January, 2001 interview Hat

GameSpy
How did the MUD concept originate at first, and how did it evolve into a game?
Richard Bartle
It didn't evolve into a game, it was always intended to be a game. It arose because Roy Trubshaw, a student at Essex University, was discussing with a bunch of other hackers a monitor call they had found for the DECSYSTEM 10 operating system. This was basically an instruction which caused memory to become writable. The group realized that this could be applied to shared memory segments to allow communication between people running the same program at the same time. Roy got to a terminal first to test it, and it worked. He decided to use it to write a multiplayer adventure game, as he'd been playing ADVENT (a.k.a. Colossal Cave, a.k.a. Adventure) and thought it might be more fun if you could be in the game with other people.
GameSpy
At the point you became involved, what was the status of the game, and which modifications did you bring to it?
Richard Bartle
I was involved almost from the beginning. My background was all games, so I knew a lot more about game design than Roy did. He built the infrastructure, but was more interested in the programming side than the game side (although he could do games). I was more interested in the game design side (although I could do programs).
When I took over, Roy had the basic game engine working, so you could move around and communicate across a few rooms, but that was all he had time for before he finished his degree. I'd made some suggestions for the architecture, but it was mainly Roy's. This was MUD version 3; there were some things he'd put in version 2 that he wanted to add but hadn't got round to, it wasn't like he'd reached his limit except for time.
When I took over there were some major pieces of coding remaining, for example if two people were in a dark room but one had a light source, the other couldn't yet see. Also, all the characters were male (as were all the players, but Roy always intended to add a female gender, it was just a bit finicky to do and there were more pressing things that he wanted to finish so I wouldn't have to code them). MUD version 3 became known as MUD1. In the end, I wrote about 75% of it and Roy wrote 25%, but his 25% was the crucial bit. We usually say that we co-wrote the game, because that properly reflects our respective contributions - about half each.
GameSpy
What is the identikit of the average MUD player?
Richard Bartle
The answer to this question is identical to that of: "What is the identikit of the average person on the Internet?" There's no such thing.
GameSpy
Did you anticipate that MUDs, and online games would remain popular after all this time, and even gain popularity?
Richard Bartle
I did, yes. Furthermore, I expect and expected them to remain indefinitely and to grow in popularity. They're the future.
GameSpy
What is in your opinion the future of MU*-type games? Why do text-based games still retain the enormous appeal they have?
Richard Bartle
The fact that MUDs are free is a major reason for their position on the periphery of the Internet. They don't look professional, they have no advertising budget, they have high barriers to entry, and magazines won't review them. The fact that they have a direct connection to the imagination ensures that they can never die - so long as people have imaginations.

More than 20 years have passed since Roy Trubshaw and Richard Bartle fired the first neutron, and the chain reaction shows no sign of stopping. With more than 1670 MU* games in existence, Essex MUD should feel like a proud grand-grandfather.


Copyright © Richard A. Bartle (richard@mud.co.uk)
20th January :\webdes~1\ .htm