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Father Of The MUD Would Close World Of Warcraft

In an interview with the Guardian the man widely hailed as the father of online roleplaying games, Richard Bartle answered various questions sent in by readers, with some surprising results.

The first MUD (Multi-User Dungeon/Domain) was set up by Bartle at the University of Essex in 1978. A MUD is basically an MMORPG played in chatrooms via a text interface. Traditionally set in a standard fantasy world (though exceptions are quite common) MUD’s allowed players from all over the world to interact, perform quests and gain experience for their characters. Sound familiar?

Today’s MMOG’s are an extension of these original MUD’s though the scope and flexibility of using a completely text based interface was somewhat diminished by the use of pretty visuals, it being far easier to describe an improvised spell or combat move than it is for a developer to try and provide an animation or effect for every conceivable action. As Bartle says:

“The virtual worlds are not as sophisticated. Yes, they have the 3D graphics, but what you can do in them as a player isn’t as sophisticated as what you can do in a textual world. This means players don’t have as many tools and abilities available to them within the world to enhance the experience of others.”

The interview gives some interesting insights into how an old hand sees the rash of new MMOG’s which are springing up, why they do things the way they do and what he thinks they should be doing to make better experiences for their players. The killer comes at the end though and I’ll reproduce it in full for you here:

If you could take over control of one major MMORPG - which would you choose and what would you do with it?
I’d take over World of Warcraft and I’d close it. I just want better virtual worlds. Sacrificing one of the best so its players have to seek out alternatives would be a sure-fire way to ensure that unknown gems got the chance they deserved, and that new games were developed to push back the boundaries.

Er, I would get to do this anonymously, wouldn’t I?

Whats interesting about Bartle’s answer is not the fact that he’d shut down WoW, but why he would do it. WoW is currently the top of the pile and continues to attract new players who might otherwise be drawn to smaller, less well known, online worlds. Taking the analogy of the food chain, WoW is at the top and is using this position of power to starve the rest of the predators. If WoW was gone maybe other less rapacious (and more original) games would be allowed to grow. (From The Guardian (UK).)

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