Best MUDs in 2023

[PapaPetro]

Any Gemstone IV or Dragonrealms players around that can tell me how those MUDs are holding up?
I played the shit out of GS3 back in the AOL days before graphical MMOs sucked all the air out of the scene. Ah the good old days as I went by "Shuricain"...
Good memories.
Improved my typing skills.

I played GS3 in the AOL days. It was lots of fun then but I suspect it would fall short of expectations today. I can't speak for DR but from what I've heard about GS4 you might be better off with the good memories.

There's a reddit but is seems almost abandoned which might provide another clue about the communities overall health. Or maybe everyone just migrated to discord.

From what I've gleaned so far, the meta-gameplay is just purely scripted at this point with Lich.
So people just run their suite of scripts and go AFK while their characters automatically "Hunt" and rest for Exp gain.
Kills the RP nature of the game; chance encounters with others while hunting an area and striking up a conversation while resting at a safe node. I remember when being a lvl 20 Lord/Lady was a big deal. Now they go past lvl 100+ and it's just arbitrary big numbers now.
What's the point of having cool flavorfully written gear if no one notices you exist as they bot around with scripting?

I checked Discord. It's a ghostville.
People are "playing" the game, but not really playing the game.
It's a simulation of playing a MUD through your scripted bot.

 

[massifist]

Now they go past lvl 100+ and it's just arbitrary big numbers now.

That's crazy! I've never been a huge fan of periodic game resets but it doesn't
seem healthy for a game to keep dragging on forever. They're probably just
milking whales out of money at this point.

 

[cretin]

HellMOO has been closed down but it spiritually lives on in InfernoMOO

inferno.optiquest.org
port 7777

Decent playerbase at the moment, on average 20 something players, more on weekends. Its functionally identical to hellmoo but some of the content has been revised for the better and for the worse and there's been an overhaul in a few systems like armor.

If you're unaware of what hellmoo was/is, it's a heavily fallout inspired moo that was notorious for its edgy content and fun PVP related shenanigans.

 

[Levenmouth]

If you're unaware of what hellmoo was/is, it's a heavily fallout inspired moo that was notorious for its edgy content and fun PVP related shenanigans.

It's much closer to Postal with porn mechanics than to Fallout tbh. Cool that isn't not dead though. The one MUD that would genuinely benefit from SSH yo.

 

[SamS816]

HellMOO has been closed down but it spiritually lives on in InfernoMOO

inferno.optiquest.org
port 7777

Decent playerbase at the moment, on average 20 something players, more on weekends. Its functionally identical to hellmoo but some of the content has been revised for the better and for the worse and there's been an overhaul in a few systems like armor.

If you're unaware of what hellmoo was/is, it's a heavily fallout inspired moo that was notorious for its edgy content and fun PVP related shenanigans.

Right now it's split between InfernoMOO and SamsaraMOO.

Inferno has been going for years I think. Recently this year SamsaraMOO opened up and is averaging around 25 - 30 players, it's based off the old 2012 fork of HellCore, has a few of the older players hanging out on it as well, it's in a soft launch state at the moment and hasn't been openly advertised but I'm hoping it picks up in popularity.

https://middry.neocities.org/samsara

moo.samsara-moo.com
port 7999

 

[cretin]

HellMOO has been closed down but it spiritually lives on in InfernoMOO

inferno.optiquest.org
port 7777

Decent playerbase at the moment, on average 20 something players, more on weekends. Its functionally identical to hellmoo but some of the content has been revised for the better and for the worse and there's been an overhaul in a few systems like armor.

If you're unaware of what hellmoo was/is, it's a heavily fallout inspired moo that was notorious for its edgy content and fun PVP related shenanigans.

Right now it's split between InfernoMOO and SamsaraMOO.

Inferno has been going for years I think. Recently this year SamsaraMOO opened up and is averaging around 25 - 30 players, it's based off the old 2012 fork of HellCore, has a few of the older players hanging out on it as well, it's in a soft launch state at the moment and hasn't been openly advertised but I'm hoping it picks up in popularity.

https://middry.neocities.org/samsara

moo.samsara-moo.com
port 7999

Is this full pvp or carebear style opt in PVP that presided over hellmoo's worst and final years?

 

[SamS816]

HellMOO has been closed down but it spiritually lives on in InfernoMOO

inferno.optiquest.org
port 7777

Decent playerbase at the moment, on average 20 something players, more on weekends. Its functionally identical to hellmoo but some of the content has been revised for the better and for the worse and there's been an overhaul in a few systems like armor.

If you're unaware of what hellmoo was/is, it's a heavily fallout inspired moo that was notorious for its edgy content and fun PVP related shenanigans.

Right now it's split between InfernoMOO and SamsaraMOO.

Inferno has been going for years I think. Recently this year SamsaraMOO opened up and is averaging around 25 - 30 players, it's based off the old 2012 fork of HellCore, has a few of the older players hanging out on it as well, it's in a soft launch state at the moment and hasn't been openly advertised but I'm hoping it picks up in popularity.

https://middry.neocities.org/samsara

moo.samsara-moo.com
port 7999

Is this full pvp or carebear style opt in PVP that presided over hellmoo's worst and final years?

Sadly (in some cases) it's the latter of the two, with PVP being an opt in thing. However, they have made it at least possible for PVP and PVE players to both be in the same corp, which is a nice change. There's a few new mutations and a couple new areas I believe too, the grinding is present with no adjustments to XP gain, they've included the easylearn system with something called tutoring which is essentially the same thing. I'd give it a try if you want something chill, community tends to be a bit more relaxed as well, they're trying to approach things from a different angle. PVP doesn't seem to be the main focus.

I played a lot during the 2011 - 2013 period, I do miss the risk of being fucked up and ganked, breaking into apartments and stealing peoples shit, that stuff was fun to me and some of my best times on Hell, I'm just hoping Gilmore, Spunky and the others decide to bring it back up, though I'm doubting it the longer it's offline. I'm wondering where the (b)admins decided to move on to, and if they're still doing work on MUD's, if something new is being worked on? I remember a brief period when Hell went down and was temporarily replaced with one set in space? It wasn't wayfar, I can't remember the name of it, I don't know if that one is still going either. Anyway, I'm on Samsara, I hope it picks up to a consistent 50 - 70 players, but I'm probably dreaming. We'll see!