuff like that. A new kind of MU* built entirely on modern (and thus far more easily accessible) coding conventions and practices, with an eye towards ease of use via things like a GUI.

[Sparks]

The reason people are talking about it taking 1-3 days for a scene is that's how long RP through Google Docs, Storium, forum RP, and so on can take.

MU* in general are not friendly to newcomers to RP; you'll find them engaging in RP on web forums, or on Tumblr, or in shared Google Docs. To draw new folks into the hobby, whatever comes next should be more approachable.

I mean, I think folks aren't talking just about converting MU* to the web, but rather making something new and web-based for RP that's more approachable to newcomers. But one of the things about it being more approachable is being more friendly to putting it down and coming back later.

[faraday]

@sparks Right. The thing that turns off newcomers is the immediacy and the requirement to set aside multiple hours per night several nights a week to play effectively. This is a huge turn off to casual players.

Yet this pacing is the same thing that die hards love about MUs.

I believe there can be a middle ground between snails pace storium/PBF and traditional MUing. But most folks seem to see it as all or nothing.

[Roz]

@faraday said in Alternative Formats to MU:

@sparks Right. The thing that turns off newcomers is the immediacy and the requirement to set aside multiple hours per night several nights a week to play effectively. This is a huge turn off to casual players.

That's not actually been my experience. I mean, it may turn off some newcomers, but there are also a lot of other options out there with much slower pacing for those people. My experience is that there are people who are ready to dive in to the kind of pacing we have on MU*s, but their turn off is the technology. They have to download a client and connect to this game and figure out commands and learn all the lingo that everyone already knows. When I was on staff at Transformers: Lost & Found, we got a lot of these kinds of RPers. Their experience is maybe somewhere like Tumblr, and there's a really high bar of education that a lot of us don't really think about.

So for me, a new web-based system isn't about adjusting pacing. It's about adjusting user-friendliness.

[faraday]

@roz I think it’s both, but yes I agree with you.

[Thenomain]

As a side-note: Everyone is disheartened by negative feedback. I just realized that after talking to @surreality about making it even easier for people to set up new clients with wikis and almost everything already installed on a Digital Ocean slice, and I've thought about doing this before, but I can only think: Why bother. The games are shrinking and there's a push away from this form of gameplay, so why do all this work if it's just a way for me to count down the minutes until my inevitable demise and the heat-death of the Universe? Isn't there anything better I could be doing with my time? Why do we continue to do this to ourselves?

Well, it's fun enough for now. Back to coding.

[surreality]

@thenomain Well... I can tell you one thing, at least. Yeah, the thing I was describing would work.

I'd be willing to help you do one with a wiki tailored around your code setup if you wanted.

I started puttering away on one with my stuff about a week ago after getting to the point of 'I may never play anywhere like I used to, but I think I have some good ideas for things that could work, and I wanna see if they can/will/do.'

The 'why bother' is a hard question (and there's a reason I'm putting this here instead of in the other spot). Everybody's answers are going to be different. Mine is, admittedly, hokey as all fuck, and an official new reason everybody gets to call me a crazy wackadoo weirdo. (But, y'know? Fuck it.)

It's because... imagination. Stories. That old quote about how the world is not made of atoms but stories is a truism for me.

Real life thing happens? How you tell it (even if you're only framing it within your own mind) helps you shape your feelings about it, and that really matters -- if I can make myself laugh about it, I'm one hell of a lot better able to get through it, even when it's hard or seems impossible, for instance.

The Hannibal television series, in its last season, had one of the few quotes from television I've ever stopped immediately to write down, though I'm paraphrasing it now: "Even the most horrible thing can be borne if it can be made into a story."

I got that, I get that, and I think, whether it's to a greater or lesser extent, most of us here will find that resonates with them on some level.

And that's really before the imagination kicks in. I always link to this or the video of it when it comes up, but he's right.

Life is sometimes hard. Things go wrong, in life and in love and in business and in friendship and in health and in all the other ways that life can go wrong. And when things get tough, this is what you should do.
Make good art.
I'm serious. Husband runs off with a politician? Make good art. Leg crushed and then eaten by mutated boa constrictor? Make good art. IRS on your trail? Make good art. Cat exploded? Make good art. Somebody on the Internet thinks what you do is stupid or evil or it's all been done before? Make good art. Probably things will work out somehow, and eventually time will take the sting away, but that doesn't matter. Do what only you do best. Make good art.
Make it on the good days too.

This was directed at artists, but don't let that fool you. It really does apply to everyone. (Don't think for a second that code isn't the same kind of creative problem solving and experimentation as most art, either; it just has a different set of tools from a pencil or a typewriter or a sewing machine.)

And I've been talking about things that somebody could just cook up privately in their own head, or on their own computer, or their own secret sketchbook, and go on their merry way, with no one else ever the wiser.

But then... here we go, another quote from the speech:

When you start out on a career in the arts you have no idea what you are doing.
This is great. People who know what they are doing know the rules, and know what is possible and impossible. You do not. And you should not. The rules on what is possible and impossible in the arts were made by people who had not tested the bounds of the possible by going beyond them. And you can.
If you don't know it's impossible it's easier to do. And because nobody's done it before, they haven't made up rules to stop anyone doing that again, yet.

I'm going to take this in another direction, though. Within each of our own heads, we have a definition of ourselves, who we are, and what we are capable of. It is often dead wrong. Dunning-Krueger comes to mind, but that isn't all of it. Most of us, whether we admit it or not, carry around all the horrible things someone said to or about us at one point or another in our lives, and even if we know they're not true, we often begin to doubt -- our ideas, our work, our feelings, ourselves. (Or, conversely -- and sometimes even simultaneously! -- we go full bore behavior blind and refuse to believe what's obvious to everyone else is possible. These people are never afraid to bare their ignorance to the public, and just enjoy the audience.)

As a result, we're not really very good -- we being 'people' -- at knowing, or really understanding, what or where our limits are. We essentially create our own list of impossibles for ourselves out of all of these things, and often enough, we are thoroughly capable of many of the things we've completely ruled out because they are 'beyond us' when the reality is, we maybe never thought of that in the first place, or never actually tried before we convinced ourselves that that's just not a thing I can do.

Nearly everybody has their own set of impossibles in their head. The kicker is, they're all as different as we all are. My impossible may be your easy peasy, and vice versa.

And this isn't just about drawing, or code; it can be as simple as being able to clearly explain an idea, or an emotion, or being willing to even try something to see if it will work or not.

When people come together in any creative exchange of any kind, sometimes, they just double up on their impossibles for it and nothing happens but a contagion of impossibles. (That happens a lot around here on the forum, and the 'doomsaying' I complain about a lot is a manifestation of this in action.)

But then there are the times that isn't what happens at all, and your easy peasy shows me that my impossible is not so impossible after all, and the story we end up with is one that I never could have imagined on my own. I thought it was impossible, after all, until it actually happened.

I hate marketing buzzwords with a passion, but it's a synergy thing, and synergy is one thing that cannot really exist in the vacuum of one's own head.

Maybe all you end up with is a story that makes you pause and think, say wow as your jaw drops, use up all your tissues as tears drop, but it's a story you never could have had before, and maybe it's the same for the other person, too, if your easy peasy showed them how to overcome their impossibles while contained wholly within the scope of something as simple as shared fiction. It need never be extrapolated further to still be positively transformative. (And many times it shouldn't be, which would normally go without saying.)

It's small, but it's big, too. (" ...it depends, yes and no?" )

So. For me, at least? So long as there are people who want to launch their imaginations at each other to see if there's a big bang (not just that kind of bang!!!) instead of bouncing off of each other's skulls with a lingering headache within the scope of shared fiction, it's worth my time to continue to try to make things that would enable them to do that as comfortably, easily, and peaceably as possible.

Bear in mind, none of what I'm describing really requires much. It doesn't need fancy (or even any) wikis. It doesn't demand anything other than the most basic code for communication, which is already 'in the box', as it were. This could be done in a gdoc, or on skype. The tools are just tools; they're there to make it easier, they're there to, ideally, help.

But I'mma quote even more of that speech now, 'cause it's the answer I wish I was smart enough to have written myself on this point.

Secondly, If you have an idea of what you want to make, what you were put here to do, then just go and do that.
And that's much harder than it sounds and, sometimes in the end, so much easier than you might imagine. Because normally, there are things you have to do before you can get to the place you want to be. I wanted to write comics and novels and stories and films, so I became a journalist, because journalists are allowed to ask questions, and to simply go and find out how the world works, and besides, to do those things I needed to write and to write well, and I was being paid to learn how to write economically, crisply, sometimes under adverse conditions, and on time.
Sometimes the way to do what you hope to do will be clear cut, and sometimes it will be almost impossible to decide whether or not you are doing the correct thing, because you'll have to balance your goals and hopes with feeding yourself, paying debts, finding work, settling for what you can get.
Something that worked for me was imagining that where I wanted to be – an author, primarily of fiction, making good books, making good comics and supporting myself through my words – was a mountain. A distant mountain. My goal.
And I knew that as long as I kept walking towards the mountain I would be all right.

[Derp]

@saosmash said in Alternative Formats to MU:

Yeah I rp from work using a webclient frequently and keep track of that tab by pulling it out and keeping it separate from the ten billion legal research tabs I have open plus Spotify.

I wish my bosses were cool enough to let me use Spotify while researching. I would be so much more enthusiastic about reading words dead people wrote. Jealous.

[Ganymede]

@derp said in Alternative Formats to MU:

I wish my bosses were cool enough to let me use Spotify while researching. I would be so much more enthusiastic about reading words dead people wrote. Jealous.

My bosses like me using YouTube for my music that I've actually shown them how to pull up Billboard Top 20 Playlists on their own computers, so they can rock and roll to classics from the 60s.

That said, and more on point, I like what @faraday's done with Ares. I don't use her web interface out of habit. If I were forced to use Ares' web portal, I would probably do so if everyone else in my cadre of player-friends did the same. If they all left because of the mandate, I might as well.

I'm not a Luddite, but I am someone who'll follow a trend, whether it's backwards or not, if the people I'm playing with are doing the same.

[Alzie]

@Thenomain and @surreality I tried to do mush in a box with docker, but I found that some of the codebases react strangely when you put them in a virtual environment. I was never able to figure out why, exactly. Rhost and Penn were fine. Mux wouldn't resolve paths, for some reason. I'm not sure what it was trying to use to resolve its paths or what it was adding to it. I never tried Ares or Evennia, but I imagine Evennia and Ares would work just fine being Python and Ruby.

[Arkandel]

I want a web-only 'MUSH' more than anything. But it's too massive a project for me to tackle on my own - I already have a job coding stuff in the mornings - and when I looked for help there was none.

For what it's worth I had a rudimentary PHP/MySQL web sockets setup working with navigatable rooms, a back end editor (on Ajax and everything ) and I was starting to put together a GM room editor when the reality of my situation struck me.

I feel this is the kind of project which would either take one exceptional person willing to spend quite a bit of time on for a year or two, or a small team splitting tasks up... unless we collectively get lucky and someone else creates a platform for a different reason which we can co-opt for our own purposes.

[Tat]

What I desperately want is something that combines a web portal like what Ares is becoming, but on steroids, with the option of a separate client that's focused on the real-time aspects of the game.

For those who haven't explored much on Ares' web portal yet, it's freaking amazing. Here is a list of things I can do easily through the web interface that I have traditionally HATED having to do on telnet:

• see system information such as weapon and armor stats
• see combat HUDs
• make changes in combat, such as adding NPCs, changing their status, adjusting weapons and armor, etc etc etc.
• reply to bb posts
• read and reply to jobs
• go through cgen
• explore the grid
• read helpfiles
• see upcoming events on a calendar (that I can sync with my own calendar)
• see who's online
• see the roster
• see the list of taken PBs
• see the census (with whatever info the game admin had decided to include)
• see a list of players
• see a list of characters

It's freaking incredible. I'm in the super early stages of playing with a set-up for a game, and I pretty much default to the web portal whenever I can. This list just covers the user side, not the admin side, where I can ALSO do things like configure the settings for basically everything.

The trend here is pretty clear to me - all the OOC things that clutter up your screen, and ESPECIALLY the ones that require remembering a lot typed commands, are moving to web. And I love it. I will probably never go back if I can help it, I love it that much.

And yet, despite the really nice web client also available there, I will almost certainly be using a separate client for the RP aspect. That's because I want my real-time stuff to be broken out into it's own 'space', because it works better for my head and my attention that way. It's the same reason I use the slack PC client instead of its browser-based one, why I use an email client instead of webmail, and why I freaking hate facebook messenger. I want that stuff in its own box.

To me, the ideal is a client that interfaces with the web capabilities, with the OOC minutia living on the web where the interface is so, so, so much easier. I look forward to the day that I don't ever have to type +jobs in a client, but can do it ALL online. Where players can submit requests in a little box and choose the category from a dropdown menu and click 'submit' instead of remembering a long command. Where game mail is basically email, and pages are PMs.

It's gonna be AWESOME.