[MUD-Dev] Persistent Worlds

[the_logos at www.achaea.com]

On Tue, 20 Feb 2001, John Buehler wrote:

> Yeah, any pertinent backstory should be presented *in* the game, not
> via some document to be read before playing the game.  And *in* the
> game doesn't mean that there's a document to be read while playing
> the game.  I want the virtual world to be experienced by the
> players, not dissected like some...  game.

Hmm. Reading the backstory in a document is really much more life-like
than game-like. Having to find it out by talking to NPCs and whatnot
(since you apparently want to prevent players from writing the
backstory down) seems very questy and game-like to me.

I realize I may not be in the majority here, but I spend probably half
my reading time reading history about the physical world. I love it,
if it's well-written. And frankly the sort of book about a fictional
world that I'd enjoy the most (say, Middle-Earth) would be a history
of Middle-Earth penned by my favorite historian, Will Durant. I'd
probably rather read that than Lord of the Rings, for instance. How
many Tolkien fans out there have found immense joy in reading the
Appendices at the end of Return of the King? Or who have bought the
Karen Wynn Fonstad Atlas of Middle Earth just to look at the maps and
read some more history of Middle Earth?

But I ramble. My point is mainly that it is much more life-like to
have history presented in document form than it is to have to ban the
players from writing down history (our best section of backstory is
one that while plotted by me, was actually written by one of our
players, who is a much more creative writer than I am) and refuse to
write any yourself, and make them collect the info from other
sources. (NPCs?) It's also futile as someone will just put pen to
paper and post it on a web page out of your control.

--matt

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