My Time With MUDs (Multi User Dungeons)

[@MMArtDamage]

Wintermute is the name of one of the AIs in WIlliam Gibson's 'Neuromancer'.

[@CainOnGames]

Yes! It was Ghostwheel in the Amber books. My brain is dumb.

[@Aravanus]

@@CainOnGames You didn't mention it so I figure its also possible you don't know the origin of "Raistlin." Its the name of one of the main characters of Dragonlance, a seires of d&d modules and a novel line published by TSR that was pretty big in the 80s & 90s. If you already were aware, sorry to be buzzing in your ear.

[@nundulan]

God I love that book trilogy (and Burning Chrome)

[@Millenia3D]

I grew up on MUDs, it's refreshing to see someone talk about them!! I feel like they're a largely forgotten and ignored part of game history even if they were instrumental in many ways

[@touchtablet3364]

Hello Tim. You and all your friends/collaborators who participated in Fallout, then VTMB, I'll be infinitely grateful for the adventures and imaginations you proposed. More than 20 years after their creation, I discovered these 3 games (with Fallout 2), literally taking me on a journey and becoming one of the best videogame experiences I've ever had. I loved these games so much, that you are featured on my deskop wallpaper alongside other video game figures such as Aonuma, Kondo, Yamaoka, Toyama, Mikami, Ueda, Spector, Newell, Hennig, brothers Houser and Benzies, Colantonio, Carrier, Druckmann and Schofield. I'm very happy to discover your channel and your anecdotes, advice, experiences and wisdom today! Thank you very much from a French gamer, you're a very inspiring person. I wish you and your loved ones all the best.

[@hpbecraft]

Story time with Tim is a great part of my day. Curious if you had direct talk with Bethesda when they were making Fallout 3, I'm sure you've already answered that and I missed it but that bomb part of your story sounds a lot like Megaton.

[@fawkewe]

Im pretty sure he was invited to the early premire which he enjoyed.

[@ebrim5013]

I really cut my adventure gaming teeth on MUDs in the 90’s as a teenager. Very fond memories and some of the places in the games I still remember quite vividly. There was no chaos quite like the town square with all the empaths fixing the broken characters being dragged in from the wilds.

[@thebalalaikaremains2321]

MUD, MUSH, MUX when my tabletop group spilt and headed off to different colleges and careers that was my gaming fix for years.

[@borgy1337]

So cool! I remember MUDs from the IRC days. In 92 I started a BBS and ran Lord of the Red Dragon on it. Fun times!

[@newfleshrecords]

It's nice to know one of the creators of something so dear to me is such a lovely person. Loved this.

[@bioshopinfinite]

Hey Tim! This is the barbershop quartet you met at PAX a few years back. Loving your channel. Such insightful content. Thanks so much.

[@HexNebula]

hi! Irrelevant to the topic of the video - but thank you so much for your content! The Fallout related ones roped me in, but I stayed for your stories and voice :) Calming and wise, looking forward to your GDC talk! All the best from the UK Edit - also the chocolate blog is a site to behold!

[@summer_xo]

My fave channel on KZbin for sure

[@C5204]

Great story, what a cool way to get a job through a MUD

[@mordtefpv5896]

Dude, Muds were the thing if you had access in the 80's. Luckily my school did. We used BBC micros, computer club had 10 of them. Oh the joy lol. Kids these days,,, Pah.

[@2Cerealbox]

TIL Tim Cain invented Pokemon.

[@jourcontre-jour1286]

Moo I say

[@Kauffy901]

I learned to code because I wanted to make adventure games, and this culminated in my developing a MUD (before they were called that). That project probably kept me alive through my turbulent teenaged years. (Coincidence: I lived in Bethesda at the time)

[@PugFury]

These stories have been the highlight of my day since you started putting them out. Thank you for doing them and please don't ever stop! P.S. So that's why talking cows are ok :)

[@julianastonoga3673]

hi Tim, I know this doesn't have anything to do with this video in specific, but I am an student of Bachelor in History here in Brazil, and my undergraduated thesis is about the geopolitic tension during the Cold War and it's representation in the Fallout universe, and I've watched A LOT of interviews about the game development, but there are a few questions I still haven't found the answer for and I would be so glad if you could help me with this important step in my academic life. I know you probably won't read this but it's worth the shot!

[@christopherdavis1860]

Always love waking up to story time tales from Papa Bear Tim.

[@scbtripwire]

OMG, I loved playing MUDs, those were so captivating!

[@cmdr.jabozerstorer3968]

In the MUD Distant Lands (I think that's what it was called) one of the Mods had a character they roleplayed and when they were in the town area, they used to threaten you with putting your character in their pockets (I think they were a giant) if you annoyed them. Anyway, I took it upon myself to create a new character called Pocketgiant. I somehow didn't get banned for it (your characters were meant to have RP-friendly names) and I used to have fun annoying the Mod. My main half-giant character actually got married in the game, which was weird to me at the time. This was in the Telnet days, of course. You can actually get proper clients now to play MUDs, which are much easier in regard to the interface as it can use different text colours and a few other QoL things..

[@SpotAllen]

Absolutely love hearing stories about MUDs. Especially on the development side. Great stuff.

[@nezimar]

'Alas, you have entered the Realms of Despair...' Loved that one in the 90s. What's crazy is I still recall how the world 'looks', mapped out in my head. No other experience like it outside of just reading.

[@mmestari]

I remember when I was in university all the hot and humid all-nighters in the language students'... ...computer room playing MUDs of course.

[@Goozeeeee]

I tried to get into MUDs just recently. Talk about an exercise in sadness. Overcoming analysis paralysis on picking a client just to be hit with the realization that the populations have beyond dwindled to niche cliques. Ugh.

[@blakej6416]

Is there any way you can boost the audio on your videos, Tim? I've noticed some of the videos have pretty low audio levels. Anyways, another great story. Thanks!

[@vlander1992able]

my parents grew up with MUD's and I can remember Dragon's Gate on AOL since my mother played it all the time before everquest. I've played ancient anguish but I'm sad to say MUD's were sorta on the way out when I got the chance to play them and I wish I could have experienced more especially Dragon's Gate, my mother still raves about the fun she had and misses it dearly to this day.

[@elburrorollerz7741]

Love the videos man! ♥ do you think you could do a long video rewriting fallout 3 n fallout 4 if you had full control of the story, with the only rule being the setting (date and location) being the same? PS not a full script just a brainstorm of how'd you do it differently

[@alchemeron]

Really loving the videos on this channel, and appreciating that you're sharing your experience. Especially enjoying hearing about the early 80's gaming scene and your tabletop stories, and how that influenced your designs. I remember tooling around with MUDs in the 90's and being fascinated but confused by them!

[@mikewaters2126]

I played probably one of the last MUDs ever I assume, in the late 2000s. Well past the dialup era. It was called Godwars 3 and it was stupid deep. This brought back memories.

[@JaymeSplendid]

I played the OG God Wars when that first came out in the 90's and also played the OG Vampire Wars as well. There was MAD drama between the two due to the fact one of the coders of GW went on to make VW with the GW code and there was issues of "stolen" code and a bunch of other stuff. Good times. EDIT Believe it or not, MUDS are still active, tho not nearly as populated as they once where, the GW codebase is still one of the most popular to this day and you will find a few with at least 10+ players on but how much fun can you have with 10 players in a GW mud?

[@leif5046]

I did game development for 6 years, working in three MMOs. Then, I took a 12-year hiatus to work in finance and retail. And now, I'm returning to game development in 2024. Fallout has always been one of my favorite games, and I’ve always been drawn toward text-based games. Thanks for your work and inspiring videos. I’m glad I stumbled upon this video when reminiscing on the early days of online gaming.

[@AphrosAnimation]

I LOVE listening to your videos! You're such a great story teller!

[@somasatori9117]

I played on a ton of MUDs when I was a teenager before moving on to the MU*/MUX scene after I lost my gaming group. The MUD I played the most was one called Iconoclast, an original IP cyberpunk game set a semi-post apocalyptic world where this mega city was under a dome. To be honest, I think it was more of a biopunk game, since the main emphasis was on gene hacking and genetic abnormalities. Anyway, some of the people I met there actually had me do some writing gigs for TTRPGs with them, so you're absolutely right about creativity being where you find it!

[@thiagoaraujosilva2058]

Tim, u'r such a cute guy. Love your lessons :)

[@Dr.JanItor]

Phrase "Moo i say" is in Fallout 2, isn`t it? )))))

[@arseniyshestakov9570]

It was in first game too :-)

[@piotrsamborowski703]

Hi, Tim! Just curious, all your previous videos had autogenerated captions, this one doesn't - did you do something differently this time? Your accent is pretty understandable for non-native English speakers, but captions help when you get more technical. Thanks :)

[@PostapocMedia]

I can't agree more about what you said regarding the sources of inspiration. Best thing is to leave one's brain open to all kinds of things around you. Other arts, nature, literally everything. Also, I've noticed that most interesting things are being created by people who had multiple influences and experiences.

[@mesushi]

Nice t-shirt Tim! It fits your perfectly.

[@sksteele1235]

Runescape was inspired by MUDs. Have you ever played Runescape, Tim?

[@pervognsen_bitwise]

Many of the early MMORPGs were inspired by MUDs and their core teams contained MUD developers. Raph Koster from Ultima Online was recruited directly from LegendMUD. Brad McQuaid from EverQuest played Sojourn and you can see a lot of DikuMUD DNA in EverQuest. Damien Schubert from Meridian 59 worked on CarnageMUD. I remember seeing the box for Meridian 59 in my local computer game store in the 90s and the tag line on the box cover advertised it as "The First-Ever Internet-Based 3D MUD", which immediately caught my eye as a MUD player.

[@sksteele1235]

@Bitwise Very cool, I didn't realize how influential they were. I watched a documentary about the development of RS and the creator discussed them briefly so I was curious if Tim had ever played RS. His stories about the MUD where he was a wizard are wild. It seems like, rather than being limiting, the text format actually gives even more freedom. You have any stories about MUDs you played?

[@DashCat9]

Always happy to see these videos pop up in my feed.

[@TransmentalMe]

This is seriously the best thing to hit KZbin in years and I love that there is just a small group of nerds gathering around Tim and showering him with appreciation. ❤

[@pixelmentia]

I was also hooked on MUDs in my teens. The pvp in them was absolutely brutal--especially if you were playing against a thief. You'd just be hanging out somewhere and then all of a sudden you were "blackjacked", dragged through several areas without being able to see where you were, then you'd wake up in a locked room and get murdered--and the player would then loot your entire corpse. Weeks or even months-worth of equipment and items gone. If you had a higher level buddy or clan you could rally them against the perpetrator, and hopefully get some of your stuff back, but otherwise you were SOL. Taught me a lot about life. Lol

[@gautampressman]

Hi Tim, here are some potential video ideas we'd love to have your thoughts on: 1) What are your thoughts about the big cultural impact Fallout has had on Russia? 2) Your thoughts on the Vault Boy character and artwork. No other game has managed to establish such a distinct identity within a game. 3) And your thoughts on Fallout's spiritual successors such as Atom RPG and passion projects like Olympus 2207, Fallout: Sonora and Fallout: Resurrection. The only reason I know of these Fallout-inspired titles is because of Warlockracy who is keeping the classic Fallout flame alive on KZbin.

[@TwinOpinion]

I was already playing Ultima Online when I discovered MUDS. Even with something like Ultima around, I still popped into MUDS quite a bit for a couple of years. One of my friends even joined a MUD team and I got to see some inner workings behind the veil. Oh my goodness, too much nostalgia this morning!

[@fightingfortruth9806]

Your story brings back my own memories. My dad never made much money so getting a new video game back in the 80s & 90s was maybe annual event at Christmas. Also, paying a sub for an online game was completely out of the question. So MUDs were the only thing I could play back then. I remember this one MUD I played often where I role-played as a thief or robber. I created my own little clan of 5 or 6 other players where we would jump out of the shadows at passing players and make them pay us gold. We had our own little lair in the sewers of this city. At one point we got into a gang war with another local clan. We'd always trash talk each other online when we'd see each other. Such a great time and such great memories. No online game has ever come close since then.

[@onlyluck-777]

Love me some MUDs! I was messing around using an LLM as the backend to create a text based adventure game that is inspired by the MUDs I played in the 90s. You can have real conversations with NPCs and they dynamically create quests.

[@xensan76]

My first "MMO" was a MUD called Medievia. Spent way too long figuring out that typing "c harm on [undead]" was a bad idea.

[@JaymeSplendid]

Man, I used to play the FK out of MUDS back in the 90s! I was a homeless squatter punk around 18 and had this old run down, single story apt block that was abandoned in what was then called the "Student Ghetto" in East Lansing Michigan. The 7 or 8 units where shuttered back in the late 80's but it still had running water but no electric. There was about 6 of us living there. I met this kid who was a student at MSU and introduced me to MUDs and took me to the computer lab that was in the lower floor of the student union, was 24hrs a day Sunday-Thurs and closed at 12am Friday and Sat during school season and closed at 12am during breaks. This was around 94-95. The computer lab as full 1990 Macintosh Classics, one Power Mac and a bunch of Windows 486 machines. You didn't need a login for the Macs but when they updated the PC's you did, but by then I has a slew of logins due to keystroke loggers I'd stick on the macs due to them not doing a fresh reboot when rebooting and everything would be saved if it where turned off. I started on a MERC mud that was bare bones when it came to player selection. You had the common races and only four classes which where Sorcerer, Warrior, Thief and Cleric and the top level was 33 and then you would hit "Immortality" which was very rare and took months of grinding. As an "Imm" you were granted special privileges where you could help out other players as if you were an admin, coder etc but did not have all the abilities they would have. The MUD was called "Evil In The Extreme" and had over 60 players and was a PK optional MUD. When that closed down, I tried to find MUDS that where similar in codebase as I knew how to move around in those and a good chunk of these MUDS has most of the same zones. Some would have the newbie areas like the circus area, some would have Smurf Village, Gnome Village, Dwarven Village, Elemental Canon etc. I moved on to Envy, then Circle, Rom and then RoT. I also played the OG God Wars mud and the OG Vampire Wars MUD where I guess there was some mad drama between the two over "stolen code" or whatever. All of these muds had at least 30-50 players on at all times. In the beginning, I would search for MUDS using Gopher, then as the WEB began to grow larger and larger, moved over to the MUD connector. I miss MUDS so much and got so good on a few of them with PK on the MUDS with the codebase I knew inside and out and had the same themes and NOT 100% original and from the ground up reworked.

[@mr_flava]

Just found out about MUDs about 2 days ago. Currently playing one called "Genesis" and I'm having a blast!!!

[@petemoss3160]

as a gamer born in 1989 i have come full circle to developing MUDs with AI (Evennia with LLM agents) ...also looking at adding more real-time spatial elements so the same engine can work as the server for a 3D client... but the LLM can still interact with the whole world as text, and generate code to customize the world... a player, a NPC, and even a GM.

[@ilmarinen79]

Scheduling creativity reminds me of the sketch where David Lynch is an executive interviewing a comedian (Louis C.K.): "Make me laugh, *go* ! *Go, funny...3...2...1!* "

[@bankbarcomo806]

in college days (~mid-late 1990's) I put up a Circle 3.0 mud which I had intended to fully overhaul into a super-hero theme with RL Earth zones(hoped to get contributions from around the world.) Never got past the starter zone re-skin, which was probably a good thing--my grades sucked enough as it was.

[@allluckyseven]

Tim, your videos have become the highlight of my day.

[@Balyrion]

I got recessed from Michigan State University because I spent all my time in the engineering building playing MUDs on old HPUX machines...Great memories =)

[@chevkoch]

Right now, inspired by your stories, I'm playing Fallout for the first time. Came across that mooing herd a while back, baffled no more.

[@ChristopherZubin]

The Discworld MUD is still the most complete computer gaming experience I've ever had. Nothing else compares.

[@Knellios]

i was rexhelm on discworld!

[@ListerTunes]

Discworld is/was an LPC MUD! I'm happy to have made a small contribution to it many years ago.

[@ChristopherZubin]

LP MUDs were the best, and Discworld was the best of all of them. It was great to be able to interact with the world in English and not Moon-ese. Thank you.@@ListerTunes

[@DarthPaperBoy]

Loved MUDs and MUCKs, so this was great. Especially love learning about the "Moo, I say" origins, since yeah, that's exactly the kind of thing I remember from exploring them. Unfortunately, I think the only one I used to visit that's still up is TinyTIM.

[@alexpetrovich85]

I couldn't tell if you were saying "Raceland" or "Rincewind" (the latter makes more sense for a MUD Wizard).

[@HazyJ28]

Being born in 95, I missed the boat on MUDS and Text Parsers. I am happy I was born the same year as Sony Playstation though.

[@pyre78]

It makes me so sad that I was born after stuff like "MUDs" were super popular, dude. I hear about so many cool things like this and I wish that I had the ability to experience that. I'd also imagine that the ability to become a wizard and code things into the game like this could also be a giant motivation for people to start coding. I wonder how many talented programmers there are out there who got their start because of MUDs.

[@kayzach4108]

They still exist and some have a lot of depth current games lack.

[@pyre78]

@@kayzach4108 Where would I be able to find them? o:

[@howdoilogin]

MUD didn't stand for Multiple User Dungeon. It stood for Multiple Undergraduate Destroyer. Because those things were only ever available on campus Arpanet and only during low hours like 1 AM in the morning.

[@lenorkhide2873]

You actually used the ARPANET?? Gah! How have you touched all these cool things, AND I've only heard about in school (as a 35 year old)

[@joeymcjoeysalot6596]

Dope shirt.

[@AncientSlugThrower]

I was a big CircleROM fanboy. I bet Tim would have been a MUSH player too. Did anyone else here play Desolation? I think it was an LP base that was set in the Wasteland universe.

[@grappydingus]

One of my buddies still plays LambdaMOO, occasionally, I wander on... but I was more of a BBS door game guy.

[@SpaceSkeletonDragon]

I used to waste a LOT of my free time on a MUD called Malevolence. Last I checked it's still running, although rarely visited by anyone these days apparently.

[@WyattsVlog]

Recently found the channel and have been watching your videos. Funny you made one about this. Like many on here, I played some many many years ago. I always find myself going back to them to code. Coding one again now. Fred Mountain sounds pretty neat. Sounds like many MUD stories I bet we all have.

[@BENOTAFRAID689]

I lost my virginity in HS to a 26 yo woman from Singapore in a MUD. Good times.

[@delerak]

This is great to see more MUD content in general, especially from someone of your caliber in game design. I try to make as much MUD content as I can on my channel.

[@LordEvilmancer]

My work life balance is I got to work and then I go home and then like can muster like 30 minutes-a couple of hours of anything creative work and then it's repeat until I'm too exhausted and burnt out until I can't even do anything. That's if I have time and don't have to like make dinner or run errands

[@drakmon123]

Hi Tim, just wanted to ask you what your thoughts of speedrunning in games from someone who has worked on so many games & the new life from a new perspective speedrunning can bring to older games.

[@willrun4fun]

My second college roommate in the mid 90s flunked out of college because of MUDs.

[@nundulan]

I played a MUD that traumatized me called HELL, only time I ever played a MUD lol

[@Malifixia]

My high school days were spent sneaking onto the telnet client on the school's computers and MUDding during study hall. Lots of hours grinding in the sewers killing rats. Met lots of great people from all corners of the world.

[@SeasoningTheObese]

I will continue to laugh at "suck" and "spew" in any context forever.

[@desertdweller9548]

MUDs were and still are a blast. Nothing since has felt the same.

[@12gagebastis]

hy Tim silly question, would you consult or lead a team doing another fallout game in the modern era? whether it be obsidian or Bethesda or and independent studio?

[@LilxJohn85]

It's so true that inspiration will come at all random times. That's the nice thing about the 'creative' field is that inspiration will hit you at anytime, and you're either I got to go try this idea out or jot it down before you forget.

[@Hibashira007]

Diku on elof checking in! Damn, that’s a nice stroll down memory lane!

[@Parker8752]

I miss muds; I played around with them in the early 2000s.

[@kayzach4108]

I grew up past the heyday of muds, But there are a lot that still exist to this day that have around 60 ish players. Some have a lot of depth that other games lack.

[@cmmmmmmmw]

I love this channel so much. Thank you Tim!

[@goop_lord]

This kind of virtual world is overdue for a comeback, IMO. Text-based game design has seen a lot of innovation in the last twenty years.

[@tsg5787]

Dwarf fortressss for asciiii

[@weenis2876]

they never left. check out awakened worlds or torchship if youre looking to play on new and fresh MUD communities

[@chukmasneeyed8871]

I keep laughing at the idea of this humorless guy named Lucifer

[@jabberw0k812]

Weeeiiird, I'm literally right in the middle of the eighth Amber book right now (for the third time).

[@stacksmalacks8826]

Story time with uncle Tim is the best part of the day

[@ian2714]

Ah so that's why the cows are in fallout, it's a random event.

[@arseniyshestakov9570]

Okay. now we know where "Moo, I say" come from in Brahmin Herd .

[@zerpblerd5966]

my friend Dave was a HUGE batMUD player

[@alexpetrovich85]

"Are you Sara Connor..." 🔫☄️🙄 😆😂🤣

[@calebszyszkiewicz719]

Do you still play DnD?

[@worldstoodstill]

He's too busy. I already asked. 😢

[@ThomasTDlrk]

I can't wait to start coding again for my mud

[@tyronos]

I spent an unhealthy amount of time in MUDs, right around when Fallout came out!

[@RippoZer0]

0:37 What is Zork? I think you overestimate us

[@weenis2876]

that fact about the brahmin was super good

[@mystwerks]

I still play muds despite being college aged, they are quite fun

[@weenis2876]

same! what games do you play?

[@mystwerks]

@@weenis2876 Torchship and Awakemud CE. I have played others in the past but these two are my main haunts. Also trying Silent Haven.

[@weenis2876]

@@mystwerks haha, i just started a character on torchship. one of my friends is a dev 😏 i played a rigger on awakened worlds last year, it was so much fun! maybe you know my friend who plays noelle on there, idk if she does anymore. keep the game alive friend :)

[@mystwerks]

@@weenis2876 She shows up occasionally, seen her two or three times in Awake on Mal. Might have interacted with her more on TS if shes been playing that lol, Im active on both the discord/ooc communities aswell

[@00oKMo00]

There are still MUDs and MUX out there 😅

[@KarasawaL30]

Everquest has forever cemented itself in my mind as a wellspring of inspiration.

[@1sweetree]

Thanks for another awesome video, Tim.

[@OMentertainment]

I really miss playing MUDs