Post by aelmme on Mar 20, 2013 12:33:53 GMT -5
Every so often, maybe once a year or so, an old player comes by to make some suggestion about how to "fix" the game or make it more appealing. It usually revolves around better eq or easier mobs. I don't think those are necessary because for many of us, the difficulty levels currently in place are fine. There's also a lot more equipment out there than most people realize, mostly due to certain items becoming "standardized", so to speak, due to being easier to get or just the traditional capstone items for their slots/classes. I should know, I wrote or helped write a number of things that are out there just waiting to be rediscovered. 
Anyway, it's plain to see that the game is slowly dying from neglect. That neglect is mostly rooted in a lack of new players, though it would be great if we could have more quests rather than promises of quests. This is my suggestion, and it doesn't involve (or shouldn't involve) major changes to the game: give the game a face. Specifically, spend some time working on animating the game into something in the style of modern games. The biggest task would be the animation, of course, but the backbone of the new front-end could just translate the mouse-clicks and key-combos into the same old telnet commands that we've been hammering into our mud clients for the past couple of decades.
I'm not naive enough to think that this sort of undertaking would be easy or quick. It probably wouldn't be free, either. But if we're in any way serious about keeping alive a pastime that we have all enjoyed for so many years, we need to commit to an effective plan of action. I know that we've got several programmers (some might even be competent) in the admin and playerbase, and there's probably others out there with graphics abilities that might be willing to contribute. (Or we could just beg/plead/cajole/blackmail Dank into leveraging his studio to help us out.)
There are many, many possibilities if we could do something like this. We could start a Kickstarter campaign to solicit donations (and glorious, valuable *attention*!) to help cover the costs of paying who we might need to pay and to upgrade hardware/network/internet for the server to handle any uptick in player activity if we do get an increase in players. If we get it all done and find that the graphics weren't as difficult as we anticipated...can you say JediMUD Mobile?
My point in suggesting such a grand idea is that even if some of us are moving on with our lives and paying less attention to this place, we don't have to let it die. As technologically ancient as the concept of a MUD is, technology has advanced to the point where making old things new again is not that hard. All it takes is some passion and commitment.
Anyway, it's plain to see that the game is slowly dying from neglect. That neglect is mostly rooted in a lack of new players, though it would be great if we could have more quests rather than promises of quests. This is my suggestion, and it doesn't involve (or shouldn't involve) major changes to the game: give the game a face. Specifically, spend some time working on animating the game into something in the style of modern games. The biggest task would be the animation, of course, but the backbone of the new front-end could just translate the mouse-clicks and key-combos into the same old telnet commands that we've been hammering into our mud clients for the past couple of decades.
I'm not naive enough to think that this sort of undertaking would be easy or quick. It probably wouldn't be free, either. But if we're in any way serious about keeping alive a pastime that we have all enjoyed for so many years, we need to commit to an effective plan of action. I know that we've got several programmers (some might even be competent) in the admin and playerbase, and there's probably others out there with graphics abilities that might be willing to contribute. (Or we could just beg/plead/cajole/blackmail Dank into leveraging his studio to help us out.)
There are many, many possibilities if we could do something like this. We could start a Kickstarter campaign to solicit donations (and glorious, valuable *attention*!) to help cover the costs of paying who we might need to pay and to upgrade hardware/network/internet for the server to handle any uptick in player activity if we do get an increase in players. If we get it all done and find that the graphics weren't as difficult as we anticipated...can you say JediMUD Mobile?
My point in suggesting such a grand idea is that even if some of us are moving on with our lives and paying less attention to this place, we don't have to let it die. As technologically ancient as the concept of a MUD is, technology has advanced to the point where making old things new again is not that hard. All it takes is some passion and commitment.
