Lovecraft MUD (CthulhuMUD)

[angelbob]

The Lovecraft MUD thing has been done, though not incredibly well.

CthulhuMUD was a heavily-adapted Dikurivative with some really clever ideas. Unfortunately, it all came out as hack'n'slash, which worked questionably for a real Lovecraft feel.

With that said, their builders and implementors were really good, and the areas came alive as a result. It would have been nice if it had been more of a "real" horror setting, but it still made a pretty good Lovecraft travelogue.

They also allowed nonhuman characters -- Mi-go, shoggoth, Yithian... Those are probably anathema to the "real" Lovecraft feel, but CthulhuMUD did them very well and they were fun to play.

[Greg]

You say that CthulhuMud doesn't do the Lovecraft thing incredibly well. But "incredibly well" compared to what?

Your criticisms have real bite. CthulhuMud would be so much better if it were less tied to D&D tropes - if a human character didn't have to kill (and often eat) students as Miskatonic university in order to raise enough levels to improve their Latin skill, or didn't have to run around the Dreamlands slaying beasts and taking their magical stuff.

However, CthulhuMud is still an oasis of originality in a sea of cliche. It may be 50% D&D, but in a world of muds that are 95% D&D, that's an impressive achievement. Certainly, I haven't found anywhere else that can give me a horror fix. All the other games that use the term "horror" in their descriptions seem to mean by it "you can play a Vampire in a D&D world" or, sometimes, "you can play a Vampire in a White Wolf world that has no quests or puzzles in it (and certainly no horror)".

[angelbob]

But "incredibly well" compared to what?

Compared, oddly enough, to some of their oldest material.

CthulhuMUD is an old MUD, and as with most old MUDs you can see which areas were created before the newest features existed. For reference, I'm referring to such areas as "The Colour Out of Space" and "The Rats in the Walls" as being really old -- they use the "look" verb for reading in some weird ways, for instance, and even for conversation with other characters. The other good examples, which don't seem to be directly from Lovecraft, are an old haunted house with an insane diary and a charred corpse, and an investigation of a disappearance involving a meteor and enormous rats.

These are all wonderful little puzzle areas, very well done. However, all the newest material is nothing like them. The new effort seems to be dedicated to ultra-powerful areas (particularly in the Dreamlands and other fantastical settings) and areas designed for non-human or non-Earth characters (Deep One, Mi-Go and various Dreamlands, for instance). All the stuff that uses the newest features, the slickest appearance and the most skilled builders tends toward that form.

That's good for the MUD -- the newer character types are much more amenable to melee combat rather than magic, research or puzzle-solving. It makes for a simple, enjoyable MUD with much more in common with existing MUDs.

But, well... It makes for a simple, combat-based MUD with more in common with regular MUDs. In other words, it pisses all over the Lovecraft feel that they worked so hard to accomplish, even if it comes equipped with slicker Sanity rules.

Sad, really.

You're correct about CthulhuMUD being far, far better than most MUDs. It is, as you say, an oasis of originality in a sea of cliche.

However, it still makes me sad that they've worked so hard to make it less like Lovecraft. As a MUD fan, you're entirely justified in saying "if it makes a better MUD, screw Lovecraft." Similarly, as a Lovecraft fan, I feel entirely justified in saying "if it makes a worse Lovecraft setting, screw making it a better MUD."

To some extent, this is a story-versus-game thing. They've taken the MUD in the "game" direction to the exclusion of a lot of their best story elements. Whether you feel this is good or bad depends on which you prefer -- story or game.

[Franklin]

This is Franklin/Nyarlathotep on CthulhuMUD. I don't want to be "that guy" who plays forum necromancer and brings forgotten threads back from the dead, but I just happened across this discussion and thought I'd throw my hat into the ring.

I've been playing CthulhuMUD for over eight years now, and have always (99% of the time, anyway) been either Franklin or Nyarlathotep - so some of you who played or poked around there back when this thread first started might remember me. Yep, same guy, but hopefully not as much of a insert-random-expletive as I was back then.

Since 2004 when the last post in this thread was made, we've made some changes that both enforce some of the negative things this thread touches on, as well as change some of them to better represent the mythos. Since 2004, three new builders have been added and we've gained a new Implementor who both pays our server costs and does some rather impressive things with the code.

As a result, the MUD is even further from its DIKU base than it once was, and is also far more entertaining/creepy/mythos...y. Yes, some changes that favor hack and slash have been made. But there have also been plenty of changes that make the MUD more enjoyable for those of us who appreciate the roleplaying aspect.

In addition to this, I believe the MUD is also about 50% larger than it would have been back then. Now the 'real world' has Arkham, Dunwich, Innsmouth, Newburyport, Dar-Kith, and overseas - Cairo, and a small chunk of England that houses The Rats in the Walls, as well as trade routes and back roads and (sometimes tedious but hopefully realistic) ocean voyages that connect the overseas areas to everything else. In addition to these areas which appear in the mythos, our builders (myself included, mea maxima culpa) have strayed from the formula of strictly Lovecraftian areas in a most dastardly manner, and included a couple of original areas which we feel fit and respect the premise. And an ongoing effort is being made to create New Orleans and London, two areas which will double the 7000 or so rooms we currently have.

And the dreamlands have been expanded, as well. Once a dreamer reaches Nasht and Kaman in the Cavern of Flames, they find themselves able to walk through an expanded (thanks to our new IMP, Ithaqua) dreamlands into Ulthar, Nir, Oriab, Oukranos, the Lirian desert, Hatheg-Kla, Uehallen, and several other areas that my brain can't quite access right now. Basically... we've taken the hack and slash, and we've spread it out and made it less obtrusive. Does that make sense? The MUD is no longer 3000 or so rooms of "exp" areas. There are still pockets of mass amounts of MOBs stashed away in the dark and dangerous corners of the MUD for those of us who like to kill and eat everything in sight, but in regards to the other thousands of rooms, they're for exploring. They're for questing, for interacting with other players. Some are even safe rooms, or newbie-safe, to keep them clean and to keep the hack and slash away from them, so that it doesn't interfere. One of the biggest complaints we've always had is that you might finally find a fellow Miskatonic University undergraduate to RP with when all of a sudden some level 10,000 hero with flaming sword of doom comes ripping through a divine portal with Yog-Sothoth hot on his heels. Kinda ruins the wry and captivating dialogue you had going on, huh? Well, steps have been taken!

It's not perfect, nope. It's probably not even close, by the standards of some who might be reading this. (Is anyone reading this? :p ) But for those who had some issues with the game before, or those who might just wanna give it a chance, be it a second or third or fourth, come on down!

www.cthulhumud.com
Port: 8889

[Greg]

> This is Franklin/Nyarlathotep on CthulhuMUD. I don't want to be "that guy"
> who plays forum necromancer and brings forgotten threads back from the dead,

Nyarlathotep bringing things back from the dead? Perish the thought! :D

> but I just happened across this discussion and thought I'd throw my hat
> into the ring.

I was very interested to hear your perspective and would like to hear more.

> Since 2004 when the last post in this thread was made, we've made some
> changes that both enforce some of
> the negative things this thread touches on

Can you say more about that?

> as well as change some of them to better represent the mythos.

Can you say more about that too? Do you mean that you have added new areas representing places from the mythos? I think you mean more than just new areas because you say

> Since 2004, three new builders have been added and we've gained a new
> Implementor who both pays our server costs and does some rather
> impressive things with the code.

> As a result, the MUD is even further from its DIKU base than it once was,
> and is also far more entertaining/creepy/mythos...y.

So, in what way has the code changed? How is the experience of playing the game different?

By the way, you might want to rewrite the description of the MUD on mudconnector.com to reflect the changes. It hasn't been updated since 2004 and promisses changes in the near future, giving the impression that nothing is really happening with the MUD.

> In addition to this, I believe the MUD is also about 50% larger than it would > have been back then. Now the 'real world'
> has Arkham, Dunwich,
> Innsmouth, Newburyport, Dar-Kith, and overseas - Cairo, and a small chunk > of England that houses The Rats in the
> Walls, as well as trade routes and
> back roads and (sometimes tedious but hopefully realistic) ocean voyages > that connect the overseas areas to
> everything else.

Excellent! Places to explore and things to see are always good.

Have you considered putting up more maps on the game's homepage? Map availability is both realistic and tremendously helpful, especially for a newer player (and anyone who doesn't like them can just ignore them). Maps showing the location of train stations and other important landmarks would be particularly helpful to explorers.

> In addition to these areas which appear in the mythos, our builders (myself > included, mea maxima culpa) have strayed
> from the formula of strictly
> Lovecraftian areas in a most dastardly manner, and included a couple of
> original areas which we feel fit and respect the premise.

Can you say more about that? By best guess is that you are saying that you have added areas containing horror that is not strictly Lovecraftian horror.

> And an ongoing effort is being made to create New Orleans and London,
> two areas which will double the 7000 or so rooms we currently have.

Those would both be great additions. Again, I hope that you consider providing maps to help people explore your vast world.

> Basically... we've taken the hack and slash, and we've spread it out and
> made it less obtrusive. Does that make sense? The MUD is no longer 3000 > or so rooms of "exp" areas. There are still
> pockets of mass amounts of
> MOBs stashed away in the dark and dangerous corners of the MUD for
> those of us who like to kill and eat everything in sight, but in regards to
> the other thousands of rooms, they're for exploring. They're for questing,
> for interacting with other players.

That sounds great! I always enjoyed exploring your world and found your quests very interesting indeed. My biggest frustration with the MUD in the past is that I had to do a lot of hacking and slashing in order to explore and it sounds like that won't be as much of a problem.

I suppose that I'd still need to do a lot of hacking and slashing in order to undertake a lot of the quests though, since you have to level to increase your skills.

> It's not perfect, nope. It's probably not even close, by the standards of
> some who might be reading this.

Nothing ever is. The old version of your MUD is still the best MUD I have ever seen. If the new one is better, and it sounds like it is, then that is something very impressive.

Thanks for keeping us up to date!

Greg

[benandjerry101]

Yep, same guy, but hopefully not as much of a insert-random-expletive as I was back then.

This sounds very interesting. Can you elaborate on what you are trying to say, or have you already stated the obvious? mmmmm, I wonder.