I think what he means is that when your actions affect Lusternia, Lusternia stays affected. I was helping some people test an experimental side of an almost defunct online game I play. They had received permission from the games company to hack the game's addon pack and attempt to code it to fit a real online format. The problem though was the areas were NOT persistent. You would complete an area, leave it, and when you returned 30 seconds later, the area had reset. Also, each area had it's own "instance", so every player their own instance of every area, and sharing these instances was particularly buggy.

In Lusternia though, I complete a quest, and it stays completed until it resets, no matter who approaches it. An event that happens (the whole Faethorn thing, for example) permanently affects the game. The effects are persistent.

Lusty ftw! Mash mash mash

except that they arn't...

Single player games, are almost never persistant, but the actions you do in them are...

I can conqure the romans in Civ, and when I come back later they will still be conqured, and the romans will never "respawn."

Multiplayer games tend to have persistant worlds, that means, its in the same state all the time. In Lusternia, any action I do will be undone eventually even if no other player does anything. Everything eventually goes back to its persistant state. In most single player games, any action I do, will remain that way untill another player changes the outcome. (A player can be a.i.)

Most Online games, don't have deformable terrain, that once its changed, its changed forever, untill another player comes and changes it again. (like you would have in Civ, or Simcity)

Hmmm, I see your point....

I still think the important things we do in Lusternia change it's course and keep it there. Maybe the coded world isn't persistent, but the things we players do with and to each other is, which makes it incredibly dynamic.

Yes, an amazing thing about Lusternia is that its a very Dynamic world, even though it has some persistant aspects.

As good as MUDs may be in their ways, you shouldn't dismiss graphical games so easily. A lot of them (MMOs excluded) take great skill and technique. Many MUD gamers find it impossible to master graphical games because they aren't adaptable or coordinated enough - in fact I daresay some MUD players are rejects who couldn't succeed at graphical games.

The close community aspect of MUDs like Lusternia is their best feature. The combat is good but very flawed - there is a lot of potential in this area, but for some reason the powers that be think that novelty features like miniatures or furniture will make and preserve a great game. No way. If Lusternia had focused on perfecting what it originally -had- and not butchering and replacing all its selling points, it would be the God of MUDs by now.

The widest-played graphical games on the net aren't widely played because new features are constantly added. They keep loyal playerbases because the games are amazing. IRE should learn from that.

Um, yes, that's all true...

But people still prefer Graphical Games over Text Games because of the 'text' word in their name, not necesarily because they're so imperfect, and graphical games are oh, so, perfect. A huge number of graphical games are made just for bleh, or the money, or because there was a succesful movie that came out.

That's my oppinion though, and as I've said, I like complexity (I've yet to see a graphical game with more useful and useable abilities as Lusternia)

I agree wholeheartedly. All the new features of the Guildwars expansion that comes out tomorrow, for example, reinforce the current features of the game, rather than adding a ton of non-sequitors like Lusternia tends to do. People who are looking forward to it are looking forward to it because it makes the game better, not because it's some new fad.

I think the non-sequtors of Lusternia were all added at the same time, as in it was at its point in development where they could implement the toys they wanted to exist in the game. (Just as gambling was put into achaea at one point)

And from this point on, those toys are going to become more integrated and the like.. but I could be wrong.

More people would filter to text games if they improved. 10 years ago, gaming was a niche thing for nerds. Now because the games have improved, it's far wider.

It's true about the movie thing. Game industries are in a trap where to sell games, they need:

- a huge budget for all the graphics
- which means the game needs to be an assured success to make a profit
- which means they have very little creative licence
- so they base it on a recent film, so they know it will sell

even though it's a shit game. The same applies to modern films based on books. People will watch The Da Vinci Code film even when it's a pile of crap. Assured profits. It's a shame, really. Blame EA.

Agreed.

Snicker.

http://www.gucomics.com/archives/view.php?cdate=20060322

But, for those of us who don't have systems, it's true. My first encounter with "PvP" consisted of my entering a room, being flooded by about fifty lines of text, and...dying. I was being killed by rockeaters with depressing regularity while at level forty+ because I didn't understand the combat system (I'm knocked down and can't move?!), and while I had health vials, I didn't realize how to use them, or what they were actually for... Or maybe it's just me, 'cause I'm an idiot.



I feel the same way! I started playing Lusternia because it was a novelty (my first text game, besides Anagrams, and my first MUD), then I started skipping guild raids in BWL and playing Lusternia instead because of how incredibly deep this game is, especially in terms of lore. It's wonderful how immersive the world can be just through text, and I adore the Library system and being able to read others' stories and theories about Lusternia. Evil APs and SATs taking my time away from playing. =(

Just because someone prefers not to have to wade through a lot of textual information when they play a game does not mean they are unintelligent. Nor does it mean that MUDders are more intelligent. What a load of crap.

Most people play games to relax, and it is a given that Lusternia at least is not a relaxing game, on the whole. You can tell by the amount of stress and angst that gets released both IC and OOC. Reading information in a textual format can be tiring and worklike.

In addition, I'd say a good 5 and a half billion people in the world would find the amount of time and money poured into MUDs to be the obscene thing, rather than people not wishing to play their games in text format. But at the end of the day, the people who do so are generally good people who are enjoying themselves, and more power to them. Same for the people playing graphic games.

Fair enough you prefer text games. But don't insult people's intelligence because they are different to you.

Not only that, but just because I play a mud doesn't mean I'm litterate.

Ok, so maybe I worded it wrong. But at least we don't immediately dismiss something just because it's not what we are used to. We try it out. We see if we like it. We dismiss it if necessary. So many people just think "No graphics? Don't want it." and I personally think that that is not exactly the most mature, intelligent thing they could do. Sorry if I offended you.

I agree, the only time it makes me mad is when people tell me text based games are dumb, even though they haven't tried it. I've had people try it, and then when they don't like it, I accept it. Of if I tell them about it and they say they don't like the way the game sounds, story, etc., okay, that's fine. But when I say I play a text based game and the response is "I've never played those, they are dumb", that pushes my buttons.

Pluses and minuses for Muds and graphical.

Combat here will never be matched on a graphical game. Ever.
You can't make a way for someone to be afflicted by a bunch of things and know it just by looking at the screen, and then curing it. Plus, sword play has always been weird in graphical games and always will be. It's too technical to have a joystick or mouse to manuever.

Roleplay can and is done very well at times, if you choose to. In a graphical mud, it's very hard to actually RP your character, you all look the same, act the same, etc etc.

No graphics can be a bummer though-would be sweet if we had realistic character models that looked like our actual characters running around-or could have a really awesome picture of every room we walked into. Celestia and Nil would be somethin to see

And if you are looking for a good graphcs game, Elder Scrolls Oblivion. It's the closest anything has ever gotten to making you feel like your in a real world-it's single player, but AMAZING. Play it, but make sure you don't get too addicted and never come back to Lusternia