Comment by Davisb135
6 days ago
I agree with you. You've also got more / easier competition. IIRC, MUDs peaked in the mid-late 90s. MMOs were really the death knell, then the explosion of other types of games, mobile games, then to your point things like Discord.
One adjacent project we're exploring for the future is if you took all of the current understanding of game design and mechanics with modern AI functionality, knowledge bases, etc, and built a MUD, what would it look like and would it be enough to bring back players from other games?
There is an ongoing project doing this (that launches this weekend I believe) to revive a MUD called Shadows of Isildur. I think a lot of effort has been put into the new changes to the codebase to bring QoL features that a modern audience would expect while keeping the bones of the game the same. I'm not certain how it will fare as, to be honest, MUDs take an inordinate amount of time to really groove into and immerse yourself in - but I am excited to see efforts like this invested on as we older MUDers find ourselves finally reaching the point of having free time again.
> There is an ongoing project doing this (that launches this weekend I believe) to revive a MUD called Shadows of Isildur
Interesting, could you share more info? I couldn't find anything on Google. I played a fair amount of SOI back in the day and it'd be fun to start over on a fresh server.
play.shadowsofisildur.com:4500 - if you'd like (it isn't on the old domain anymore) there's also a discord that I'm a bit hesitant to link to where all the discussion is taking place that has a lot of the old folks hanging around and nostalgifying.
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Would be kind of a cool experiment for a mud-style interface, where each npc/avatar was backed by a lower-cost LLM... similar rules for the npcs in the game, but a background feed, and history of interactions with other players as background.
Maybe limiting npc's to only a certain number of moves that aren't a response to other users per day...
It could be a lot of fun.
I'm building this exact thing, actually. Intelligence determines which model powers a mob/npc. Getting neat results so far!
A MUD exists as a platform for creative writing - introducing LLMs into one would deprive it of its primary function.
That sounds very different than my memory of MUDs. The ones I remember were much more a text-based version of "World of Warcraft" or other similar MMOs where you navigate through a world, complete quests, etc. You could chat with other players but it was more about teaming up for quests than a creative writing/roleplaying exercise.
Not to say that what you're describing didn't exist, but I don't think it was defining feature of all MUDs.
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In some cases but coming from someone who played MUDs back in the day on a monochrome display and dial-up I know I would have been very interested in playing one with NPCs powered by an LLM had they been available back then. The NPCs as they existed were generally just furniture and the interesting part was playing with and talking to other people.
Most people played MUDs for the grind. Levels and loot. They care about the story as much as you care about it in Path of Exile.
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I honestly worry that the relevance of text-based systems is largely tied with literacy and how it interacts with the player's imagination -- something largely in decline, at least in the US.
It's not just imagination the relevance is also tied to focus and attention. I have multiple friends who claim that the reason they don't read is because are "visual learners" .
The real truth is they have a 30 second attention span and can't finish a page without daydreaming so in order to stay focussed they need a YouTube video than contains the same information but with constant visual changes.
Jesus H. Christ, never thought about that.
Sadly, you're not wrong... It might not get off the ground, but if we're able to, we'll give it a shot.
I really, really hope you lot manage to!