Improving BBS games for the future

[Malakai]

After running Nostalgia BBS for over a year, one of the things that I have both noticed firsthand and through feedback is that bbs games just aren't long enough.

One of my visitors e-mailed me right after putting up Infinity Complex and said "I think I've mastered it." within two days of playing the game. This guy never played the game before then. I saw his score and can agree that he probably did come close to mastering it. Maybe not the pvp aspects, but he got to the top rank and high score in no time.

Games like mutants can be beaten in one day. Wilderlands can beaten in one or 2 days as well. Turn-based games like lord or lunatix only take up a few minutes a day. Crossroads of the elements, albiet a pretty difficult game, has a small world and could probably be beaten within 3-4 days as well.

Back in the day, games like mutants and crossroads held their own mainly through multi-player interaction and sometimes pvp. Games like blademaster are fun for awhile, but they have little or no replay value once you get bored of it.

And then you have the IF/adventure/text-based games, which seem impossible, but if you know the formula, can be beaten usually in a matter of minutes. Of course, if you don't know the secrets, then it could take a long time, but they have no replay value after you beat them.

Slots, bowling, card, and misc games have very little going for them on bbses, because they take such little time to play and may not appeal to everyone.

Looking into what's now the popular thing, every software company seems to be putting out MMORPGs. One of the appealing things about most MMORPGs is that they're updated often, have new areas added, new quests, new items or enemies, etc. Their worlds continue to grow non-stop. There are pretty much no limits.

I can see some attempts to create this on a few bbs games in the past, like having in-game editors, but it can be a pain in the rear trying to create a large let's say a new 200-room area, which is fun and fulfilling, with some of the scripting languages we got out there. I'm sure there are room limits as well.

Then, you have IGMs, which is probably the better idea, yet they are implimented in games that really can't fully take advantage of what an IGM could be capable of doing in a real mud-type game, as opposed to LORD, Lunatix, and the various other BBS games that supports IGMs.

Some muds, like smaug, actually have a similar feature, which you can download add ons and put them on your mud. I'm not saying that this would be able to make games like mutants or wilderlands any better, but it probably could work for tele-arena, swords of chaos, crossroads of the elements, and definitely majormud. Maybe The Rose COG as well.

Between making addons/mods for the muds and possibly making editing the muds a bit easier (point and click, remote/html editing) it could possibly make BBSes a little less small or limited.

Having several sysops working together, freely distributing the add-ons/mods, every person could have their chance to give back to the BBS community.

Even though I make a reference to game X, Y, or Z, I'm not specifically talking about those games, but just comparing a few that I feel that would work in a system like I'm talking about.

One thing these types of mods would need are entry/exit points into a mud. They could either be pre-maid and use closed doors or gates to block traffic unless that gate is enabled, or have it setup where you can assign any room number an entry/exit point and assign it a mod.

The point is this. Most worldgroup systems aren't going to have much traffic in non-majormud games. If people don't have other players to pvp or play with often on games like mutants, they'll get burned out of playing it by themselves. If people can beat most of the games in 1 or a few days, then they're going to get bored of the games too. BBSes need game worlds that never stop growing and adding new features.

I'm not saying this is anyone's responsibility to implement these types of features into games, nor am I suggesting any one here drop what they're doing and see if they can make it happen. I'm just throwing an idea out there and see what others think about it.

[dspain]

After running Nostalgia BBS for over a year, one of the things that I have both noticed firsthand and through feedback is that bbs games just aren't long enough.

One of my visitors e-mailed me right after putting up Infinity Complex and said "I think I've mastered it." within two days of playing the game. This guy never played the game before then. I saw his score and can agree that he probably did come close to mastering it. Maybe not the pvp aspects, but he got to the top rank and high score in no time.

Games like mutants can be beaten in one day. Wilderlands can beaten in one or 2 days as well. Turn-based games like lord or lunatix only take up a few minutes a day. Crossroads of the elements, albiet a pretty difficult game, has a small world and could probably be beaten within 3-4 days as well.

Back in the day, games like mutants and crossroads held their own mainly through multi-player interaction and sometimes pvp. Games like blademaster are fun for awhile, but they have little or no replay value once you get bored of it.

And then you have the IF/adventure/text-based games, which seem impossible, but if you know the formula, can be beaten usually in a matter of minutes. Of course, if you don't know the secrets, then it could take a long time, but they have no replay value after you beat them.

Slots, bowling, card, and misc games have very little going for them on bbses, because they take such little time to play and may not appeal to everyone.

Looking into what's now the popular thing, every software company seems to be putting out MMORPGs. One of the appealing things about most MMORPGs is that they're updated often, have new areas added, new quests, new items or enemies, etc. Their worlds continue to grow non-stop. There are pretty much no limits.

I can see some attempts to create this on a few bbs games in the past, like having in-game editors, but it can be a pain in the rear trying to create a large let's say a new 200-room area, which is fun and fulfilling, with some of the scripting languages we got out there. I'm sure there are room limits as well.

Then, you have IGMs, which is probably the better idea, yet they are implimented in games that really can't fully take advantage of what an IGM could be capable of doing in a real mud-type game, as opposed to LORD, Lunatix, and the various other BBS games that supports IGMs.

Some muds, like smaug, actually have a similar feature, which you can download add ons and put them on your mud. I'm not saying that this would be able to make games like mutants or wilderlands any better, but it probably could work for tele-arena, swords of chaos, crossroads of the elements, and definitely majormud. Maybe The Rose COG as well.

Between making addons/mods for the muds and possibly making editing the muds a bit easier (point and click, remote/html editing) it could possibly make BBSes a little less small or limited.

Having several sysops working together, freely distributing the add-ons/mods, every person could have their chance to give back to the BBS community.

Even though I make a reference to game X, Y, or Z, I'm not specifically talking about those games, but just comparing a few that I feel that would work in a system like I'm talking about.

One thing these types of mods would need are entry/exit points into a mud. They could either be pre-maid and use closed doors or gates to block traffic unless that gate is enabled, or have it setup where you can assign any room number an entry/exit point and assign it a mod.

The point is this. Most worldgroup systems aren't going to have much traffic in non-majormud games. If people don't have other players to pvp or play with often on games like mutants, they'll get burned out of playing it by themselves. If people can beat most of the games in 1 or a few days, then they're going to get bored of the games too. BBSes need game worlds that never stop growing and adding new features.

I'm not saying this is anyone's responsibility to implement these types of features into games, nor am I suggesting any one here drop what they're doing and see if they can make it happen. I'm just throwing an idea out there and see what others think about it.

im actually working on a game thats a mud but completely database driven.
the races/classes/rooms/monsters/spells/items/terrains/barriers all that is done within the game and takes effect immediately with no restart.
although you took the bbs down if you want to play with it and gimme some feedback lemme know ill compile you a commercial version.

i got this idea after seeing so many posts of people wanting majormud,tele-arena,soc,etc.. all the different things into one so i figured what the hell make one game engine where the sysop can make it however he wants.
fantasy,sci-fi,etc....