Ok, as I said, I know it's not about Lusternia. It's just that without a doubt in the ten years I have played MUDs I have come across few, if any, that are parallel to the quality that IRE ones show.

I really, really, wish they would tackle a cyberpunk one. Or at least a sci-fi fantasy one. Though not cheesy sci-fi. I want grit, cybernetic implants... ok so cyberpunk.

Thoughts?

Shulgin

I'd be hard-pressed to stomach the TMS forums long enough to find it again, but the Head Cheese has pretty much said that he doesn't think there's enough interest in the MUD community to justify the costs in building a game with that theme.

Iii want a dark modern IRE MUD, like Film Noir style (think sorta similar to Sin City)

That would be awesome.

A Noir-type MUD would work only if people RPed (and we know that a huge amount of them do not), and it couldn't use standard IRE mechanics. A cyberpunk one, though... hmm...

It was discussed before, but all the credits and afflictions would make MORE sense in cyberpunk than in high fantasy settings. You simply buy memory cards and download their contents into your brain (credits, lessons), and when it gets to afflictions - your cyber-body gets hit with viruses (computer or nano ones) which make it affect strange, and you have to use an anti-virus/dermal patch to remove the effect. Yup, works for me. Rather easy to get into the RP too. I would look forward to it, but yeah... the Big Chief said it isn't happening.

There is a Shadowrun MUD out there though, but I am not sure how good it is.

Bear with me, ladies and gentlemen: a western MUD.

Three different archtypes: ranged attackers (guns for towns, bow and arrow for tribes), physical fighters (tomahawks for tribes, blades for towns) and spiritual leaders (priests for towns and shamans for tribes, both with powers that are more diplomatic/healing than offensive).

Instead of cities, towns; instead of communes, free-ranging tribes of indians; instead of guilds, different districts in said towns/different sections of said tribes; instead of champions, Sheriffs; instead of leaders... uh... well, leaders are the same.

Afflictions could be harder to give, but more long-lasting, perhaps even with the chance of infection if, say, you're shot and do nothing about the bullet. (Meaning you'd need to sit down after a battle with a practicioner of medical arts and get the bullet pulled out, which in turn could cause bleeding and scarring.) The entire game would be in a constant state of warfare due to severe idealogical differences between the communities, and raids would be constant and much more effective, owing to the fact the "guards" would be much weaker and more difficult to find than in other IRE MUDs. There could be a much larger number of organizations, and the organizations themselves would be smaller, allowing for fragile alliances between seperate zones for free-trade/repelling common foes.

Bliss.

I agree. I think IRE could do something like that so well, as Cuber's already elaborated. There are also so many fantasy-style MUDs around, but pitifully few sci-fi related ones (that are easy to find, worthwhile, and don't deal with Star Trek or Star Wars ... not that there's anything wrong with either one).

What might be interesting is if IRE could poll to see if there was interest in such an idea. Also remember that we've got four MUDs of IREers to potentially draw from, as well as those out there who don't play an IRE MUD or two (or three, or four) already.

I'm going to have to agree as well. A well-done cyberpunk MUD would stand out from the crowd quite a bit. I'd definitely play it. As long as it wasn't cheesy like someone mentioned earlier.

I would spasm over a good cyber MUD, or at least a modern one, like the noir genre Cuber suggested *drool* It's too bad the new IRE game is already planned and has only simple technologies.

I do know of a Rapture code based Mud, that asks in the builder application to submit an example of cyperpunk stuff...

How popular is Anarchy Online?

If they got permission for it, ShadowRun IRE mud anyone? I'd drool, yell w00t five times out loud and do a barrel roll, not necessarily in that order but you get the point!

Jack, you ****er, the Western IRE MUD was my idea. Hell, one day I wrote up half a 'Gunslinger' skillset.

If you're talking about Ilyrias, that's steampunk, not cyberpunk. There's a big difference.

I love steampunk...

For the confused, steampunk has the same "punkish" attitudes but features pre-electricity (Victorian era steam and clockwork powered) mechanics, whereas cyberpunk is much more modern/futuristic with cyborgs and virtual reality.

The Wiki article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steampunk

A lot of anime uses a Steampunk theme.

Can other attitudes be applied? I want a steamgoth MUD. Or maybe a cyberhappy one. How about nuclearsad? Coalambiguous?

I couldn't help but break out laughing at that. Still got it, I see, Guido.

Its all punk to me

Let's have a Coalsad MUD. That would be incredible.

Cyberhappy: "WHEEEEEEEE those CheMiFun drugs are FUN. WHEEEEEEEE" *blam*
Steamgoth: "Oh woe is me. Why must I exist in such dull and unbearably ennui-filled times? It is so dull. I feel sad. I think I'm going to kill myself by throwing myself into that mechanically powered grinder. Sweet, sweet oblivion, here I come."
Nuclearsad: "But I don't want to go to Vietnam!"
Coalambiguous: "Ho hum. Another day pumping water into the steam engine."

Oh, and Ilyrias is more fantasy than Steampunk, from what I've seen; it does have some cool steampunk elements, although they're more 17th--16th century analog than Victorian.