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The idea of the current game is to score 300,000 points, to solve some
"quests", run through zones
and become a wizard. Points are scored for dropping treasure into the
sacrificial pit at the Temple of Paradise, or the one at the Village
Church. Points can also be scored for killing both mobiles and players
who have chosen to become player
killers.
Please look around and stop by the MUD to say "Hi!" You
can reach Atrocity MUD by telnet-ing to:
telnet://atrocitymud.org:6715
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A brief history
Although Atrocity Mud was set up back in 1997, it was not opened to the
public in any capacity until early 1998, after the worst of the bugs
inherited with the codebase had been eradicated. There then followed
nearly another year of tinkering, tweaking, enhancing and further
bug-fixing before the the gameplay reached anything vaguely resembling
what exists today.
We now have a truly unique codebase, with only a few areas of code
closely resembling the C-Dirt code that we started with. A new codebase,
built from the ground up, is in the pipeline - details of this will
appear elsewhere on this site at a later date.
Our primary objective in building the world of Atrocity has always been
to create a varied, challenging and above all fun gaming environment.
Key features of the MUD that have taken us further in this direction
are:
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Robustness and Continuity. There's little more frustrating
than completing half a quest or collecting a pile of treasure, only
to have it taken away from you because the software underpinning the
world just couldn't cope. In recognition of this, any known bug that
may cause the MUD to crash receives the highest priority until it is
fixed. ALL newly developed code is tested before being built into
the main server and unleashed on the public. On those occasions when
a bug does slip through the net, we have more complex code than most
MUDs to deal with such an eventuality and ensure that the MUD will
restart with the world in an identical state whenever that is at all
possible.
-
Combat System. We are constantly striving to reach the
perfect balance, across all classes, of challenge without irksome
frustration or irksome repetitiveness. Our physical combat is more
realistic than on many MUDs and we try to ensure that all our spells
and skills have a unique twist that may make each one particularly
useful in some situations.
-
Continuous Object Regeneration (COR). We don't think you
should have to wait until the whole world is reset before you can
attempt a quest. We were one of the first quest-based MUDs to
implement an "autoreset" system (based on Asylum's). There are
still occasions when the core code changes in such a fundamental
way that a complete reset is necessary, but we hope one day to
restrict these occasions to a total server failure (the optimum
without using hardware redundancy).
-
Dynamic Quest Status. With other players running around
with quest-critical items and others resetting to their former
positions, the quest status list is crucial for checking on whether
a particular quest is available for an attempt. Atrocity's Quest
Status updates in real time, so you can be confident when marching
off to attempt a quest that you won't suddenly discover too late
that some crucial aspect has been broken by another player.
-
Fluid Immortality. Whilst your first long-term goal on
Atrocity will be to accumulate enough points and complete enough
quests to become a wizard, that needn't be an end to your
character's running. Wizards may defrob to mortality at any time
and, as long as they keep sufficient points, return to base and
refrob to immortality later. This could be just for the fun of
running, or to complete more quests in order to achieve a higher
level of immortality on refrobbing. With each level of immortality
comes extra privileges.
-
Player Killer System. Some people want to kill each other,
other would prefer to focus their violent attentions on the less
sentient characters. At Atrocity, we let you take the choice.
Player Killers can kill other Player Killers for substantial reward,
though the risks are greater too. It is in recognition of the
latter that only Player Killers can attain the highest level of
player immortality.
Finally, we're not about to rest on our laurels. There will always be
something to improve and therefore we will always be improving something!
The ultimate goal is a fully realised world without removing the fun
borne of the fantasy.
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