Trackside Interview: Matt Adcock@MUDGamers.com/BC-Dev.net

The MUDdy Hobo recently had a chance to ask a bunch of questions of Matt Adcock, whose official site can be found at bc-dev.net. We appreciate him taking the time to answer!

MH: How did you first discover MUDs?

Matt Adcock: I guess I was a relative latecomer to MUDs. I first discovered them around 1998/9 while at university. I don’t remember exactly how I started, possibly through TMC I think. I tried a few games that I don’t really remember much about, but the first MUD I played for any length of time was called Avalon.

MH: You indicated on your website that FMud, your Flash-based MUD client, came about because you weren't happy with existing web-based clients. How popular has FMud become since it became available? What are you happy with? What still needs work?

Matt Adcock: There are several MUDs out there using it and I think it is definitely a good alternative to something like the JTA telnet client. The biggest barrier to entry is the requirement to serve a policy file and that’s what I get the most support queries about. Unfortunately, this is required by the Flash player and the only real workaround is to use a proxy, which is what I did with MudGamers.

I think the client definitely looks nicer than some of the Java ones out there, and the scripting capabilities are pretty advanced for an embedded client. You can also save logs in plain text or HTML and load/save script settings locally which is nice.

The main problems with the client are the telnet and terminal support which are rather limited. It works well enough for the majority of MUDs out there, but ideally I’d like it to be more compliant. Background colours are probably the most glaring omission right now.

MH: How did your RPG project, Maiden Desmodus, come about?

Matt Adcock: About a year ago, I was looking to get involved in a MUD project and responded to an ad on TMC from Wade Gustafson who was looking for a partner to work with on a new project. Wade is an excellent writer and a very creative guy and he had several game themes that he’d fleshed out and between us we settled on Maiden Desmodus.

Wade does all the writing and the overall world theme and story, while I do the programming and design the game systems and mechanics. There is some crossover of course and we frequently bounce ideas off each other, but generally we work really well together within our own areas.

MH: What's the current status of Maiden Desmodus?

Matt Adcock: The original plan was to open Q1 of 2009 but as is often the way that has slipped a bit, but we hope to open soon. Certainly it’ll be a matter of weeks rather than months.

We began last summer and while it doesn’t feel like nearly a year I’m pleased with how much we have done in that time. As of today we have 1069 rooms, 373 objects, 171 mobiles and 297 scripts – all unique prototypes. We also have around 20,000 more lines of code than when we started.

I made the decision right away to use Nakedmud as a base to build on and I think it definitely gave us a head start compared to coding from scratch. It was a bit of a risk as at the time there were no operational MUDs using the codebase, but I liked the design and it was actively maintained which is a huge benefit.

MH: How are you approaching theme development on Maiden Desmodus? Are you providing a detailed history for players to build from or do you focus more on broader strokes while players fill in more of the details as time goes by?

Matt Adcock: There is definitely a distinct theme and world history to Maiden Desmodus. This is based around a faction conflict between two warring Kingdoms, as well as the mysterious figure of the Maiden Desmodus herself. I guess the setting would best be described as medieval low magic fantasy with a dark horror feel. It’s pretty gritty and brutal and I think it’s a nice change of pace from the more common gothic type of horror you often see in MUDs.

What we’re working on right now is putting in a long quest line which will introduce new players to the game world, history and the ongoing faction conflict. Each faction has a line of 20 quests each so hopefully these will really help to engage players with the setting.

Wade wrote a full-length novel based around another game theme he developed, so he is pretty detail-oriented and it’s fair to say he knows the setting of Maiden Desmodus inside and out. Unfortunately I spend too much time in the code and can’t even find my way around the world half the time, which is a little embarrassing I suppose. Although having designed the combat system I can PK him really easily :)

MH: How did the MUDGamers site come about?

Matt Adcock: It was something of a Sunday afternoon thing that I did after being frustrated trying to navigate TMC. I thought it would be so much cooler if MUD portal sites were more like modern web game sites such as Kongregate. Presenting games clearly and providing players with plenty of tools to sort and find games they are interested in playing, combined with a ‘click to play’ interface just seemed like a really good idea. This is even more important when you are trying to attract new players from outside the established MUD community.

I never really intended MudGamers to seriously compete with the likes of TMC and TMS, it was more of a ‘call to action’ for those sites to show them that MUDs can be presented in a more modern, appealing and accessible way. That said however, traffic is increasing and we just hit 75 games listed on the site so I am really pleased with how it’s working out.

MH: On your site, you state that you're working on a client for Iron Realms Entertainment. What's the status of that project? How did it come about?

Matt Adcock: The project is mostly complete now and the client has been used by IRE on several Flash gaming sites as well as on their main portal site. Back when I was first developing FMud I had heard that IRE were looking at doing a Flash based client so I got in touch and we went from there. Jeremy at IRE has been great to work with and it was a lot of fun working with him and their design guy to knock the client into shape. It was also a good learning opportunity for me as FMud was actually my first project using Adobe Flex.

MH: How optimistic are you about the future of text-based games? Why?

Matt Adcock: I am definitely optimistic and believe that MUDs have the potential to grow. Text games will always have a niche appeal, but with more and more people getting into online games there has to be a new audience out there for MUDs. Even my mother in law enjoys playing web games in her spare time.

Taking IRE as an example, if you look at the comments on their Kongregate entry there are plenty of “wtf text suxors” comments, but equally there are quite a few from players who’d never played a text game before and really enjoyed it. We need to find better ways of reaching these gamers.

Again this goes back to the reasoning behind MudGamers, I imagined someone coming from a MMORPG or web gaming background landing on TMC and just not knowing where to start. We need to say really clearly to people “these are the games, click here to play them”.

MH: What's the most important lesson MUD developers can learn from graphical MMORPGs?

Matt Adcock: The single biggest lesson is accessibility, no doubt about it. By this I mean ease with which a new player can get into your game. If you look at modern MMORPGs like WoW, WAR, AoC etc, character creation is simple, there are no separate tutorials to complete, no manuals to read, and new players are directed where to go and what to do as soon as they enter the game world.

Too often in MUDs I see a detailed character creation process where the player is forced to make character choices without knowing the consequences of those choices. This is often followed by some kind of “MUD school” that is completely removed from the rest of the game, often accompanied by lists of help files to read and remember. Couple this with some pretty arcane syntax and many games can be quite intimidating to players unfamiliar with MUDs.

Whatever the focus of your game, whether it is hack and slash, PvP, role-playing or whatever, the key is to get new players involved in that right from the start. You need to draw them in from the moment they log in, not tell them to go spend an hour reading help files or wandering around a phoney MUD school.

MH: How valuable are social networking tools such as Twitter and Facebook for MUDs? Why?

Matt Adcock: Social networking is a great way to reach people who may share a common interest with you, so in that sense sites like Facebook could be used by MUDs as a marketing tool. I know FMud can be embedded on Facebook, MySpace or as a Google widget for example.

I think there are one or two MUDs that use Twitter for broadcasting game information and events in real time, and certainly if more people talk about MUDs whether on regular blogs or on services like Twitter it can only help MUDs as a whole. I personally use both Facebook and Twitter (@bcdev), although not specifically to publicise my MUD projects.

MH: Have you built a career around your projects or are they something you do in spare time? What do you do for a living?

Matt Adcock: I do have some commercial MUD projects, but I think it’d be something of a stretch to say I make a living from them! I have a wonderful day job taking care of my daughter and also work freelance as a web developer.

MH: What MUD-focused sites do you follow? Why?

Matt Adcock: I follow TMC, TMS and Mudbytes, although I am not a very frequent contributor to any of them. I also read quite a few blogs and other gaming sites such as Massively and Gamasutra. I do enjoy keeping up with what’s going on in the MUD and wider MMORPG community, although the signal to noise ratio can be pretty low a lot of the time.

MH: Are current MUD-focused sites missing something? What can they do to make themselves more relevant and viable?

Matt Adcock: As I’ve said before, I’d love to see a MUD community portal site that looked and functioned a lot more like a site such as Kongregate. A modern look with simplified navigation is important to attract and retain new visitors, and a way to play the listed games without having to download a dedicated client is really essential.

It’s not just about cosmetic changes however. I also think there needs to be a fundamental shift in thinking by those of us who run MUDs. Traditionally there has been a lot of competition for players between MUDs but I believe this only harms the community in the long run. We all have our favourite few MUDs, but these often change over time as we discover new games or revisit old ones. I’d like to see portal sites that bring MUDs and their individual player bases together, where I can try out a variety of MUDs and hopefully find several that I can enjoy playing. Once you add in cross game features like chat and rankings you can really start to build a sense of community between games, rather than the site simply being a place to list in order to attract players to your own game.

MUDs are definitely a niche market, yet they can offer players a wide range of unique gameplay experiences. It’s vital that we, as MUDs, present what we’re about in the best possible way. I have the greatest respect for the existing MUD community sites and I think they do a great job, however I believe there are better ways to present MUDs, particularly to those who may never have played one before.

MH: One opportunity presented by MUDGamers.com is the sense of multiple projects available at a click through a single platform. Where do you see that going in the coming years?

Matt Adcock: Personally I’d love to take the MudGamers concept of “click to play” and apply it to a smaller selection of high quality games with cross game features like chat, achievement ladders and badges, all combined with a common account and micro transaction system. Something similar to what Skotos do I guess, but with a free to play model and more cross game features. This way you can build a community around a collection of games with the goal of sharing players rather than competing for them. You could also add in some simple Flash games that complement the MUDs, such as MUD themed mini games or even link them to the MUDs directly. One of the ideas I’ve got for Maiden Desmodus is to take the mass warfare system I’m working on out of the MUD completely and into a simple graphical strategy game on the website where the outcome of battles would be reflected in the MUD.

MH: What books are you reading these days? Got any movies, music, and games to recommend?

Matt Adcock: It’s terrible but I haven’t read a novel in ages. I’m reading Ted Castranova’s Synthetic Worlds right now which already feels a little dated but is a fascinating read none the less. I’m a big Steven Erikson fan and I think he has a new one out this Summer, but it’s frustrating waiting for the next novel as you invariably forget half of what’s happened before. I’ve also been following George RR Martin’s Song of Ice and Fire but I’ve no idea when his next one is out, he seems to have been writing it for years now. My wife loved the new Star Trek but I fell asleep before the end so not sure I can really recommend it!

As far as gaming goes I don’t have as much time as I’d like and haven’t had the Xbox on for a couple weeks now. I tried Age of Conan recently but couldn’t really get into it so I am getting my MMORPG fix from Warhammer these days. It’s frustrating as I want to really like it, but it always somehow disappoints. It’s wonderfully accessible and I love how you can jump into PvP through scenarios or realm conflict almost immediately. The way the realm conflict is scaled in particular is great design but in practice there’s something missing. I almost wonder if it’s just too easy; you can jump in and out of PvP as you like, there’s no death penalty and with the open party system no need to find a group. It’s almost like there are no incentives not to suck, and with a game that forces team play to such a degree, being surrounded by mediocre players is no fun at all. If things get much worse I may have to turn to Darkfall. But I digress. I don’t really play any MUDs at the moment as I am too focused on Maiden Desmodus.

MH: Are you most passionate about the programming elements or the creative facets of your projects? More about nuts and bolts than the shiny? Why?

Matt Adcock: I like to think that programming is creative, at least it is the way I do it! I guess you’d say I love the nuts and bolts, the mechanics and the systems behind the design. The “how and the why” of games has always appealed to me, even as a player.

MH: Are text-based games that don't offer some form of web-based interface effectively doomed to perpetually tiny playerbases? How can they reach beyond the niche audience otherwise?

Matt Adcock: I don’t know about doomed, but they are certainly limiting their appeal if they don’t offer a web interface. There are plenty of options around in either Flash or Java, and I’ve even seen a few HTML implementations, so it should be relatively simple for any game to setup. They could even list on MudGamers and redirect from their own website direct to the client page if they wanted.

MH: You've blogged about the need for more commercialized MUDs. Has there been any blowback from this from people who condemn the monetization of text-based games? Why is it important to see more commercialized games?

Matt Adcock: I haven’t had any negative feedback on that actually, although there are definitely a few people in the MUD community who think commercial games are taboo. I don’t think it’s a particularly credible position given that MUDs have been commercial for at least as long as they’ve been free, and certainly before free codebases like DIKU and LP.

The main reason I’d like to see more commercial projects is I believe that this would raise the general profile of text games and help to attract more players to all MUDs. More revenue for MUDs means they can spend more on advertising, particularly outside the established MUD community. Developing new portal and community sites with the kinds of features I’ve mentioned would also cost money.

MH: What's the most important thing a MUD developer needs to consider before embarking on their own project?

Matt Adcock: I think you really need to be clear what your motivations are and what you hope to achieve. If you just want to learn programming that’s great, but if you want to produce a game try not to get too bogged down in the technical details. I suppose at this point I should make the customary appeal for people to join an existing project rather than start their own, but nobody who wants to run their own MUD wants to hear that :)

The single most important thing is to make sure you finish what you start.

MH: Where do you see MUDs going as a medium in the next few years? Five? Ten? Are they still around? What niche are they filling?

Matt Adcock: I’d like to see MUD portal sites incorporating some of the features I’ve advocated, and I definitely think we’ll see more web based clients in the future, particularly with custom features like maps, stat bars etc. I also think we’ll see more games merging, at least in terms of marketing, so rather than all trying to attract players to their own websites they can come under one site with a common interface.

While lacking the shinies of big graphical MMORPGs, MUDs can still fill an important niche for several years yet. Given that they are so much cheaper to develop and operate MUDs are able to cater to minority gaming interests in ways that graphical MMORPGs simply cannot. Features such as enforced role-play or permadeath, obscure historical settings and frequent administration run events just aren’t commercially viable for many graphical MMORPGs.

Graphical games will eventually catch up and we’re already seeing this for example with the Hero Engine which uses similar content creation tools to those that MUDs have had for years (not surprising given that it’s from Simutronics). I’m sure these types of tools will find their way to the masses one day, and then we’ll be inundated with hobbyist graphical MMORPGs, DIKU style. Art is still a huge barrier but maybe in the future procedural generation will become more viable and creating content for a graphical game will be on a par with that for a text game.

There will always be some players who just prefer text over graphics of course, but once graphical games are as cheap and easy to produce then we may well see the end of MUDs. I think that day is still a long way off though.

Trackside Interview: Aristotle@Threshold

We recently had the opportunity to ask a bunch of questions of Aristotle, lead developer over at Threshold, about his text-based online roleplaying game.

MH: How did you get involved in MUDs?

Aristotle: I played MUD-like BBS games in college, and a friend on my favorite BBS said to me one day "hey, you should try these games on the internet called MUDs." I took him up on the offer, and my life was irrevocably altered (for the better!).

MH: What's the origin story behind Threshold? What led to it opening in 1996?

Aristotle: The OOC origin story? Well, I had given up on MUDs due to having a bunch of my code stolen a few years earlier. But one summer I was clerking for a law firm, not really liking it, and needed something "fun" to do. So I decided I'd take another crack at making a MUD, but this time I would do it solo so my code couldn't be stolen. That was how Threshold came to be.

The IC origin story is something you need to play Threshold to discover.

MH: How has the playerbase changed since the advent of graphical MMORPGs?

Aristotle: I think Threshold's playerbase has become a little older and more mature since the advent of graphical MMORPGs. While we definitely suffered an overall usage hit for a few years, the long term net effect has been very positive on our community. We lose a lot of the "l2play n00b" types to the graphical MMOs, and frankly they can keep them.

MH: Have you added features to Threshold that were meant to directly compete with MMORPGs?

Aristotle: Not really, no. We get a lot of good ideas from playing graphical MMOs, but I do not think we have ever added a feature specifically to compete with MMORPGs. The closest thing to that would be the simple fact that we always try to be mindful of the accessibility factor that MUDs have going for them. The main reason we do not have a custom client that we REQUIRE is because we want to keep Threshold (and MUDs in general) as widely accessible as possible.

MH: What makes Threshold stand out from the many other MUDs available for people to play?

Aristotle: There are three main things that make Threshold standout: 1) Is is the only RP required (and enforced) commercial game on the internet. 2) It has an absolutely wonderful community. I think the fact that our playerbase is about 50% female is a huge factor there. It helps our community stay balanced and diverse. 3) A fanatical devotion to quality. We could churn out content a lot faster if we really wanted to, but we want everything we add to the game to be top notch in quality. A corollary to this is the fact that we care very deeply about our players. We talk to them on an almost daily basis and are always open to player feedback.

MH: How do you classify Threshold: Hobbyist or commercial? Is it what you do for a living?

Aristotle: Threshold is definitely a commercial game. It is part of our company, Frogdice, and it is my full time job (as well as my wife's full time job).

MH: What do players get in exchange for making real money contributions to Threshold?

Aristotle: I should mention first that almost everything you can receive with real money can also be obtained through regular gameplay. With that said, the main things players receive are convenience options (like quick transport back to their house), in game coin, extra gear storage, and a wide variety of customization options (for their character, their house, etc.).

MH: The game is touted as the oldest RP-enforced MUDs around. How is RP enforced? Where can we check out logs of RP activities from Threshold?

Aristotle: RP is enforced largely by the community itself. New players are immediately offered help by in game advisors, and the RP requirement is made very clear. If players run afoul of it, other players try to take them aside and explain the RP requirement. If they continue to be a problem, they are reported to the admins who take over from there. It is extremely rare that admins have to get involved. It is even rarer that someone refuses to stay IC and roleplay. By making this rule very clear during creation we avoid problems before they start.

MH: What has been the brightest moment for you and your playerbase on Threshold?

Aristotle: This is an easy one. I met my wife through Threshold. For the playerbase, I think the brightest moment was when we switched to free to play. Doing that meant people never had to worry about losing a friend because they wanted to play less and could not justify a recurring fee.

MH: What has been the darkest moment for you and your playerbase?

Aristotle: I think the darkest moment for me was riding out the initial effects of the big graphical MMOs on the MUD genre. That was probably the darkest moment for our players as well. Fortunately, we played to our strengths and have been able to recover and grow quite nicely in the last 3-4 years.

MH: Threshold is an original theme, but are there any fantasy books that you'd recommend for familiarizing oneself with the tone of the game?

Aristotle: Dragonlance is an excellent series for experiencing a classic fantasy world. Threshold is a little more high fantasy than Dragonlance. David Eddings' various series would be good as well (for the traditional good vs. evil conflict), but again Threshold is more high-fantasy, high-magic.

MH: Where do most of Threshold's players hail from?

Aristotle: Threshold has players from over 50 countries. The USA, Canada, Britain, and Australia are certainly the most common due to the language issue. But it amazes me where some of our players come from. I find it particularly interesting that we have players from Israel and Iran, and have benefited from their perspective on our OOC game forums.

MH: What's the most beneficial advertising for Threshold? Paid ads or word-of-mouth?

Aristotle: Word of mouth is without a doubt the most beneficial and effective form of advertising for Threshold.

MH: What does the future hold for text-based online gaming? How will Threshold and other games like it continue to sustain themselves? Where are the new audiences to be found?

Aristotle: I hosted a roundtable discussion on this topic at the most recent IMGDC (Independent MMO Game Developers Conference). I think text games will continue to be viable and even grow as they provide a unique type of gameplay. Text games still do communication and interaction better than graphical games, largely because you are always at the chat interface. You do not have to click in a box and hit enter just to BEGIN speaking with people.

New audiences are to be found from graphical MMOs in my opinion. As graphical MMOs continue to deliver the same pure hack-n-slash gameplay, text games will be able to attract people to their deeper gameplay. Text games really should work together to get the word out on graphical MMO fan sites and forums.

MH: What are you reading lately? Favorite TV shows? Music? Movies? Computer games?

Aristotle: About half of what I read is sci-fi/fantasy, a quarter is non-fiction, and another quarter is modern thriller/drama/mystery type stuff. My absolute favorite TV show right now is Bones, but House is a close second. I rarely get to see movies (since we have two young kids), but I really want to see the new Star Trek movie, the Wolverine movie, the new Terminator movie, and Angels & Demons.

I play a lot of computer games, but right now I am pretty desperate for a good one. The last computer game I played that I really liked was The Witcher. I try to play just about every MMO out there for at least a month or two. I feel game developers really need to make an effort to play other games so they know what else is being done in the market.

MH: What can people expect from Threshold in the next year? Five years?

Aristotle: People can expect lots of interesting story and plot lines (as we continue to tell the story of Threshold's world, and let players shape it), new lands to explore, and some pretty advanced new systems that will add even more variety to Threshold's gameplay. We have a few systems currently in development that are things people have wanted for years. We added a new developer a little over a year ago and he has been a huge boon to Threshold. We have really hit our stride working together and it is paying awesome dividends for Threshold and its players.

HSpace needs help!

HSpace is still on the road to making a return to the MUSH scene, but has suffered some recent setbacks.

Revian, the chief developer working on HSpace 5.0, is currently looking for someone to help staff the test MUSH – add new ship classes and other features to keep people coming back to check out what's new and shiny. He's also looking for a player relations assistant to help visitors make their way around the testbed and learn more about HSpace. And, finally, he needs someone with graphic design expertise to work on the HSpace standalone client interface. (No programming knowledge needed, just a knack for making things look pretty and efficient.)

Interested in any of these positions? Send email to Revian at revian@hspace.org or log in to the test MUSH at telnet://mindgames-studio.com 4201

Threshold represents at IMGDC!

Turns out, the folks from Threshold are making an appearance on behalf of our text-based gaming habit at the Independent MMO conference in Las Vegas! Wish 'em luck letting them know we're not dead!

Here's to hoping that, for once, what happens in Vegas goes all over the damned place.

Dear fellow travelers...

The MUDdy Hobo owes everyone a huge apology for falling off the tracks for the last few weeks. It's been a frantic time, what with the work deadlines and up-and-moving shuffle from an apartment to the new house.

However, the move is more or less complete, a major work deadline is behind me now, and I can spend a bit of time riding the rails again.

The next stop: Threshold!

Love writing lore?

It's not much to do with MUDs, but the MUDdy Hobo will try to drop a useful tidbit about other things here and there:

Blizzard, the folks behind World of Warcraft, are holding a writing contest. If you're interested in learning more, visit this link.

Good luck!

Trackside Interview: Revian@HSpace 5.0

For those who remember the old-school MUSH space engine known as HSpace, which had its origins on Hemlock MUSH, there's good news: A new incarnation of the project is underway at hspace.org

Revian, one of the main developers working on HSpace 5.0, took some time to answer a few questions from the MUDdy Hobo:

MH: HSpace used to be THE top-of-the-line RP MUSH space engine - so what happened to it?

Revian: It went through the hands of several coders, initially HSpace 4 was done by Gepht. When he didn't have the time anymore I took it over and developed it into 4.2, from there it was developed on my several developers, most notably Mark Hassman, who, assisted by Gepht I believe, did some work on it. This lead to the 'trueline' branch, which eventually died off as the people working on it didn't have the time anymore to work on it.

MH: How did the new resurgence come about? What drove the revival to create HSpace 5.0?

Revian: Well, I was away from the community for a bit as I settled into my real life and didn't really have the time to work on anything. Now that my life calmed down a bit I felt I should have a look how HSpace was doing. When I discovered the state it was in I decided it was time to do something back for the community where I learned many of the skills I now use in my life on a day-to-day basis. And I decided I should contribute something back, developing a new, better version of HSpace seemed like the right thing to do. Since Mongo(Shawn Sagady) had been working on a revival attempt for HS 4, I decided to contact him, he immediately responded with great enthousiasm. Because of my greater programming experience I took the programming lead role, while Shawn does more of the design side, since that's where his skill vastly surpass my own.

MH: What do you consider to be the most promising features in the works for HSpace 5.0?

Revian: It's hard to say, but I'm very excited about the modular system design, which should allow players huge flexibility in configuring and tweaking their own ships. We also have the new pseudo-Newtonian physics system, which should allow a whole new level of ship control during ship to ship combat. Additionally I'm very glad with the somewhat integrated economy, which will allow cargo mass affecting ship maneuverability. And also harvesting of resources in space. Finally, I hope that the integrated autopilot will make the system much more easy to use and attractive to the community's none-code-heavy players.

MH: The old HSpace had some mods that allowed the engine to be used on games that weren't necessarily space-oriented but did have vehicles, such as aircraft, boats, and submarines. How much support will HSpace 5.0 have for that kind of functionality?

Revian: Initially we do not plan to support that, simply because it is not our main target. We will focus on supporting space very well, as I honestly believe it's better for us to do one thing well than a lot of things and features mediocre. As a development team we're always moving though and the future might very well offer such functionality.

MH: How are you approaching HSpace development to make it more RP-friendly?

Revian: Well, first of all we've already received a lot of great suggestions from the community. We will be integrating better automation systems meaning on regular patrols more time can be spent roleplaying, and less to monitor every single gauche on the vessel. Also we will allow for more types of ship to ship (and bridge to bridge) communication. Finally we'll try and make the messages aboard the ship give more 'feel' to the vessel, we are examining the possibilities of windows in ship rooms for example that offer players in those rooms a view of space. We are not sure how much of that we can get into the first release though.

MH: What's the biggest challenge facing HSpace 5.0?

Revian: Well, asides from the things that will be challenging and we have control over, which is making it a true contribution to existing MUSHes and there system. A challenge we have less influence over lies in bringing it to the people and getting it to be used (and improved through feedback, suggestions and patches!) by the community.

MH: When are you aiming to release HSpace 5.0 for public consumption?

Revian: Currently we believe summer 2009 is a feasible time to have a fully functional initial release. That does not mean that it will contain all features requested, since we will continue to improve and develop it past that point. But it will provide all functionality needed to run a solid roleplaying (or social) environment on.

MH: Can HSpace 5.0 be used for platforms beyond PennMUSH? If not, are there any plans to eventually try to create mods that work with other platforms?

Revian: We will not be providing that functionality from the current development team, however we did take great care to make sure integration on other platforms is as easy as possible. For those technical amongst us, there are two files to be implemented, all functions from HSIface.h need to be implemented in a CPP file, and all hooks in HSIfacePennHooks.cpp will have to be duplicated for that platform. Internally HSpace uses no code that depends on Penn.

MH: What's your background with HSpace? With other coding projects?

Revian: I am a long time roleplayer(although time has not permitted me to roleplay for quite a while), I have experienced HSpace on several MUSHes, and also tried to develop a couple MUSHes using it, but never quite succeeded. In my daily life I'm a Software Engineer for a internet media company and I have experience with many open source packages (for example Mozilla, VLC, Qt), and have contributed to some.

MH: What inspirations colored the development of HSpace 5.0? (In the past, we've talked about how physics in 5.0 will let you mimic the spin-around-under-velocity-and-shoot maneuver from Babylon 5, for example.)

Revian: Well, I've always loved Sci-Fi, Babylon 5 and Battlestar Galactica will most definitely have colored the development. Of course Star Trek, even though we will not Trek-orient the space system, and related technobabble will most definitely have had an influence. Last the people working on it and playing with it have inspired us, Shawn has contributed some great ideas and beaten some stupid ones out of me.

MH: What's been the biggest headache in trying to get HSpace 5.0 off the ground?

Revian: Getting people to take it seriously, thanks for helping with that!

MH: Developing a space system for a niche MUD population - a niche within a niche within a niche - seems like it might be a real boulder-up-the-hill sort of task. Why do it? Do you worry that you're investing a lot of time and energy in a system that might not get many eyes on it?

Revian: My personal ambition is mainly to learn, both in coding and in human relations it is a great learning experience to work on such a project. Although my real life job provides me with plenty of experiences and completely different learning experiences, it is within a strict corporate environment. This project gives me a chance to educate myself outside of that environment in different directions.

MH: Are there other similar applications you'd like to see developed for MUSHes?

Revian: I can't think of anything at the moment to be honest. I would love to eventually develop graphical extensions which would maintain the richness of text-based roleplaying but truly augment to the experience of the users environment.

Thanks to Revian for taking the time! And, if you're of a mind to check out the new HSpace, be sure to visit their testbed MUSH at the following telnet address: mindgames-studio.com 4201.