Optional Realities & Project Redshift

[Jeshin]

@Alzie
Also yes I referred to MUDs as the progenitor to MUSHes because they are. MUDs went down the path of gamey and MUSHes went down the path of tabletop and story focus. This is just a fact it doesn't make MUDs better than MUSHes. You are attributing a stereotype to me and applying your presumptions to my statements and taking them in that manner. Which is fine but please refrain from putting words and meanings to my statements beyond what I write.

EDIT - Or don't do what I asked. That's cool too.

[Gingerlily]

@Thenomain

I am not actually -sure- to be honest. I mean, Example MUD for me is Threshold RPG, that is where I played for most of my Mudding years, and though I do not anymore it isn't because I don't love the staff, or didn't enjoy the play, or that I found MUSHing to be the 'best' kind of dessert and I'd just never known about it. (It did turn out to be a more appropriate one for me as I got older and the time and direct screen attention I could put into gaming changed)

So there, and I don't want to be a spokesman because it has been a while and this is through the haze of my memory, but you die, you go to the Underworld, and the God of the Underworld brings you back. Now the idea is that npcs die all the time and don't come back, it isn't like The Land That Death Forgot is the theme, so death still has to exist as a concept. And rping as if death is permanent also prevents other sorts of rp-detrimental and game detrimental things such as camping around waiting for an NPC you just killed to respawn so you can kill him again. "Evil Wizard Zoobie has died, victory unto us, let us go!" "Well we could take him again, he'll be back in what, 15 minutes?" This would not be conducive to any kind of sinking into your character, and RP Muds are sort of trying to merge that "We like to party up with our tank, our healer, our mages, and whatever and go have cool adventures/explore/fight stuff in real time" with "Also we are telling a larger story involving races, religions, clans, politics, etc etc, whatever is in our theme."

Theme and setting don't say that death is permanent /necessarily/. There is a God of the Underworld, sometimes he restores deserving souls. The PCs are just very deserving souls? It's why I said it sounded a bit ooc. It /is/, there is a suspension of disbelief you are playing through. Because you don't mix what you know ooc with what you know ic, the same way on a WoD game you probably wouldn't say "I suspect that guy has Dominate 5, which means he will just make us do whatever, so lets avoid him." You wouldn't say "I suspect if I don't succeed in my attempt to kill this dragon, the great God Mortis will revive me, but I will not be nearly so powerful and I could lose all of my awesome gear, still it is worth the risk." You talk about the risk vs. reward as if death is feared because it is death, not because of the game mechanics of death.

Does that make more sense? I mean, it is perfectly logical that a game that wanted to incorporate some kind of 'death' that occurred when hit points were all gone that was not death exactly but something else, and still offer penalty so that the motives were there to 'play well' so to speak still existed could do so. The 'you die, you are resurrected, you may die again, but death is still death and we act like it is death because we have not written a deathless world' doesn't HAVE to be how it is. I haven't seen a game that plays with this shade of grey, but it could be done, yeah. I get you @Thenomain

[Gingerlily]

As a follow up to Theno's other post, especially because I keep sounding 'final' in my discussions and then going on, my only real reason for feeling 'vested' in this conversation is that I feel like I might be the only person (besides maybe @Jeshin, but he has to rep his thing here) around who actually enjoys MUDs /and/ MUSHes and does not quite understand why it seems like in general people are so either or. Get your geek on with the dice and more ST involvement, get your geek on with some 'mobs' and a little more hacking/slashing/crafting to go with your evil clan's plot to take over the world...they are all perfectly legitimate, lovely ways to be geeky!

[Thenomain]

@Gingerlily said:

Does that make more sense?

It absolutely does.

See, I have a roundabout point, and that is that some terms are being talked about as if they were chiseled out of marble. We all probably feel that way about some of The Way We Do Things, but a different group of people may just look at you funny, like you walked out of some religious compound and are withstanding that the world works a different way.

I am all for Muds Being Muds, and Mushes Being Mushes, and I probably could enjoy a Mud for what it is, but that's not what's going on here.

they are all perfectly legitimate, lovely ways to be geeky!

Yeah! Go geeky! Let's accept more than one set of qualifications! Acceptance!

[Gingerlily]

Yeah, I agree with you entirely. The game I refer to is also one of text gaming's dinosaurs, its been up since 1996 I think, so it is entirely possible that even if they did -not- want permadeath they would have found different ways to explore what to do with death if they were doing it today, or had done it 3 years ago, or 5, or even 10. A game that old can add developments, and tweak old systems, but some fundamentals have to be kept as is unless it is 'rebooting' or something.

But yeah. I am probably repeating myself from earlier in the thread somewhere, but these are text roleplaying games accessed through telnet, they have far more commonalities than differences. The differences can be sort of interesting to think about, ponder, learn from? But to draw lines between and make a big deal out of to me gets yawny. Cake, Ice Cream, blah. Etc.

[Thenomain]

@Gingerlily

Cake, Ice Cream

Someone came into our Cake Decoration (and Rogue Elements) conglomerate and said they're advertising desserts and making a newsletter for dessert shops of every kind, but we can only show cakes if they 1) are cold, 2) can melt, 3) are made from a milk or cream base.

I will accept that a dessert that can melt has a bit of urgency to it that maybe they enjoy in their post-meal delights, but saying you're for all desserts but will only really feature desserts that are nearly Ice Cream may not be the best way to approach it. A very small number of cake-decorators work for Baskin Robins.

Okay, my example is horrible, but in my defense I like both cake and iced cream and maybe a dessert-shop newsletter should dial it back if it wants to call itself "a place for all dessert makers to talk about their thing".

[Jeshin]

Hey,

So as to the representation thing @Thenomain we had a chat conversation where I did point out that neither I (or Optional Realities) claim to represent all forms of text-based gaming as if we get to speak for them. We do claim and state that we want to be a community for all text-based games and as a community we currently have a presence from everything except a MUX.

The intent is not to speak for anyone but to give them a forum to speak for themselves. That is the reason we even advertise on existing communities such as this one. We want other outlooks, other opinions, and other ideas to feel comfortable sharing.

[Thenomain]

@Jeshin

Except for what games you list, which must 1) be cold, 2) can melt, 3) are made from a milk or cream base.

As I mentioned earlier, there are no guidelines on the board themselves. I suppose I wouldn't still be harping on this if I didn't know how exclusionary it was.

[Jeshin]

The connections page and sub-forums have no impact on anyone's ability to create an account and begin sharing their ideas or opinions. Even if those opinions is that the connections page and sub-forums are biased and poorly thought out. There's even a thread for that right here.

Now if you have a philosophical or principal reason against participating in a community which has a linkback and sub-forum policy that is divergent from its community policy that anyone can post then I understand. I've even considered removing the listings (which I've stated a couple of times on here) but the potential benefit doesn't outweigh the setback that it'd likely cause us. Thus I have to do what I think is best and accept that I might be wrong and might end up changing my mind in the future or that I simply can't please everyone.

Connections/Sub-forum =/= Ability to participate in the forums , good example of this is @fstltna who has a game which doesn't qualify but openly gets to advertise both her game(s) and listing website without being harassed. They were even nice enough to put one of our banner ads up on their site (which we did not ask for but did accept!).

[Thenomain]

I have an objection that your stated goal is not in line with one of your practices. I have a smaller objection that the practices I'm talking about are not listed on the associated page.

[Jeshin]

One of those I can fix in the next 24 hours and will. Jeshin makes a to-do note

[crayon]

@Alzie said:

@crayon So, because work would be required, nothing is done. Which is consistent with the real reason that we both seem to know but won't say.

Some games put the work in and some don't. It really depends on how strongly the game designer feels about their game and where their own preferences lie, one way or the other. Some MUDs are perfectly comfortable with having 'code' and 'roleplay' being completely separate, some want to integrate the two. Differentiating between those two types in the specific context of MUDs is, I think, part of the reason the requirements are set up the way they are. Similar design elements tend to reflect similar design philosophy, regardless of whether we're talking about 'RPIs', 'MUDs', or 'MUSHes'. I'm not sure where you're really going with the 'real reason'. It's certainly not a matter of hardcoding permdeath in the specific context of deleting pfiles. I'm pretty confident that's a thirty minute job, tops, even on some of the more FUBAR codebases.

[Alzie]

@crayon I guess I should be blunt: People are lazy. A fact which, even without me saying it in direct terms, you have so far given plenty of evidence for.

[Thenomain]

The other option is that the Mud-centric community is content with their code-base options. This is like the Mush-centric community being content with their code-base options. Pro-tip: We are not; we just put up with it because it's what we do.

My 30-minute experience with MUDs indicate to me that the same thing is going on there.

[crayon]

@thenomain said:

The other option is that the Mud-centric community is content with their code-base options. This is like the Mush-centric community being content with their code-base options. Pro-tip: We are not; we just put up with it because it's what we do.

My 30-minute experience with MUDs indicate to me that the same thing is going on there.

Yeah, I think that's certainly the case, likely in both communities to greater or lesser extents. Which can be especially problematic with some MUD codebases given that the majority of them weren't really developed with any sort of focus on roleplay, writing, or storytelling in mind.

We also have a fresh article and some discussion up:

Jeshin writes on where text-based games fit into the bigger picture of gaming, and the powers of text as a gaming medium!
http://optionalrealities.com/the-text-based-rpg-unlimited-potential/

The character concept competition is still underway! Submit a character idea and potentially win cash!
http://optionalrealities.com/forums/index.php?topic=198.0

Engage in game design discussion on integrating age into skill systems...
http://optionalrealities.com/forums/index.php?topic=218.0

...and the merits of systems that gate content to preserve scarcity based on player rewards.
http://optionalrealities.com/forums/index.php?topic=217.0

Or come sign up for our first round of community mafia...
http://optionalrealities.com/forums/index.php?topic=214.0

...Or other games!
http://optionalrealities.com/forums/index.php?topic=210.0

That fourth link is something I'd like to hear a little bit from the MUSH community on, because I don't have any firsthand experience on a MUSH with a setting appropriate to these sorts of playing systems. How do MUSHes typically approach situations where you want to limit players' access to things like certain races or powers to preserve some level of IC scarcity, or is that a thing that even ought be addressed? For example, an overabundance of force users in a Star Wars setting, or elves in a Tolkien setting, or that sort of thing.

[Thenomain]

@crayon said:

Which can be especially problematic with some MUD codebases given that the majority of them weren't really developed with any sort of focus on roleplay, writing, or storytelling in mind.

This is a huge reason why I find the prerequisites for listing a game on your site to be specious.

Okay, Mystery Science Theno 3000 time:

Jeshin writes on where text-based games fit into the bigger picture of gaming, and the powers of text as a gaming medium!
http://optionalrealities.com/the-text-based-rpg-unlimited-potential/

Oh, wow, that title isn't biased at all. I'm pretty sure that text-based games fit nowhere into Sinistar or Hatfall.

I mean, I suppose someone had to write the text, "I HUNGER." On the other hand, I doubt that counts.

The character concept competition is still underway! Submit a character idea and potentially win cash!
http://optionalrealities.com/forums/index.php?topic=198.0

Bribing the social crowd for page views and artificial friends is pretty popular. This must count as your advertising budget.

Engage in game design discussion on integrating age into skill systems...
http://optionalrealities.com/forums/index.php?topic=218.0

Been there, done that, went well but not for everyone. What's to discuss?

...and the merits of systems that gate content to preserve scarcity based on player rewards.
http://optionalrealities.com/forums/index.php?topic=217.0

aka: Economic Systems, they're the best!

Or come sign up for our first round of community mafia...
http://optionalrealities.com/forums/index.php?topic=214.0

No thanks; the community mafia posts here enough already.

...Or other games!
http://optionalrealities.com/forums/index.php?topic=210.0

Like Mushes without permadeath or automated systems? Because those are my favorite. Tell me when you get Space Trader, then we'll talk.

Tying a few of the above together: I wrote Space Trader fanfic, back in the day. Yes, really. I also wrote the start of "A Year In the Life" for SMAC where I was going to write out a short game of this from a peon's view, but got no further than Year Three before I gave it up.

That fourth link is something I'd like to hear a little bit from the MUSH community on

What, not the third link? Because I'm pretty sure that The Mush Community has a pretty solid idea of what skill systems are about, and we've played around quite a lot with age and skills, to greater or lesser extent, over the past ten, fifteen years.

I liked what we did with it on TwoMoonsMUSH where the characters live for hundreds of years, but it turns out pretty petty on a lot of other games.

How do MUSHes typically approach situations where you want to limit players' access to things like certain races or powers to preserve some level of IC scarcity

Either curate it, quota it, or let everyone have it. There is no typical answer, because it's driven by theme and what people want out of gameplay.

For example, it would be utterly stupid for someone to quota the number of supernaturals on a World of Darkness game (okay, for you non-RPGers, an Underworld game), even though by setting they are pretty rare. By theme, they are all over the place.

On the other hand, on a Dresden Files game focused around the Wizard Court (sorry, whatever it's called), having the vampire players dominate the game may throw off the intent of the game. If by game design you decide this is the case, you may have to find some way of limiting it. This isn't a horrible thing as long as you're up front about it.

[Jeshin]

I have to admit, the snark was much easier to read and have a chuckle at (which I think is the intent) with the Mystery Science Theno 3000 tag. You should keep it for future rundowns of our rundowns.

I do wonder if you guys think Depression Quest or other Interactive Novels qualify as Text-based games or if they're just a variant of choose your own adventure. It's a discussion we're having on OR in response to my article which assumes that text-based games are under represented on game platforms like Steam (yes I'm aware of Sanctuary RPG, it's pretty cool).

[Thenomain]

@Jeshin said:

I do wonder if you guys think Depression Quest or other Interactive Novels qualify as Text-based games or if they're just a variant of choose your own adventure.

It's Text-Based, that's for certain. The question is whether or not it's a Game or a Toy. Here, I think the distinction is personal. Depression Quest certainly has a goal, though if that's what made a game then most RPGs would fail out of the box, most Mushes and most Muds. It fails to have a system or rules for play, but I cannot deny that this is a thing you play with, more interactive than a book or a roller-coaster.

I think it can be classified as "automated storytelling", a tool/toy that you play with in order to experience prepared ideas. It can cross into more game territory (the Lone Wolf solo-rpg game books, for example), but I don't see a need or reason to do so.

I also think that a lot of people are no longer reading this thread, so starting a new one for this question will probably get a more varied set of responses.

[surreality]

@Jeshin said:

I do wonder if you guys think Depression Quest or other Interactive Novels qualify as Text-based games or if they're just a variant of choose your own adventure.

Are they multi-player? (I am not familiar with the game in question, and haven't investigated the genre more broadly.) If not, I would lean toward 'choose your own adventure'.

As a side note, respectfully: '[we] guys' have a pretty broad range of opinions; you'll likely get a spread of them on any given question. I realize this is generally pretty self-evident, but the couching of the statement suggests an expectation of groupthink that is... well, to put it (not so) delicately, the odds of any three people around here agreeing on everything are slim enough to taunt the lottery for being a shameless hussy that never stops putting out.

[Jeshin]

Hey,

Ah yes it does seem to imply I was looking for a group think answer, but no I was just interested given one of the responses to my article is that text-based games are represented in gaming already but all such examples (except Sanctuary RPG) were officially tagged as "Interactive Novels" which are games that use text to convey characters, places, and events and then provide you with dialogue/choice branches. So technically it is text-based but is it similar to what multi-player text-based games do? I don't think so.

As to reading this thread, I don't want to clutter up the community with to many questions >.> but in the future I will try and split off such academic/opinion stuff into mildly constructive or something and reserve this thread for more shameless plugging that can be safely ignored if so desired.